Mark Twain

A man can seldom – very, very, seldom – fight a winning fight against his training; the odds are too heavy.

The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.

So I became a newspaperman. I hated to do it but I couldnt find honest employment.

If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.

Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.

In Boston they ask, How much does he know? In New York, How much is he worth? In Philadelphia, Who were his parents?

However intense my experience, I am conscious of the presence and criticism of a part of me, which, as it were, is not a part of me, but a spectator, sharing no experience, but taking note of it, and that is no more I than it is you. When the play, it may be the tragedy, of life is over, the spectator goes his way. It was a kind of fiction, a work of the imagination only, so far as he was concerned.

In his private heart no man much respects himself.

With the past, I have nothing to do; nor with the future. I live now.

Croesus said to Cambyses; That peace was better than war; because in peace the sons did bury their fathers, but in wars the fathers did bury their sons.

First love is only a little foolishness and a lot of curiosity: no really self-respecting woman would take advantage of it.

Having power is not nearly as important as what you choose to do with it.

If you can’t fly, then run, if you can’t walk run, then walk, if you can’t walk, then crawl, but by all means keep moving.

Heaven is the work of the best and kindest men and women. Hell is the work of prigs, pedants and professional truth-tellers. The world is an attempt to make the best of Heaven and Hell.

Every quotation contributes something to the stability or enlargement of the language.

Life cannot subsist in society but by reciprocal concessions.

How could youths better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living?

Life is short, but there is always time for courtesy.

In lapidary inscriptions a man is not upon oath.

Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world.

I cannot pretend to feel impartial about colors. I rejoice with the brilliant ones and am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.