Quotes from H. L. Mencken

The great achievement of liberal Protestantism was to make God boring.

Jury - A group of 12 people, who, having lied to the judge about their health, hearing, and business engagements, have failed to fool him.

The thing constantly overlooked by those hopefuls who talk about abolishing war is that it is by no means an evidence of decay but rather a proof of health and vigor.

There is no record in the history of a nation that ever gained anything valuable by being unable to defend itself.

It is inaccurate to say that I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency. This makes me forever ineligible for public office.

Well, I tell you, if I have been wrong in my agnosticism, when I die I'll walk up to God in a manly way and say, Sir, I made an honest mistake.

Honor is simply the morality of superior men.

Kant was probably the worst writer ever heard of on earth before Karl Marx. Some of his ideas were really quite simple, but he always managed to make them seem unintelligible. I hope he is in Hell.

A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.

The common argument that crime is caused by poverty is a kind of slander on the poor.

A church is a place in which gentlemen who have never been to Heaven brag about it to persons who will never get there.

Economic independence is the foundation of the only sort of freedom worth a damn

There is always a well-known solution to every human problem - neat, plausible, and wrong.

I go on working for the same reason that a hen goes on laying eggs.

Have you ever watched a crab on the shore crawling backward in search of the Atlantic Ocean, and missing? That's the way the mind of man operates.

All talk of winning the people by appealing to their intelligence, of conquering them by impeccable syllogism, is so much moonshine.

There's no underestimating the intelligence of the American public.

At eight or nine, I suppose intelligence is no more than a small spot of light on the floor of a large and murky room.

The Catholic clergy seldom bother to make their arguments plausible; it is plain that they have little respect for human intelligence, and indeed little belief in its existence.

Jealousy is a keen observer, but looks for all the wrong signs.

The only cure for contempt is counter-contempt.

It doesn't take a majority to make a rebellion; it takes only a few determined leaders and a sound cause.

Morality is doing what is right, no matter what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told, no matter what is right.

Democracy is also a form of worship. It is the worship of Jackals by Jackasses.