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Free speech is too dangerous to a democracy to be permitted
H. L. Mencken
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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
Autobiographer
Essayist
Historian
Journalist
Linguist
Literary Critic
Satirist
Social Critic
Writer
Baltimore
Maryland
Henry Louis Mencken
Speech
Dangerous
Democracy
Free
Permitted
More quotes by H. L. Mencken
The sort of man who likes to spend his time watching a cage of monkeys chase one another, or a lion gnaw its tail, or a lizard catch flies, is precisely the sort of man whose mental weakness should be combated at the public expense, not fostered.
H. L. Mencken
There are men so philosophical that they can see humor in their own toothaches. But there has never lived a man so philosophical that he could see the toothache in his own humor.
H. L. Mencken
The highfalutin aims of democracy, whether real or imaginary, are always assumed to be identical with its achievements. This, of course, is sheer hallucination. Not one of those aims, not even the aim of giving every adult a vote, has been realized. It has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good.
H. L. Mencken
A critic is a man who writes about things he doesn't like.
H. L. Mencken
On one issue, at least, men and women agree. They both distrust women.
H. L. Mencken
I detest converts almost as much as I do missionaries.
H. L. Mencken
A man is called a good fellow for doing things which, if done by a woman, would land her in a lunatic asylum.
H. L. Mencken
The aim of New Deals is to exterminate the class of creditors and thrust all men into that of debtors. It is like trying to breedcattle with all cows and no bulls.
H. L. Mencken
The pedant and the priest have always been the most expert of logicians - and the most diligent disseminators of nonsense and worse.
H. L. Mencken
If x is the population of the United States and y is the degree of imbecility of the average American, then democracy is the theory that x times y is less than y
H. L. Mencken
Watching two women kiss is like watching two prizefighters shake hands.
H. L. Mencken
The final test of truth is ridicule. Very few dogmas have ever faced it and survived.
H. L. Mencken
The wholly manly man lacks the wit necessary to give objective form to his soaring and secret dreams, and the wholly womanly woman is apt to be too cynical a creature to dream at all.
H. L. Mencken
Immorality: the morality of those who are having a better time.
H. L. Mencken
Wife: one who is sorry she did it, but would undoubtedly do it again.
H. L. Mencken
The common notion that free speech prevails in the United States always makes me laugh.
H. L. Mencken
Next to the semi-colon, quotation marks seem to be the chief butts of reformatory ardor.
H. L. Mencken
I have long been convinced that the idea of liberty is abhorrent to most human beings. What they want is security, not freedom. Thus it seldom causes any public indignation when an enterprising tyrant claps down on one of his enemies. To most men it seems a natural proceeding.
H. L. Mencken
As long as you represent me as praising alcohol I shall not complain.
H. L. Mencken
Temptation is an irresistible force at work on a movable body.
H. L. Mencken
