The most common of all follies is to believe in the palpably untrue. — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
The first kiss is stolen by the man; the last is begged by the woman. — H. L. Mencken First kiss Copy Share Image
Let's not burn the universities yet. After all, the damage they do might be worse. — H. L. Mencken Damage Copy Share Image
One may no more live in the world without picking up the moral prejudices of the world than one will be able… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
Morality is the theory that every human act must be either right or wrong, and that 99 % of them are wrong. — H. L. Mencken Character Copy Share Image
Liberty and democracy are eternal enemies, and every one knows it who has ever given any sober reflection to the matter. — H. L. Mencken Democracy Copy Share Image
A skeptic as to all ideas, including especially my own, I have never suffered a pang when the ideas of some other… — H. L. Mencken Envy Copy Share Image
I roll out of my couch every morning with the more agreeable expectations. — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
What the meaning of human life may be I don't know: I incline to suspect that it has none. — H. L. Mencken Human life Copy Share Image
Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. — H. L. Mencken Common people Copy Share Image
Some immemorial imbecilities have been added deliberately, on the ground that it is just as interesting to note how foolish men have… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
The worst government is the most moral. One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane. But when fanatics are on… — H. L. Mencken Fanatics Copy Share Image
The American people, taking one with another, constitute the most timorous, snivelling, poltroonish, ignominious mob of serfs and goosesteppers ever gathered under… — H. L. Mencken Age Copy Share Image
The wholly manly man lacks the wit necessary to give objective form to his soaring and secret dreams, and the wholly womanly… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
Every reader of the Dreiser novels must cherish astounding specimens--of awkward, platitudinous marginalia, of whole scenes spoiled by bad writing, of phrases… — H. L. Mencken American literature Copy Share Image
Love, to the inferior man, remains almost wholly a physical matter. The heroine he most admires is the one who offers the… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
It is not materialism that is the chief curse of the world, as pastors teach, but idealism. Men get into trouble by… — H. L. Mencken Curse Copy Share Image
The fundamental trouble with marriage is that it shakes a man's confidence in himself, and so greatly diminishes his general competence and… — H. L. Mencken Battle Copy Share Image
I believe there is a limit beyond which free speech cannot go, but it's a limit that's very seldom mentioned. It's the… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
It is the invariable habit of bureaucracies, at all times and everywhere, to assume...that every citizen is a criminal. Their one apparent… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
Life without sex might be safer but it would be unbearably dull. It is the sex instinct which makes women seem beautiful,… — H. L. Mencken Beautiful Copy Share Image
I know a good many men of great learning-that is, men born with an extraordinary eagerness and capacity to acquire knowledge. One… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
To the best of my knowledge and belief, the average American newspaper, even of the so-called better sort, is not only quite… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
Some time ago a publisher told me that there are four kinds of books that seldom, if ever, lose money in the… — H. L. Mencken Book Copy Share Image
The human race is divided into two sharply differentiated and mutually antagonistic classes: a smal l minority that plays with ideas and… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
When a candidate for public office faces the voters he does not face men of sense; he faces a mob of men… — H. L. Mencken Copy Share Image
Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under. — H. L. Mencken Ashamed Copy Share Image
Wife: one who is sorry she did it, but would undoubtedly do it again. — H. L. Mencken Inspirational Copy Share Image
