H. L. Mencken Quotes - Page 31

• Poetry is a comforting piece of fiction set to more or less lascivious music.

  H. L. Mencken

  Comforting, Fiction, Pieces

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.449, Vintage

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

  H. L. Mencken

  Sad, God, Long Distance Relationship

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.189, Knopf

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• Of government, at least in democratic states, it may be said briefly that it is an agency engaged wholesale, and as a matter of solemn duty, in the performance of acts which all self-respecting individuals refrain from as a matter of common decency.

  H. L. Mencken

  Freedom, Agency, Government

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• The art of writing, like the art of love, runs all the way from a kind of routine hard to distinguish from piling bricks to a kind of frenzy closely related to delirium tremens.

  H. L. Mencken

  Running, Art, Writing

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.27, Knopf

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• The notion that anything is gained by fixing a language in a groove is cherished only by pedants.

  H. L. Mencken

  Fixing, Pedants, Language

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “American Language”, p.607, Knopf

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• I drink exactly as much as I want, and one drink more.

  H. L. Mencken

  Drinking, Alcohol, Want

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• A government at bottom is nothing more than a group of men, and as a practical matter most of them are inferior men. ... Yet these nonentities, by the intellectual laziness of men in general ... are generally obeyed as a matter of duty (and) assumed to have a kind of wisdom that is superior to ordinary wisdom.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, Intellectual, Groups

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.69, Knopf

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• A prohibitionist is the sort of man one couldn't care to drink with, even if he drank.

  H. L. Mencken

  Drinking, Food, Men

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• A man always blames the woman who fools him. In the same way he blames the door he walks into in the dark.

  H. L. Mencken

  Funny Inspirational, Dark, Men

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.620, Vintage

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• The lunatic fringe wags the underdog.

  H. L. Mencken

  Inspirational, Funny, Underdog

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.622, Vintage

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• The most valuable of all human possessions, next to a superior and disdainful air, is the reputation of being well-to-do.

  H. L. Mencken

  Funny, Life, Success

  H. L. Mencken, Marion Elizabeth Rodgers (2010). “H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series”, Hubsta Ltd

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• The formula of the argument is simple and familiar: to dispose of a problem all that is necessary is to deny that it exists.

  H. L. Mencken

  Simple, Argument, Problem

  H. L. Mencken, Marion Elizabeth Rodgers (2010). “H.L. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series”, Hubsta Ltd

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• Any defeat, however trivial, may be fatal to a savior of the plain people. They never admire a messiah with a bloody nose.

  H. L. Mencken

  People, Noses, May

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• The scent of frying astronomers long ago ceased to ascend to Yahweh.

  H. L. Mencken

  Long Ago, Atheism, Yahweh

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• 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 flavoured and colored and put into cans.

  H. L. Mencken

  Public Opinion, Factories, States

  "Notes on Democracy". Book by H. L. Mencken, 1926.

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• Whenever I write anything that sets up controversy its meaning is distorted almost instantly. Even the editorial writers of newspapers seem to be unable to understand the plainest sentence.

  H. L. Mencken

  Writing, Newspapers, Controversy

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• Truth - Something somehow discreditable to someone.

  H. L. Mencken

  Freedom, Democracy

  "A Mencken Chrestomathy". Book by H. L. Mencken, 1949.

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• I know of no American who starts from a higher level of aspiration than the journalist. . . . He plans to be both an artist and a moralist -- a master of lovely words and merchant of sound ideas. He ends, commonly, as the most depressing jackass of his community -- that is, if his career goes on to what is called a success.

  H. L. Mencken

  Depressing, Artist, Careers

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• Jealousy is the theory that some other fellow has just as little taste.

  H. L. Mencken

  Jealous, Littles, Taste

  "A Mencken Chrestomathy". Book by H. L. Mencken, 1949.

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• A great literature is thus chiefly the product of doubting and inquiring minds in revolt against the immovable certainties of the nation.

  H. L. Mencken

  Mind, Literature, Inquiring

  "Prejudices Second Series".

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

  H. L. Mencken

  Marriage, Husband, Men

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• I have little belief in human progress. The human race is incurably idiotic. It will never be happy.

  H. L. Mencken

  Race, Progress, Littles

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• No romantic novel ever written in America, by man or woman, is one half so beautiful as My Ántonia.

  H. L. Mencken

  Beautiful, Men, America

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• I believe in only one thing and that thing is human liberty.

  H. L. Mencken

  Believe, Liberty, Humans

  "Letters of H. L. Mencken". Book by Guy J. Forgue, 1961.

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

  H. L. Mencken

  Dog, Men, Differences

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.412, Knopf

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