“The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it. Power is what all messiahs really seek: not the chance to serve. This is true even of the pious brethren who carry the… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind — that its modest and greatly overestimated services on the ethical side have been more than overcome by the damage it has done to clear and honest thinking.… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“Suffice it to say that the vile arts of the hussy prevailed over that noble and upright man—that she enticed him, by adroit appeals… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“I can't recall a single masculine figure created by a woman who is not, at bottom, a booby.” — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“If there had been any formidable body of cannibals in the country he [Harry Truman] would have promised to provide them with free missionaries,… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“I have seen something of the horrors of war, and much too much of the worse horrors of peace.” — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“Don’t tell me. I have been there. No longer ago than last Tuesday—or was it last Monday?—I went into one of those big restaurants… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“ONE OF the most irrational of all the conventions of modern society is the one to the effect that religious opinions should be respected.… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“But though every normal man thus cherishes the soothing unction that he is the intellectual superior of all women, and particularly of his wife,… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“If the average man is made in God's image, then a man such as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God, and so… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“The American moron’s mind simply does not run in that direction; he wants to keep his Ford, even at the cost of losing the… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“Once I ventured the guess that men worked in response to a vague inner urge for self-expression. But that was probably a shaky theory,… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
“He writes the worst English that I have ever encountered. It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered… — H.L. Mencken Copy Share Image
![“If there had been any formidable body of cannibals in the country he [Harry Truman] would have promised to provide them with free missionaries, fattened at the taxpayers’ expense.” quote by H.L. Mencken](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/3e7/h-l-mencken-2-5374_quote_if-there-had-been-any-formidable-body-of_142631.jpg)
