Mark Twain

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other.

Do something every day that you don’t want to do. This is the golden rule for acquiring the habit of doing your duty without pain.

There are two types of speakers, those that are nervous and those that are liars.

You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, burning bushes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?

There is a great deal of human nature in people.

No matter how carefully you plan your goals they will never be more than pipe dreams unless you pursue them with gusto.

I have learned, that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.

If you are in a poker game and after 20 minutes you don’t know who the patsy is, then you’re the patsy.

Sometimes the place you are used to is not the place you belong.

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers borrowed one from another.

I think if we go back and check our record, the Negro has proven beyond a doubt that we have been more than patient in seeking our rights as American citizens.

Good men must not obey the laws too well.

Englishmen hate Liberty and Equality too much to understand them. But every Englishman loves a pedigree.

I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.

The effort to understand the universe is one of the very few things that lift human life above the level of farce and give it some of the grace of tragedy.

What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined – to strengthen each other – to be at one with each other in silent unspeakable memories.

Necessity does everything well.

Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.

Men are wise in proportion, not to their experience, but to their capacity for experience.

We are paid for our suspicions by finding what we suspected.