When fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.
H. L. MENCKENEvery normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.
More H. L. Mencken Quotes
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Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.
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It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man.
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Free speech is too dangerous to a democracy to be permitted.
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In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican.
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On one issue, at least, men and women agree. They both distrust women.
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A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.
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Once a woman passes a certain point in intelligence she finds it almost impossible to get a husband: she simply cannot go on listening without snickering.
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The kind of man who demands that government enforce his ideas is always the kind whose ideas are idiotic.
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The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it is true because he gets pleasure out of it.
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The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed a standard citizenry, to put down dissent and originality.
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It is the classic fallacy of our time that a moron run through a university and decorated with a Ph.D. will thereby cease to be a moron.
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The central belief of every moron is that he is the victim of a mysterious conspiracy against his common rights and true deserts.
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There are two kinds of Europeans: The smart ones, and those who stayed behind.
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A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married.
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The theory seems to be that as long as a man is a failure he is one of God’s children, but that as soon as he succeeds he is taken over by the Devil.
H. L. MENCKEN