1,045 Quotes by H. L. Mencken

Popularity – The capacity for listening sympathetically when men boast of their wives and women complain of their husbands.

Have you ever watched a crab on the shore crawling backward in search of the Atlantic Ocean, and missing? That’s the way the mind of man operates.

The difference between the smartest dog and the stupidest man – say a Tennessee Holy Roller – is really very small.

Wealth – any income that is at least one hundred dollars more a year than the income of one’s wife’s sister’s husband.

The dying man doesn’t struggle much and he isn’t much afraid. As his alkalies give out he succumbs to a blest stupidity. His mindfogs. His will power vanishes. He submits decently. He scarcely gives a damn.

It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him.

Osteopath – One who argues that all human ills are caused by the pressure of hard bone upon soft tissue. The proof of his theory isto be found in the heads of those who believe it.

The capacity of human beings to bore one another seems to be vastly greater than that of any other animal.

I never lecture, not because I am shy or a bad speaker, but simply because I detest the sort of people who go to lectures and don’t want to meet them.