Mark Twain quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Mark Twain

Mark Twain Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Mark Twain on Wise Famous Quotes.

The human race was always interesting and we know by its past that it will always continue so, monotonously.

Let us consider that we are all insane. It will explain us to each other. It will unriddle many riddles

One must travel, to learn. Every day, now, old Scriptural phrases that never possessed any significance for me before, take to themselves a meaning.

The man who is ostentatious of his modesty is twin to the statue that wears a fig-leaf.

Truth is neither alive nor dead; it just aggravates itself all the time ...

A good and wholesome thing is a little harmless fun in this world; it tones a body up and keeps him human and prevents him from souring.

Cherimoya, the most delicious fruit known to men.

Always do what's right. That will gratify some and surprise the rest.

Do not tell fish stories where the people know you; but particularly, don't tell them where they know the fish.

All you need is ignorance and confidence and the success is sure.

Stripping away the irrational, the illogical, and the impossible, I am left with atheism. I can live with that.

Why is it that, among men, physical courage is a trait so plenteous yet moral courage is a trait so rare?

Slade had to kill several men - some say three, others say four, and others six - but the world was the richer for their loss.

One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.

It is not worth while to try to keep history from repeating itself, for man's character will always make the preventing of the repetitions impossible.

Hi-YI! YOU'RE up a stump, ain't you!

He had only one vanity; he thought he could give advice better than any other person.

College is a place where a professor's lecture notes go straight to the students' lecture notes, without passing through the brains of either.

You can't reason someone out of something that they weren't reasoned into in the first place.

You cannot surprise an individual more than twice with the same marvel

Denial is much more then an Egyptian River.

Death is to life as heaven is to hell they're both dependent on each other

If the world ends, I'll just head on down to Kentucky because they're always 20 years behind.

Explore. Dream. Discover.

People who do not read have no advantage over those who can not read.

We like a man to come right out and say what he thinks- if we agree with him.

There have been innumerable Temporary Seekers after the Truth-have you ever heard of a permanent one?

If the man doesn't believe as we do, we say he is a crank, and that settles it. I mean, it does nowadays, because now we can't burn him.

Who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it?

There's a good spot tucked away somewhere in everybody. You'll be a long time finding it, sometimes.

Men write many fine and plausible arguments in support of monarchy, but the fact remains that where every man has a voice, brutal laws are impossible

Talent without work is useless, thank God

To do good is noble. To tell others to do good is even nobler and much less trouble.

These are sad days in literature. Homer is dead. Shakespeare is dead. And I myself am not feeling at all well.

All people have had ill luck, but Jairus's daughter and Lazarus had the worst.

Humor must not professedly teach and it must not professedly preach, but it must do both if it would live forever.

Don't use a five-dollar word when a fifty-cent word will do.

A conspiracy is nothing but a secret agreement of a number of men for the pursuance of policies which they dare not admit in public

Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.

Dance like nobody's looking.

Eschew surplusage.

There ain't no harm in a hound, nohow.

The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next.

Buy land, they're not making it anymore.

The difference between those that succeed and those that fail is, those that succeeded tried.

The way it is now, the asylums can hold the sane people, but if we tried to shut up the insane we should run out of building materials.

My axiom is, to succeed in business: avoid my example.

Spare the rod and spile the child, as the Good Book says. I'm a laying up sin and suffering for us both,

Everything has its limit - iron ore cannot be educated into gold.

They say that you can't live by bread alone, but I can live on compliments.

My advice to girls: first, don't smoke - to excess; second, don't drink - to excess; third, don't marry - to excess.

Be good and you will be lonely.

Children have but little charity for each other's defects.

Braveness is resistance to concern, mastery of panic - not absense of anxiety.

Whatever you say, say it with conviction

Ours is a terrible religion. The fleets of the world could swim in spacious comfort in the innocent blood it has spilt.

April 1. This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four.

Conservatism is the blind and fear-filled worship of dead radicals.

There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind-the humorous.

I was born modest, but it didn't last.

Methuselah lived to be 969 years old . You boys and girls will see more in the next fifty years than Methuselah saw in his whole lifetime.

We can't always have the beautiful aspect of things. Let us make the most of our sights that are beautiful and let the others go

What would men be without women? Scarce, sir ... mighty scarce.

I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.

I hate editors, for they make me abandon a lot of perfectly good English words.

Humorists of the 'mere' sort cannot survive. Humor is only a fragrance, a decoration.

I'm merely running some errands. This is now off the record.

Everybody's private motto: It's better to be popular than right.

In statesmanship get formalities right, never mind about the moralities.

A well put together unreality is pretty hard to beat.

To be vested with enormous authority is a fine thing; but to have the on-looking world consent to it is finer.

I did not attend his funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

India has two million gods, and worships them all. In religion all other countries are paupers; India is the only millionaire.

Figures don't lie, but liars figure.

I've experienced a great deal of pain and suffering in my life ... most of which has never happened.

Every person is a book, each year a chapter,

Learning softeneth the heart and breedeth gentleness and charity.

Who knows, he may grow up to be President someday, unless they hang him first!
Aunt Polly about Tom Sawyer

You cannot trust your eyes, if your imagination is out of focus.

You can't reason with your heart; it has its own laws, and thumps about things which the intellect scorns.

All of us contain Music & Truth, but most of us can't get it out.

Except a person be part coward, it is not a compliment to say he is brave.

Honesty: The best of all the lost arts.

Golf is a good walk spoiled.

No one is willing to acknowledge a fault in himself when a more agreeable motive can be found for the estrangement of his acquaintances.

A few fly bites cannot stop a spirited horse.

All say, 'how hard it is that we have to die' -- a strange complaint to come from the mouths of those who have had to live.

An honest man in politics shines more there than he would elsewhere.
- A Tramp Abroad

There are two reasons why anybody buys anything. The real reason, and the reason they give you.

The trouble is not in dying for a friend, but in finding a friend worth dying for.

I wonder how much it would take to buy a soap bubble, if there were only one in the world.

It is hard enough luck being a monarch, without being a target also.

We are all ignorant; just about different things.

The truth is, a person's memory has no more sense that his conscience, and no appreciation whatever of values and proportions.

The worst loneliness is not to be comfortable with yourself.

Loose and forbear!

During the gold rush its a good time to be in the pick and shovel business

Switzerland would me a mighty big place if it were ironed flat.

The ignorant are afraid to betray surprise or admiration ... they think it ill manners.

Grown people everywhere are always likely to cling to the religion they were brought up in.