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Sane and intelligent human beings are like all other human beings, and carefully and cautiously and diligently conceal their private real opinions from the world and give out fictitious ones in their stead for general consumption.

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
Like
Beings
Conceal
World
Ones
Consumption
Opinion
Carefully
Give
Sane
Human
Opinions
Stead
Humans
Private
Cautiously
Giving
Intelligent
Fictitious
Real
General
Diligently

More quotes by Mark Twain

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The pause - that impressive silence, that eloquent silence, that geometrically progressive silence which often achieves a desired effect where no combination of words, howsoever felicitous, could accomplish it.
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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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Learn from the mistakes of others - you won't live long enough to make them all yourself. He's opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer him the position.
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The idea that a baby doesn't amount to anything! Why, one baby is just a house and a front yard full by itself. One baby can, furnish more business than you and your whole Interior Department can attend to. He is enterprising, irrepressible, brimful of lawless activities.
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Man is a marvelous curiosity...he thinks he is the Creator's pet...he even believes the Creator loves him has passion for him sits up nights to admire him yes and watch over him and keep him out of trouble. He prays to him and thinks he listens. Isn't it a quaint idea.
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It is human to exaggerate the merits of the dead.
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The first half of my life I went to school, the second half of my life I got an education.
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The old man laughed loud and joyously, shook up the details of his anatomy from head to foot, and ended by saying that such a laugh was money in a man's pocket, because it cut down the doctor's bills like everything.
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Until I came to New Mexico, I never realized how much beauty water adds to a river.
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Eight grown Americans out of ten dread the coming of the Fourth, with its pandemonium and its perils, and they rejoice when it is gone-if still alive.
Mark Twain
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Every time I read a Jane Austen novel, I feel like a bartender at the gates of heaven.
Mark Twain
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Too much is just enough.
Mark Twain
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Humorists of the 'mere' sort cannot survive. Humor is only a fragrance, a decoration.
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There are several kinds of stories, but only one difficult kind-the humorous.
Mark Twain
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When your opinions start to coincide with those of the majority, it is time to reconsider your opinions.
Mark Twain
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Your friends may love you in private but your enemies will hate you in public.
Mark Twain
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There are things which some people never attempt during their whole lives, but one of these is not poetry. Poetry attacks all human beings sooner or later, and, like the measles, is mild or violent according to the age of the sufferer.
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Life becomes fully understandable only the moment we realise that we are all mad.
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It is not in the least likely that any life has ever been lived which was not a failure in the secret judgment of the person who lived it.
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A man who carries a cat by the tail is getting experience that will always be helpful. He isn't likely to grow dim or doubtful. Chances are, he isn't likely to carry the cat that way again, either. But if he wants to, I say let him!
Mark Twain