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A sense of humor always withers in the presence of the messianic delusion, like justice and the truth in front of patriotic passion.

H. L. Mencken

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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
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Henry Louis Mencken
Justice
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The essence of science is that it is always willing to abandon a given idea for a better one the essence of theology is that it holds its truths to be eternal and immutable.
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The idea that leisure is of value in itself is only conditionally true. The average man simply spends his leisure as a dog spends it. His recreations are all puerile, and the time supposed to benefit him really only stupefies him.
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The allurement that women hold out to men is precisely the allurement that Cape Hatteras holds out to sailors they are enormously dangerous and hence enormously fascinating.
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Human progress is furthered, not by conformity, but by aberration.
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The saddest life is that of a political aspirant under democracy. His failure is ignominious and his success is disgraceful.
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The most curious social convention of the great age in which we live is the one to the effect that religious opinions should be respected.
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He slept more than any other president, whether by day or by night. Nero fiddled, but Coolidge only snored.
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If the average man is made in God's image, then a man such as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God, and so God may be jealous of him, and eager to see his superiority perish with his bodily frame.
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Whenever A attempts by law to impose his moral standards upon B, A is most likely a scoundrel.
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Psychotherapy is the theory that the patient will probably get well anyhow and is certainly a damn fool.
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Confidence: The feeling that makes one believe a man, even when one knows that one would lie in his place
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At the end of one millennium and nine centuries of Christianity, it remains an unshakable assumption of the law in all Christian countries and of the moral judgement of Christians everywhere that if a man and a woman, entering a room together, close the door behind them, the man will come out sadder and the woman wiser.
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Osteopath--One who argues that all human ills are caused by the pressure of hard bone upon soft tissue. The proof of his theory isto be found in the heads of those who believe it.
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Jealousy is a keen observer, but looks for all the wrong signs.
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The Christian always swears a bloody oath that he will never do it again. The civilized man simply resolves to be a bit more careful next time.
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The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.
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I detest converts almost as much as I do missionaries.
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The Public ... demands certainties ... But there are not certainties
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Free speech is too dangerous to a democracy to be permitted
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It doesn't take a majority to make a rebellion it takes only a few determined leaders and a sound cause.
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