No one in this world, so far as I know – and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me – has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.
H. L. MENCKENAn idealist is one who, on noticing that roses smell better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup.
More H. L. Mencken Quotes
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Misogynist: A man who hates women as much as women hate one another.
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When somebody says it’s not about the money, it’s about the money.
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The best teacher is not the one who knows most but the one who is most capable of reducing knowledge to that simple compound of the obvious and wonderful.
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The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. Put it in his hand and it’s good-bye to the Bill of Rights.
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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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Morality is doing what is right, no matter what you are told. Religion is doing what you are told, no matter what is right.
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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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Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.
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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.
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It is even harder for the average ape to believe that he has descended from man.
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All government, in its essence, is a conspiracy against the superior man: its one permanent object is to oppress him and cripple him.
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Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods.
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The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth.
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Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
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Socialist: A man suffering from an overwhelming conviction to believe what is not true.
H. L. MENCKEN