Quotes from Mark Twain

There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

Each time in fiction or in history I meet a well-defined personality I am personally interested in him, for we know each other already, because we met on the river.

I felt like the Last Man, neglected of the judgment, and left pinnacled in mid-heaven, a forgotten relic of a vanished world.

These coins are not very valuable. Jack went out to get a napoleon changed, so as to have money suited to the general cheapness of things, and came back and said he had swamped the bank, had bought eleven quarts of coin, and the head of the firm had gone on the street to negotiate for the balance of the change. I bought nearly half a pint of their money for a shilling myself. I am not proud on account of having so much money, though. I care nothing for wealth.

Oh, go to bed! Dan said that, and went away. Oh, yes, it's all very well to say go to bed when a man makes an argument which another man can't answer.

the easiest way to get along in life is to not cause too many quarrels

There is no such thing as the Queen's English. The property has gone into the hands of a joint stock company and we own the bulk of the shares!

Now, then, that is the tale. Some of it is true.

Gäbe es die letzte Minute nicht, so würde niemals etwas fertig.

Oprost je miris koji ljubi?ica ostavi na stopalu koje ju je zdrobilo.

We had a notion to get out and join the sixty soldiers, but upon reflecting that there were four hundred of the Indians, we concluded to go on and join the Indians.

Almost every convert runs the risk of catching our civilization... I compassionate missionary, leave China! come home and convert these Christians!

If you have nothing to say, say nothing.

La gentillesse est le langage qu'un sourd peut entendre et une aveugle peut voir

The Southern heart is too impulsive; Southern hospitality is too lavish with the stranger. - The Spirit of Tennessee Journalism

Nothing incites to money-crimes like great poverty or great wealth. - More Maxims of Mark, Johnson, 1927

Had I never loved, I never would have been unhappy; but I turn to Him who can save, and if His wisdom does not will my expected union, I know He will give me strength to bear my lot.

I have never wished a man dead, but I have read some obituaries with great pleasure. -

His hair was short and parted accurately in the middle, and he had all the look of an American person who would be likely to begin his signature with an initial, and spell his middle name out.

There are basically two types of people. People who accomplish things, and people who claim to have accomplished things. The first group is less crowded.

The statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception.

How blind and unreasoning and arbitrary are some of the laws of nature - the most of them, in fact!

Some people scorn a cat and think it not an essential; but the Clemens tribe are not of these.

Presently a serpent sought them out privately, and came to them walking upright, which was the way of serpents in those days. The serpent said the forbidden fruit would store their vacant minds with knowledge. So they ate it, which was quite natural, for man is so made that he eagerly wants to know; whereas the priest, like God, whose imitator and representative he is, has made it his business from the beginning to keep him from knowing any useful thing.