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Mark Twain

220 quotes

“I haven't a particle of confidence in a man who has no redeeming petty vices whatsoever.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1865 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Answers to Correspondents", The Californian, 17 June 1865. Anthologized in The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, and Other Sketches (1867)
“I'll risk forty dollars that he can outjump any frog in Calaveras county.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1865 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"; first published as "Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog" in the New York Saturday Press, 18 November 1865; revised by the author and reprinted the following month in The Cal…
“I don't see no p'ints about that frog that's any better'n any other frog.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1865 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" (1865)
“He was ignorant of the commonest accomplishments of youth. He could not even lie.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1867 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Brief Biographical Sketch of George Washington", The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, and Other Sketches (1867), ed. John Paul
“I have seen Chinamen abused and maltreated in all the mean, cowardly ways possible to the invention of a degraded nature, but I never saw a policeman interfere in the matter and I never saw a Chinaman righted in a court of justice for wrongs thus done him.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1868 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Treaty With China", article in The New York Tribune, (August 28, 1868). Quoted in Mark Twain's Letters, volume ii, p. 239
“Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1867 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Facts Concerning the Recent Resignation", described by the author as written about 1867, first published in Mark Twain's Sketches, New and Old‎ (1875)
“Tomorrow night I appear for the first time before a Boston audience — 4000 critics.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1869 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Pamela Clemens Moffet, 9 November 1869, in Albert Bigelow Paine, Mark Twain's Letters: Arranged with Comment (1917), Vol. 1, p. 168
“He is now fast rising from affluence to poverty.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1869 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Rev. Henry Ward Beecher's Farm" (1869), anthologized in Mark Twain's Sketches (1872)
“Ah, it was worth ten years of a man’s life to be dead then! Everything was pleasant. I was in a good neighbourhood, for all the dead people that lived near me belonged to the best families in the city.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1872 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A Curious Dream", in Mark Twain’s Sketches, Selected and Revised by the Author (London: George Routledge & Sons, 1872) p. 308
“Barring that natural expression of villainy which we all have, the man looked honest enough.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1870 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A Mysterious Visit", Buffalo Express, 19 March 1870. Anthologized in Mark Twain's Sketches, New and Old‎ (1875)
“Formerly, if you killed a man, it was possible that you were insane—but now, if you, having friends and money, kill a man, it is evidence that you are a lunatic.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1870 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A New Crime", first published as "The New Crime" in the Buffalo Express, 16 April 1870. Anthologized in Mark Twain's Sketches, New and Old‎ (1875).
“Is not this insanity plea becoming rather common? Is it not so common that the reader confidently expects to see it offered in every criminal case that comes before the courts? [...] Really, what we want now, is not laws against crime, but a law against insanity.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1870 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A New Crime" (1870)
“It [the press] has scoffed at religion till it has made scoffing popular. It has defended official criminals, on party pretexts, until it has created a United States Senate whose members are incapable of determining what crime against law and the dignity of their own body is—they are so morally blind—and it has made light of dishonesty till we have as a result a Congress which contracts to work for a certain sum and then deliberately steals additional wages out of the public pocket and is pained and surprised that anybody should worry about a little thing like that.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1873 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: License of the Press", an address before the Monday Evening Club, Hartford (1873)
“Benjamin Franklin did a great many notable things for his country, and made her young name to be honored in many lands as the mother of such a son. It is not the idea of this memoir to ignore that or cover it up. No; the simple idea of it is to snub those pretentious maxims of his, which he worked up with a great show of originality out of truisms that had become wearisome platitudes as early as the dispersion from Babel.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1875 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Late Benjamin Franklin", The Galaxy, Vol. 10, No. 1, July 1870Anthologized in [http://books.google.com/books?id=5LcIAAAAQAAJ Mark Twain's Sketches, New and Old‎ (1875)
“This poor little one-horse town.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1875 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Undertaker's Chat", first published as "A Reminiscence of the Back Settlements" in The Galaxy, Vol. 10, No. 5, November 1870Anthologized in [http://books.google.com/books?id=5LcIAAAAQAAJ Mark Twain's Sketches, New a…
“A baby is an inestimable blessing and bother.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1876 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Annie Moffett Webster (1 September 1876)
“The funniest things are the forbidden.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1879 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Notebook 18 (February–September 1879)" in Mark Twain's Notebooks & Journals, Vol. 2 (1975), ed. Frederick Anderson, , p. 304
“We haven't all had the good fortune to be ladies; we haven't all been generals, or poets, or statesmen; but when the toast works down to the babies, we stand on common ground.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1879 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Answering a toast, "To the Babies," at a banquet in honor of General U.S. Grant (November 14, 1879).
