Mark Twain Quotes (1103 Quotes)

To create man was a quaint and original idea, but to add the sheep was tautology

All say, 'How hard it is that we have to die' - a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.

It is hard enough luck being a monarch, without being a target also

I have criticized absent people so often, and then discovered, to my humiliation, that I was talking with their relatives, that I have grown superstitious about that sort of thing and dropped it.

What is the difference between a taxidermist and a tax collector? The taxidermist takes only your skin.

There is no salvation for us but to adopt Civilization and lift ourselves down to its level.

I am opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me the position.

Human pride is not worthwhile there is always something lying in wait to take the wind out of it.

Be careless in your dress if you will, but keep a tidy soul.

Thousands of geniuses live and die undiscovered - either by themselves or by others.

A conspiracy is nothing but a secret agreement of a number of men for the pursuance of policies which they dare not admit in public.

An Englishman is a person who does things because they have been done before. An American is a person who does things because they haven't been done before.

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.

Ideally a book would have no order to it, and the reader would have to discover his own.

For England must not fall it would mean an inundation of Russian and German political degradations which would envelop the globe and steep it in a sort of Middle-Age night and slaverly which would last till Christ comes again--which I hope he will n

Civilizations proceed from the heart rather than from the head.

When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet in his private heart no man much respects himself.

(Twain on Cain) it was his misfortune to live in a dark age that knew not the beneficent Insanity Plea

I am not one of those who in expressing opinions confine themselves to facts.

It's a great place to live, but I wouldn't want to visit there

Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thought that is forever flowing through one's head.

Travel has no longer any charm for me. I have seen all the foreign countries I want to except for heaven and hell, and I have only a vague curiosity as concerns one of those.

Let us swear while we may, for in heaven it will not be allowed

I am a border ruffian from the State of Missouri,I am a Connecticut Yankee by adoption.In me you have Missouri morals,Connecticut culturethis gentlemaen,is the combination which makes the perfect man

Public opinion is held in reverence. It settles everything. Some think it is the voice of God.

If readers recognized that he was an ass, unaware of his own stupidity, ''your work will be a triumph.

The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.

The more things are forbidden, the more popular they become.

In writing, I shall always confine myself strictly to the truth, except when it is attended with inconvenience.

There is more real pleasure to be gotten out of a malicious act, where your heart is in it, than out of thirty acts of a nobler sort.

If you should rear a duck in the heart of the Sahara, no doubt it would swim if you brought it to the Nile.

When a man's dog turns against him it is time for a wife to pack her trunk and go home to mama.

The Bible has noble poetry in it and some clever fables and some blood-drenched history and a wealth of obscenity and upwards of a thousand lies.

In statesmanship get the formalities right, never mind about the moralities.

A man cannot be uncomfortable without his own approval.

Surgeons and anatomists see no beautiful women in all their lives, but only a ghastly stack of bones with Latin names to them, and a network of nerves and muscles and tissues inflamed by disease.

The report of my death is exaggerated.

I can't do literary work for the rest of this year because I'm meditating another lawsuit and looking around for a defendant

History is strewn thick with evidence that a truth is not hard to kill, but a lie, well told, is immortal.

Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.

The universal brotherhood of man is our most precious possession, what there is of it

The true Southern watermelon is a boon apart, and not to be mentioned with commoner things. It is chief of this world's luxuries, king by the grace of God over all the fruits of the earth. When one has tasted it, he knows what the angels eat. It was not a Southern watermelon that Eve took we know it because she repented.

Earn a character first if you can. And if you can't, assume one.

Never let formal education get in the way of your learning.

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.

Who is this Renaissance Where did he come from Who gave him permission to cram the Republic with his execrable daubs.

An occasional compliment is necessary to keep up one's self-respect

The most difficult We do not deal in facts when we are contemplating ourselves.

Life should begin with age and its privileges and accumulations, and end with youth and its capacity to splendidly enjoy such advantages.

It is discouraging to try and penetrate a mind like yours. You ought to get it out and dance on it. That would take some of the rigidity out of it.