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Puritanism. The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.
H. L. Mencken
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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
Autobiographer
Essayist
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Literary Critic
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Baltimore
Maryland
Henry Louis Mencken
God
Somewhere
Misanthropy
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Puritanism
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Fear
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May
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Spirituality
More quotes by H. L. Mencken
Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.
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Wife: one who is sorry she did it, but would undoubtedly do it again.
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The great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom even ordinarily respectable.
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The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.
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Never drink if you've got any work to do. Never.
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Of all the human qualities, the one I admire the most is competence. A tailor who is really able to cut and fit a coat seems to me an admirable man, and by the same token a university professor who knows little or nothing of the thing he presumes to teach seems to me to be a fraud and a rascal.
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I'm ombibulous. I drink every known alcoholic drink and enjoy them all.
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Man is a natural polygamist: he always has one woman leading him by the nose, and another hanging on to his coattails.
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The course of the United States in World War II, I said, was dishonest, dishonorable, and ignominious, and the Sunpapers, by supporting Roosevelt's foreign policy, shared in this disgrace.
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A bad artist almost always tries to conceal his incompetence by whooping up a new formula.
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Whenever a reporter is assigned to cover a Methodist conference, he comes home an atheist.
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There are no institutions in America: there are only fashions.
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So few men are really worth knowing, that it seems a shameful waste to let an anthropoid prejudice stand in the way of free association with one who is.
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The capacity of human beings to bore one another seems to be vastly greater than that of any other animal.
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The State doesn't just want you to obey, it wants to make you WANT to obey.
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Jury - A group of 12 people, who, having lied to the judge about their health, hearing, and business engagements, have failed to fool him.
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A large part of altruism, even when it is perfectly honest, is grounded upon the fact that it is uncomfortable to have unhappy people about one.
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Women have a hard enough time in this world: telling them the truth would be too cruel.
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What fetched me instantly (and thousands of other newcomers with me) was the subtle but unmistakable sense of escape from the United States.
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Only a jackass ever talks over his affairs with a woman, whether she be his sweetheart, wife, or sister, or mother.
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