“Among the three or four million cradles now rocking in the land are some which this nation would preserve for ages as sacred things, if we could know which ones they are.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1879 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To the Babies" (14 November 1879)
“Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1881 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Draft manuscript (c.1881), quoted by Albert Bigelow Paine in Mark Twain: A Biography (1912), p. 724
“Be respectful to your superiors, if you have any.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1882 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Advice to Youth", speech to The Saturday Morning Club, Boston, 15 April 1882. Mark Twain Speaking (1976), ed. Paul Fatout, p. 169
“When the doctrine of allegiance to party can utterly up-end a man's moral constitution and make a temporary fool of him besides, what excuse are you going to offer for preaching it, teaching it, extending it, perpetuating it? Shall you say, the best good of the country demands allegiance to party? Shall you also say it demands that a man kick his truth and his conscience into the gutter, and become a mouthing lunatic, besides?”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1884 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Consistency", paper read at the Hartford Monday Evening Club on 5 December 1887. The Complete Essays of Mark Twain, p. 582 (First published in the 1923 edition of Mark Twain's Speeches, ed. Albert Bigelow Paine, pp. 120…
“Loyalty to petrified opinions never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul in this world — and never will.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Consistency" (5 December 1887). This quote is engraved on Twain's bust in the National Hall of Fame
“He [George Washington Cable] has taught me to abhor and detest the Sabbath day and hunt up new and troublesome ways to dishonor it.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1885 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to William Dean Howells, 27 February 1885, in Albert Bigelow Paine, Mark Twain's letters: Arranged with Comment (1917), Vol. 2, p. 450
“An experienced, industrious, ambitious, and often quite picturesque liar.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1898 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Private History of a Campaign That Failed", The Century, Vol. 31, No. 2, December 1885Anthologized in [http://books.google.com/books?id=1T00Sc_cVYIC The American Claimant, and Other Stories and Sketches (1898)
“It does look as if Massachusetts were in a fair way to embarrass me with kindnesses this year. In the first place, a Massachusetts judge has just decided in open court that a Boston publisher may sell, not only his own property in a free and unfettered way, but also may as freely sell property which does not belong to him but to me; property which he has not bought and which I have not sold. Under this ruling I am now advertising that judge's homestead for sale, and, if I make as good a sum out of it as I expect, I shall go on and sell out the rest of his property.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1885 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter of acceptance of membership to Concord Free Trade Club (March 28, 1885): Mark Twain, his life and work: a biographical sketch (1892), William Montgomery Clemens, Clemens Pub. Co.
“As I slowly grow wise I briskly grow cautious.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1901 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: English as She Is Taught", The Century, Vol. 33, No. 6, April 1887A slightly abridged version was reprinted as [http://books.google.com/books?id=CxIuAAAAYAAJ&pg=PR11 Introduction to Caroline B. Le Row, English as She Is…
“A circle is a round straight line with a hole in the middle.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) said by 1910 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then Success is sure.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Mark Twain's Notebook, 1887
“The kingly office is entitled to no respect; it was originally procured by the highwayman’s methods; it remains a perpetuated crime, can never be anything but the symbol of a crime. It is not more entitled to respect than is the flag of a pirate. A monarch, (whether good or bad), when good, is entitled to the consideration which we accord to a pirate who keeps Sunday school between crimes; when bad, (or a nullity) he is entleed [sic] to none at all.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1883 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From notebook 28 (July 1888–May 1889), as cited in Mark Twain's Notebooks & Journals Volume III 1883–1891, Berkeley & London: University of California Press, 1979, p. 399
“The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter—'tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1888 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to George Bainton, 15 October 1888, solicited for and printed in George Bainton, The Art of Authorship: Literary Reminiscences, Methods of Work, and Advice to Young Beginners (1890), pp. 87–88.
