The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it makes a better soup.
Happiness is the china shop; love is the bull.
Conscience is the inner voice that warns us somebody may be looking.
If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some sinner and wink your eye at some homely girl.
A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.
Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.
Truth would quickly cease to be stranger than fiction, once we got as used to it.
I know some who are constantly drunk on books as other men are drunk on whiskey.
Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.