1,045 Quotes by H. L. Mencken

That it should still be necessary, at this late stage in the senility of the human race to argue that women have a fine and fluent intelligence is surely an eloquent proof of the defective observation, incurable prejudice, and general imbecility of their lords and masters.

Public opinion, in its raw state, gushes out in the immemorial form of the mob's fear. It is piped into central factories, and there it is flavored and colored, and put into cans.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

It is not the drinker, but the man who has just stopped drinking, who thinks the world is going to the dogs.

Looking for an honest politician is like looking for an ethical burglar.

I hate all sports as rabidly as a person who likes sports hates common sense.

On the one side was bigotry, ignorance, hatred, superstition, every sort of blackness that the human mind is capable of. On the other side was sense.

Some immemorial imbecilities have been added deliberately, on the ground that it is just as interesting to note how foolish men have been as to note how wise they have been.

The way for newspapers to meet the competition of radio and television is simply to get out better papers.