“The other night the view appeared even more surprising and picturesque. On the other side (of Lake Como) cliffs, trees and very white houses reflected their perfectly clear images on the lake and long beams of light, coming from distant windows, marked the motionless surface. Immediately next to it, great silver mansions under the moon shone among a thick dark and shapeless foliage, among the shadows that fell from the top of the cliffs and touched the lake edge where every stretch of the magical vision was reflected several times and with precision.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1872 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Mark Twain, Cites in The innocents abroad, John Camden Hotten, Londra, 1872
“Weather is a literary specialty, and no untrained hand can turn out a good article on it.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1892 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The American Claimant, foreword (1892)
“I am opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me the position.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1892 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: American Claimant (1892)
“If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1894 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Notebook entry, January or February 1894, Mark Twain's Notebook, ed. Albert Bigelow Paine (1935), p. 240
“James Ross Clemens, a cousin of mine, was seriously ill two or three weeks ago in London, but is well now. The report of my illness grew out of his illness; the report of my death was an exaggeration.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1897 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: From a note Twain wrote in London on May 31, 1897 to reporter Frank Marshall White: Shelley Fisher Fishkin, Lighting Out For the Territory : Reflections on Mark Twain and American Culture (Oxford University Press, 1996)…
“A round man cannot be expected to fit in a square hole right away. He must have time to modify his shape.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1897 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: More Tramps Abroad (1897)
“[Citing a familiar "American joke":] In Boston they ask, How much does he know? In New York, How much is he worth? In Philadelphia, Who were his parents?”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1897 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us?", in How to Tell a Story and Other Essays (1897)
“Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our hardnesses yield, all our irritations and resentments flit away and a sunny spirit takes their place.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1897 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us?" (1897)
“Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1899 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in "An Interview with Mark Twain", From Sea to Sea: Letters of Travel (1899) by Rudyard Kipling, Ch. 37, p. 180
“I was sorry to have my name mentioned as one of the great authors, because they have a sad habit of dying off. Chaucer is dead, Spencer is dead, so is Milton, so is Shakespeare, and I'm not feeling so well myself.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1899 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech to the Savage Club, 9 June 1899, in Mark Twain's Speeches (1910), ed. William Dean Howells, pp. 277–278. (Possibly fabricated from a paraphrase in Aaron Watson, The Savage Club: a Medley of History, Anecdote, and…
“He had only one vanity; he thought he could give advice better than any other person.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg", ch. I, in The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays (1900)
“There is nothing in the world like a persuasive speech to fuddle the mental apparatus and upset the convictions and debauch the emotions of an audience not practised in the tricks and delusions of oratory.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg", ch. III, in The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays (1900)
“It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people [the Filipinos] free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: New York Herald, October 15, 1900, quoted in A Pen Warmed Up In Hell:Mark Twain in Protest, edited by Frederick Anderson, Harper & Row, 1979
“Definition of a classic — something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoting or paraphrasing a Professor Winchester in "Disappearance of Literature", speech at the Nineteenth Century Club, New York, 20 November 1900, in Mark Twain's Speeches (1910), ed. William Dean Howells, p. 194
“We believe that out of the public school grows the greatness of a nation.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Address at a meeting of the Berkeley Lyceum, New York, November 23, 1900. Quoted in Mark Twain's Speeches (1910), ed. William Dean Howells, p. 146 (The speech is titled "Public Education Association" in that book, but a…
“The silent colossal National Lie that is the support and confederate of all the tyrannies and shams and inequalities and unfairnesses that afflict the peoples — that is the one to throw bricks and sermons at.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1900 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: My First Lie, and How I Got Out of It", in The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays (1900)
“Your race, in its poverty, has unquestionably one really effective weapon—laughter. Power, Money, Persuasion, Supplication, Persecution—these can lift at a colossal humbug,—push it a little—crowd it a little—weaken it a little, century by century: but only Laughter can blow it to rags and atoms at a blast. Against the assault of Laughter nothing can stand.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1897 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Chronicle of Young Satan" (ca. 1897–1900, unfinished), published posthumously in Mark Twain's Mysterious Stranger Manuscripts (1969), ed. William Merriam Gibson (pp. 165–166 in the 2005 paperback printing, )
“Whose property is my body? Probably mine. I so regard it. If I experiment with it, who must be answerable? I, not the State. If I choose injudiciously, does the State die? Oh no.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1901 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Osteopathy" (1901), in Mark Twain's Speeches, p. 253
“...[H]eaven for climate, Hell for society.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) first seen 1901 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech to the Acorn Society (1901)