Sayings & Quotes

[Lilith7]

"The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin."

"I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it."

"There is one notable thing about our Christianity: bad, bloody, merciless, money-grabbing, and predatory. The invention of hell measured by our Christianity of today, bad as it is, hypocritical as it is, empty and hollow as it is, neither the deity nor his son is a Christian, nor qualified for that moderately high place. Ours is a terrible religion. The fleets of the world could swim in spacious comfort in the innocent blood it has spilled."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot."



"When even the brightest mind in our world has been trained up from childhood in a superstition of any kind, it will never be possible for that mind, in its maturity, to examine sincerely, dispassionately, and conscientiously any evidence or any circumstance which shall seem to cast a doubt upon the validity of that superstition. I doubt if I could do it myself."



"There isn't a foot of land in the world which doesn't represent the ousting and re-ousting of a long line of successive "owners" who each in turn, as "patriots" with proud swelling hearts defended it against the next gang of "robbers" who came to steal it and did -- and became swelling-hearted patriots in their turn."


"Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

'Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.'


"The less a man knows the bigger the noise he makes and the higher the salary he commands.”

“Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.”


"Man is a religious animal. He is the only religious animal. He is the only animal that has the 'True Religion' - several of them! He is the only animal that loves his neighbour as himself but cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven.."



Of all the animals, man is the only one that is cruel. He is the only one that inflicts pain for the pleasure of doing it...

"It is just like man's vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions...
The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot."
I am not interested to know whether experimentation produces results that are profitable to the human race or doesn't...The pain which it inflicts upon unconsenting animals is the basis of my enmity toward it, and it is to me sufficient justification of the enmity without looking further...
In studying the traits and dispositions of the so-called lower animals, and contrasting them with man's, I find the result humiliating to me."

"The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be left out in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste."

Mark Twain (1835-1910).

[Lilith7]

"Of all the animals, man is the only one that is cruel. He is the only one that inflicts pain for the pleasure of doing it."


"It is just like man's vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions."

"The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot."

"I am not interested to know whether experimentation produces results that are profitable to the human race or doesn't."

"The pain which it inflicts upon unconsenting animals is the basis of my enmity toward it, and it is to me sufficient justification of the enmity without looking further."

"In studying the traits and dispositions of the so-called lower animals, and contrasting them with man's, I find the result humiliating to me. "

"Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"Faith is believing what you know ain't so."

"The tragedy of old age is not that one is old but one is young."

'Anyone who stops learning is old, whether twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing you can do is keep your mind young.'


"I have been through some terrible things in my life some of which actually happened."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

War Prayer
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle -- be Thou near them! With them -- in spirit -- we 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 unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with 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 it -- for 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. '


"Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual."


“If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you; that is the principal difference between a dog and a man.”
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"Go to heaven for the climate, hell for the company."

"Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.”

“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure. ”

“Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.”

“God created war so that Americans would learn geography.”

Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education."


"Reality can be beaten with enough imagination."

“When your friends begin to flatter you on how young you look,
it’s a sure sign you’re getting old.”

"Only kings, presidents, editors, and people with tapeworms have the right to use the editorial "we."


"I was sorry to hear my name mentioned as one of the great authors, because they have a sad habit of dying off. Chaucer is dead, so is Milton, so is Shakespeare, and I am not feeling very well myself."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

“When the rich rob the poor its called business, When the poor rob the rich it is called violence”

“A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”

“Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.”

“Few things are harder to put up with than a good example.”

Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"An honest man in politics shines more there than he would elsewhere."

"Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer."

"I have a higher & grander standard than George Washington. He could not lie. I can, but I won’t."


"A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain."


In honour of Mark Twain's birthday, here's a piece of writing advice from a letter he wrote to a student named D.W. Bowser:
"I notice that you use plain, simple language, short words and brief sentences. That is the way to write English—it is the modern way and the best way. Stick to it; don't let fluff and flowers and verbosity creep in. When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them—then the rest will be valuable. They weaken when they are close together. They give strength when they are wide apart. An adjective habit, or a wordy, diffuse, flowery habit, once fastened upon a person, is as hard to get rid of as any other vice."
Mark Twain

[Lilith7]

"Normality is a paved road: It’s comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow on it “


“I would rather die of passion than of boredom. “

“Art is to console those who are broken by life. “

“I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it. “

Vincent Van Gogh

[Lilith7]

“If you truly love nature, you will find beauty everywhere. “

“I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart. “

“Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together “


“What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything? “


“I often think that the night is more alive and more richly colored than the day “

Vincent Van Gogh

[Lilith7]

“I put my heart and soul into my work, and I have lost my mind in the process. “

“A great fire burns within me, but no one stops to warm themselves at it, and passers-by only see a wisp of smoke “

“I don't know anything with certainty, but seeing the stars makes me dream.”

“I dream my painting and I paint my dream. “
Vincent van Gogh

[Lilith7]

“There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people “

“Be clearly aware of the stars and infinity on high. Then life seems almost enchanted after all “

“Your profession is not what brings home your weekly paycheck, your orofession is what you're put on earth to do, with such passion & intensity that it becomes spiritual in calling.”
Vincent Van Gogh

[Lilith7]

"The old believe everything. The middle aged suspect everything. The young know everything."

"I can resist everything except temptation."


"Keep love in your heart. A life without it is like a sunless garden when the flowers are dead"

"Be yourself. Everyone else is already taken."

"Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much."
Oscar Wilde

[Lilith7]

"America had often been discovered before Columbus, but it had always been hushed up."

"Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination."

"Arguments are to be avoided; they are always vulgar and often convincing."

"Biography lends to death a new terror."

"Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months."

"I think that God in creating Man somewhat overestimated his ability."

"If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you."

Oscar Wilde

[Lilith7]

"To recommend thrift to the poor is both grotesque & insulting. It is like advising a man who is starving to eat less."

"I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying."

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go."

"There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."

"To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all."

Oscar Wilde

[Lilith7]

"The only difference between the saint and the sinner is that every saint has a past, and every saint has a future."

"I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best."

"To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance."

"The only thing to do with good advice is to pass it on. It is never of any use to oneself."

“What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing”

"It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it."
Oscar Wilde

[Lilith7]

"There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written.


“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.”


“There are only two tragedies in life. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.”


“The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young.“


"You never knowingly do something for the last time without a certain sadness of the heart."
Oscar Wilde

[Lilith7]

“I wonder now how the foreign policies of the United States would look if we wiped out the national boundaries of the world, at least in our minds, & thought of all children everywhere as our own. Then we could never drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima or napalm on Vietnam, or wage war anywhere, because wars, especially in our time, are always wars against children, indeed our children.”
Howard Zinn, A people's history of the United States.