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The typical lawmaker of today is a man wholly devoid of principle - a mere counter in a grotesque and knavish game. If the right pressure could be applied to him, he would be cheerfully in favor of polygamy, astrology or cannibalism.

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
Pressure
Counter
Lawmaker
Principles
Applied
Lawmakers
Game
Wholly
Cannibalism
Games
Typical
Cheerfully
Today
Favor
Polygamy
Right
Favors
Devoid
Would
Principle
Grotesque
Men
Mere
Astrology

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Shave a gorilla and it would be almost impossible, at twenty paces, to distinguish him from a heavyweight champion of the world. Skin a chimpanzee, and it would take an autopsy to prove he was not a theologian.
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When I mount the scaffold at last these will be my farewell words to the sheriff: Say what you will against me when I am gone, but don't forget to add, in common justice, that I was never converted to anything.
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The great difficulty about keeping the Ten Commandments is that no man can keep them and be a gentleman.
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The chief contribution of Protestantism to human thought is its massive proof that God is a bore.
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There are no ugly cigars, only ugly smokers.
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Religion deserves no more respect than a pile of garbage.
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The movies today are too rich to have any room for genuine artists. They produce a few passable craftsmen, but no artists. Can you imagine a Beethoven making $100, 000 a year?
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He sailed through American history like a steel ship loaded with monoliths of granite.
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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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The book of Genesis, a farrago of nonsense so wholly absurd that even Sunday-school scholars have to be threatened with Hell to make them accept it.
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The double standard of morality will survive in this world so long as the woman whose husband has been lured away is favoured with the sympathetic tears of other women, and a man whose wife has made off is laughed at by other men.
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The idea that the sole aim of punishment is to prevent crime is obviously grounded upon the theory that crime can be prevented, which is almost as dubious as the notion that poverty can be prevented.
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Save among politicians it is no longer necessary for any educated American to profess belief in Thirteenth Century ideas
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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.
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Skin diseases are something doctors like, the patient neither dies nor gets well.
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It is impossible to imagine the universe run by a wise, just and omnipotent God, but it is quite easy to imagine it run by a board of gods.
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I know of no human being who has a better time than an eager and energetic young reporter.
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Our literature, despite several false starts that promised much, is chiefly remarkable, now as always, for its respectable mediocrity.
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It is difficult to imagine anyone having any real hopes for the human race in the face of the fact that the great majority of men still believe that the universe is run by a gaseous vertebrate of astronomical heft and girth, who is nevertheless interested in the minutest details of the private conduct of even the meanest man.
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The war on privilege will never end. Its next grat campaign will be against the special privileges of the underprivileged.
H. L. Mencken