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In the beginning of a change the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot.

Mark Twain

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Mark Twain
Age: 74 †
Born: 1835
Born: November 30
Died: 1910
Died: April 21
Aphorist
Author
Autobiographer
Humorist
Journalist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Prosaist
Science Fiction Writer
Teacher
Florida
Missouri
Samuel Langhorne Clemens
Samuel L. Clemens
Samuel Clemens
Men
Cause
Libertarian
Veteran
Liberty
Hated
Remembrance
Causes
Brave
Nationalism
Armistice
Politics
Greatness
Patriot
Scorned
Peace
Succeed
Bravery
Timidity
Political
Beginning
Patriotism
Timid
Change
Cost
Costs
Succeeds
Nothing
Courage
Join
Scarce

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To be a patriot, one had to say, and keep on saying, Our Country, right or wrong, and urge on the little war. Have you not perceived that that phrase is an insult to the nation?
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If we learned to walk and talk the way we learn to read and write, everyone would limp and stutter.
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Civilization largely consists in hiding human nature. When the barbarian learns to hide it we account him enlightened.
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the size of a misfortune is not determinable by an outsider’s measurement of it but only by the measurements applied to it by the person specially affected by it.
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I cannot call to mind a single instance where I have ever been irreverent, except toward the things which were sacred to other people.
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There is not a single human characteristic that can be safely labeled as American.
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Your road is everything that a road ought to be...and yet you will not stay in it half a mile, for the reason that little, seductive, mysterious roads are always branching out from it on either hand, and as these curve sharply also and hide what is beyond, you cannot resist the temptation to desert your own chosen path and explore them.
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Demagogue--a vessel containing beer and other liquids.
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To get the full value of joy You must have someone to divide it with. After all these years I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning it is better to live outside the Garden with her than inside it without her.
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