"The essence of a sound style is that……" — H. L. Mencken
"The essence of a sound style is that it cannot be reduced to rules-that it is a living and breathing thing with something of the devilish in it-that it fits its proprietor tightly yet ever so loosely, as his skin fits him. It is, in fact, quite as seriously an integral part of him as that skin is. . . . In brief, a style is always the outward and visible symbol of a man, and cannot be anything else."
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H. L. Mencken
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647 Quotes by H. L. Mencken
H. L. Mencken has 647 quotes on this site.
A few more worth reading:
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A man full of faith is simply one who has lost the capacity for clear and realistic thought.
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Religion deserves no more respect than a pile of garbage.
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When I die, I shall be content to vanish into nothingness.... No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever…
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People say we need religion when what they really mean is we need police.
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Everyman is thoroughly happy twice in his life, just after he has met his first love, and just after he…
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Well, I tell you, if I have been wrong in my agnosticism, when I die I'll walk up to God…
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The Old Testament, as everyone who has looked into it is aware, drips with blood; there is, indeed, no more…
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Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in their readiness to doubt.
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To every complex question there is a simple answer and it is wrong...
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The average man never really thinks from end to end of his life. The mental activity of such people is…
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I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind - that its modest and greatly overestimated services…
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Goverment is actually the worst failure of civilized man. There has never been a really good one, and even those…
See all 647 quotes by H. L. Mencken »
More Anything Else Quotes
This quote is filed under Anything Else Quotes,
one of 1,558 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
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I knew from the age of 16 that I wanted to be a writer because I just didn't think I…
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A poet is, before anything else, a person who is passionately in love with language.
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A tremendous number of people in America work very hard at something that bores them. Even a rich man thinks…
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I think I hate cynicism more than anything else. It's the curse of our age, and I want to avoid…
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Your only obligation in any lifetime is to be true to yourself. Being true to anyone else or anything else…
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Love him and let him love you. Do you think anything else under heaven really matters?
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What you think means more than anything else in your life. More than what you earn, more than where you…
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No man, however strong, can serve ten years as schoolmaster, priest, or Senator, and remain fit for anything else.
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You know, when you get your first asparagus, or your first acorn squash, or your first really good tomato of…
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I give everything I have to give on the screen. I feel I don't owe the public anything else.
— Emmanuelle Beart
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Rest until you feel like playing, then play until you feel like resting, period. Never do anything else.
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