H. L. Mencken Quotes - Page 14

• In the main, there are two sorts of books: those that no one reads and those that no one ought to read.

  H. L. Mencken

  Funny, Book, Reading

  "A little book in C major".

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• Theology is the effort to explain the unknowable in terms of the not worth knowing.

  H. L. Mencken

  Knowing, Effort, Literature

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• Women hate revolutions and revolutionists. They like men who are docile, and well-regarded at the bank, and never late at meals.

  H. L. Mencken

  Hate, Men, Meals

  H. L. Mencken (1924). “Prejudices Fourth Series”

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• The only way for a reporter to look at a politician is down.

  H. L. Mencken

  Looks, Way, Politician

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• No government is ever really in favor of so-called civil rights. It always tries to whittle them down. They are preserved under all governments, insofar as they survive at all, by special classes of fanatics, often highly dubious.

  H. L. Mencken

  Rights, Government, Class

  "Minority Report: H.L. Mencken's Notebooks". Book by H. L. Mencken (p. 33), 1956.

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• A man is called a good fellow for doing things which, if done by a woman, would land her in a lunatic asylum.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, Land, Done

  A Little Book in C Major ch. 3 (1916)

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• War will never cease until babies begin to come into the world with larger cerebrums and smaller adrenal glands.

  H. L. Mencken

  Baby, Peace, War

  'Minority Report'. Collected in Notebooks (1956).

  68 Copy quote

• There is only one justification for having sinned, and that is to be glad of it.

  H. L. Mencken

  Religion, Liberty, Morality

  "A little book in C major".

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• Pastor: One employed by the wicked to prove to them by his example that virtue doesn't pay.

  H. L. Mencken

  Wicked, Example, Pay

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• New York: A third-rate Babylon.

  H. L. Mencken

  New York, Babylon, Rate

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• The argument that capital punishment degrades the state is moonshine, for if that were true then it would degrade the state to send men to war... The state, in truth, is degraded in its very nature: a few butcheries cannot do it any further damage.

  H. L. Mencken

  Freedom, War, Men

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• Communism, like any other revealed religion, is largely made up of prophecies. When they fail to come off its clergy simply say that they will be realized later on. Thus, if we have another boom, they will argue that the collapse of capitalism is only postponed. The fact that the greatest booms ever heard of followed Marx's formal prophecy of the downfall of capitalism is already forgotten, just as millions have long since forgotten the early Christian prophecy that the end of the world was at hand. The first Christians accepted postponements as docilely as the Communists of today.

  H. L. Mencken

  Christian, Hands, Long

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.277, Knopf

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• The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line.

  H. L. Mencken

  Life, Spiritual, War

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.131, Vintage

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• For me to go into politics would be like sending a virgin into a house of ill-repute.

  H. L. Mencken

  House, Would Be, Ill

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• God is the immemorial refuge of the incompetent, the helpless, and the miserable. They find not only sanctuary in his arms, but also a kind of superiority, soothing to their macerated egos; he will set them above their betters.

  H. L. Mencken

  Ego, Sanctuary, Arms

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• I confess I enjoy democracy immensely. It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing.

  H. L. Mencken

  Democracy, Amusing, Enjoy

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.168, Vintage

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• Not by accident, you may be sure, do the Christian Scriptures make the father of knowledge a serpent - slimy, sneaking and abominable.

  H. L. Mencken

  Christian, Father, Thinking

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• There are two kinds of Europeans: The smart ones, and those who stayed behind.

  H. L. Mencken

  Smart, Two, Kind

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• The mistake that is made always runs the other way. Because the plain people are able to speak and understand, and even, in many cases, to read and write, it is assumed that they have ideas in their heads, and an appetite for more. This assumption is a folly.

  H. L. Mencken

  Running, Mistake, Writing

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• A national political campaign is better than the best circus ever heard of, with a mass baptism and a couple of hangings thrown in.

  H. L. Mencken

  Couple, Political, Baptism

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• You come into the world with nothing, and the purpose of your life is to make something out of nothing.

  H. L. Mencken

  Life, Change, Wisdom

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• Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable.... A man full of faith is simply one who has lost (or never had) the capacity for clear and realistic thought. He is not a mere ass: he is actually ill.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, May, Belief

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.11, Vintage

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• If what I may believe - about gall-stones, the Constitution, castor oil, or God - is conditioned by law, then I am not a free man.

  H. L. Mencken

  Believe, Men, Law

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.344, Vintage

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• It is the dull man who is always sure, and the sure man who is always dull.

  H. L. Mencken

  Faith, Men, Dull

  H.L. Mencken (1920). “Prejudices Second Series”

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• There are two kinds of music; German music and bad music.

  H. L. Mencken

  Funny, Music, Humorous

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