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The Jews fastened their religion upon the Western world, not because it was more reasonable than the religions of their contemporaries - as a matter of fact, it was vastly less reasonable than many of them - but because it was far more poetical.

H. L. Mencken

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H. L. Mencken
Age: 75 †
Born: 1880
Born: September 12
Died: 1956
Died: January 29
Autobiographer
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Literary Critic
Satirist
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Baltimore
Maryland
Henry Louis Mencken
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Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule—and both commonly succeed, and are right.
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It is the natural tendency of the ignorant to believe what is not true. In order to overcome that tendency it is not sufficient to exhibit the true it is also necessary to expose and denounce the false.
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Who ever heard, indeed, of an autobiography that was not (interesting)? I can recall none in all the literature of the world
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The only way for a reporter to look at a politician is down.
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Has the art of politics no apparent utility? Does it appear to be unqualifiedly ratty, raffish, sordid, obscene, and low down, andits salient virtuosi a gang of unmitigated scoundrels? Then let us not forget its high capacity to soothe and tickle the midriff, its incomparable services as a maker of entertainment.
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Say what you will about the ten commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them.
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It is only doubt that creates.
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At eight or nine, I suppose intelligence is no more than a small spot of light on the floor of a large and murky room.
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The motive of fear is the be-all and end-all of religion.
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There is nothing worse than an idle hour, with no occupation offering. People who have many such hours are simply animals waiting docilely for death. We all come to that state soon or late. It is the curse of senility.
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The lunatic fringe wags the underdog.
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I'm thoroughly convinced that editors don't help authors.
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I confess I enjoy democracy immensely. It is incomparably idiotic, and hence incomparably amusing.
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The common notion that free speech prevails in the United States always makes me laugh.
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On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
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Every complex problem has a simple solution that doesn't work.
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War is the only sport which is genuinely amusing. And it is the only sport which has any intelligible use.
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History deals mainly with captains and kings, gods and prophets, exploiters and despoilers, not with useful men.
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The difference between the smartest dog and the stupidest man - say a Tennessee Holy Roller - is really very small.
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A mood of constructive criticism being upon me, I propose forthwith that the method of choosing legislators now prevailing in the United States be abandoned and that the method used in choosing juries be substituted. That is to say, I propose that the men who make our laws be chosen by chance and against will of all the rest of us, as now.
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