Quotes by Twain, Mark

"A good memory and a tongue tied in the middle is a combination which gives immortality to conversation."

Twain, Mark on conversation   

"Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear -- not absence of fear."

Twain, Mark on courage
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"It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world, and moral courage so rare."

Twain, Mark on courage
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"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."

Twain, Mark on courage
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"The human race is a race of cowards; and I am not only marching in that procession, but carrying a banner."

Twain, Mark on war   

"There are several good protections against temptation, but the surest is cowardice."

Twain, Mark on war
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"Why was the human race created? Or at least why wasn't something creditable created in place of it? God had His opportunity. He could have made a reputation. But no, He must commit this grotesque folly -- a lark which must have cost Him a regret or two when He came to think it over and observe effects."

Twain, Mark on creation   

"Man was made at the end of the week's work when God was tired."

Twain, Mark on creativity
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"Beautiful credit! The foundation of modern society. Who shall say that this is not the golden age of mutual trust, of unlimited reliance upon human promises? That is a peculiar condition of society which enables a whole nation to instantly recognize point and meaning in the familiar newspaper anecdote, which puts into the mouth of a distinguished speculator in lands and mines this remark: -- I wasn't worth a cent two years ago, and now I owe two millions of dollars."

Twain, Mark on credit   

"A crime persevered in a thousand centuries ceases to be a crime, and becomes a virtue. This is the law of custom, and custom supersedes all other forms of law."

Twain, Mark on crime and criminals   

"The public is the only critic whose opinion is worth anything at all."

Twain, Mark on criticism   

"Often, the less there is to justify a traditional custom, the harder it is to get rid of it."

Twain, Mark on custom   

"Sacred cows make the best hamburger."

Twain, Mark on customers   

"By law of periodical repetition, everything which has happened once must happen again and again -- and not capriciously, but at regular periods, and each thing in its own period, not another's and each obeying its own law."

Twain, Mark on cycles   

"On with dance, let joy be unconfined, is my motto; whether there's any dance to dance or any joy to unconfined."

Twain, Mark on dance and dancing
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"The people of those foreign countries are very, very ignorant. They looked curiously at the costumes we had brought from the wilds of America. They observed that we talked loudly at table sometimes. They noticed that we looked out for expenses and got what we conveniently could out of a franc, and wondered where in the mischief we came from. In Paris they just simply opened their eyes and stared when we spoke to them in French! We never did succeed in making those idiots understand their own language. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in itand stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid againand that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large mattertis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"Say the report is exaggerated. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"A jay hasnt got any more principle than a Congressman. A jay will lie, a jay will steal, a jay will deceive, a jay will betray; and four times out of five, a jay will go back on his solemnest promise. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"To my mind Judas Iscariot was nothing but a low, mean, premature Congressman. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"I think I can say, and say with pride, that we have some legislatures that bring higher prices than any in the world. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"When you have prayed for victory you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victorymust follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God the Father fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battlebe Thou near them! With themin spiritwe also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with anavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied itfor our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"The teacher reminded us that Romes liberties were not auctioned off in a day, but were bought slowly, gradually, furtively, little by little; first with a little corn and oil for the exceedingly poor and wretched, later with corn and oil for voters who were not quite so poor, later still with corn and oil for pretty much every man that had a vote to sellexactly our own history over again. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"Of all Gods creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the lash. That one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"By his father he is English, by his mother he is Americanto my mind the blend which makes the perfect man. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"So I became a newspaperman. I hated to do it but I couldnt find honest employment. "

Twain, Mark on uncategorised   

"It ain't so much what we know that gets us into trouble. It's what we know that just ain't so."

Twain, Mark on   

"History may not repeat itself, but it does rhyme a lot"

Twain, Mark on history
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"It is terrible to speak well and be wrong. Mark Twain"

Twain, Mark on   

"Put your eggs in one basket - and watch that basket."

Twain, Mark on