1,045 Quotes by H. L. Mencken

Judge: a law student who marks his own examination-papers.

The other day a dog peed on me. A bad sign.

There is always a sheet of paper. There is always a pen. There is always a way out.

A dull, dark, depressing day in Winter: the whole world looks like a Methodist church at Wednesday night prayer meeting.

The average man gets his living by such depressing devices that boredom becomes a sort of natural state to him.

The verdict of a jury is the a priori opinion of that juror who smokes the worst cigars.

The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth. Liberty is not a thing for the great masses of men. It is the exclusive possession of a small and disreputable minority, like knowledge, courage and honor. It takes a special sort of man to understand and enjoy liberty - and he is usually an outlaw in democratic societies.

What chiefly distinguishes the daily press is its incurable fear of ideas, its constant effort to evade the discussion of fundamentals by translating all issues into a few elemental fears, its incessant reduction of all reflection to mere emotion.

The doctrine that the cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy is like saying that the cure of crime is more crime.