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.
H. L. MENCKENThe urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.
More H. L. Mencken Quotes
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For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
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A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married.
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Free speech is too dangerous to a democracy to be permitted.
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Imagine the Creator as a low comedian, and at once the world becomes explicable.
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The ideal way to get rid of any infectious disease would be to shoot instantly every person who comes down with it.
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If a politician found he had cannibals among his constituents, he would promise them missionaries for dinner.
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There are two impossibilities in life: “just one drink” and “an honest politician.”
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Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
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Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule—and both commonly succeed, and are right.
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A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers.
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Sometimes the idiots outvote the sensible people.
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On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
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What men value in this world is not rights but privileges.
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On one issue, at least, men and women agree. They both distrust women.
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Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.
H. L. MENCKEN






