H. L. Mencken ( 10 of 103 )
All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not read more
All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them.
Remorse is regret that one waited so long to do it.
Remorse is regret that one waited so long to do it.
We suffer most when the White House busts with ideas.
We suffer most when the White House busts with ideas.
Any man who inflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.
Any man who inflicts the human race with ideas must be prepared to see them misunderstood.
The human race is divided into two sharply differentiated and mutually antagonistic classes, almost two genera- a small minority that read more
The human race is divided into two sharply differentiated and mutually antagonistic classes, almost two genera- a small minority that plays with ideas and is capable of taking them in, and a vast majority that finds them painful, and is thus arrayed against them, and against all who have traffic with them. The intellectual heritage of the race belongs to the minority, and to the minority only. The majority has no more to do with it than it has to do with ecclesiastic politics on Mars. In so far as that heritage is apprehended, it is viewed with enmity. But in the main it is not apprehended at all.
Demagogue: one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.
Demagogue: one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.
It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is read more
It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics, though she is still forbidden to resort to physics or chemistry.
Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt.
Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt.
Bachelors have consciences, married men have wives.
Bachelors have consciences, married men have wives.
All government, in its essence, is organized exploitation, and in virtually all of its existing forms it is the implacable read more
All government, in its essence, is organized exploitation, and in virtually all of its existing forms it is the implacable enemy of every industrious and well-disposed man.
