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We are always more anxious to be distinguished for a talent which we do not possess, than to be praised for the fifteen which we do possess.

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
Always
Praised
Distinguished
Fifteen
Anxious
Possess
Musical
Praise
Talent

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Concentration of power in a political machine is bad and an Established Church is only a political machine it was invented for that it is nursed, cradled, preserved for that it is an enemy to human liberty, and does no good which it could not better do in a split-up and scattered condition.
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Don't wrestle with pigs. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.
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The reason most people don't go to church is because they've already been.
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Creed and opinion change with time, and their symbols perish but Literature and its temples are sacred to all creeds and inviolate.
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An American has not seen the United States until he has seen Mardi-Gras in New Orleans.
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Do good when you can, and charge when you think they will stand it.
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The altar cloth of one aeon is the doormat of the next.
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The test of any good fiction is that you should care something for the characters the good to succeed, the bad to fail. The trouble with most fiction is that you want them all to land in hell, together, as quickly as possible.
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When one reads Bibles, one is less surprised at what the Deity knows than at what He doesn't know.
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If you need help identifying actionable analytics check out this post.
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There is not a single celebrated Southern name in any of the departments of human industry except those of war, assassination, lynching, murder, the duel, repudiation, & massacre.
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I have a religion-but you will call it blasphemy. It is that there is a God for the rich man but none for the poor.....Perhaps your religion will sustain you,will feed you-I place no dependence in mine. Our religions are alike, though, in one respect-neither can make a man happy when he is out of luck.
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Don't wait the time is never just right.
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One mustn't criticize other people on grounds where he can't stand perpendicular himself
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All say, ‘how hard it is that we have to die’ -- a strange complaint to come from the mouths of those who have had to live.
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When I was younger I could remember anything, whether it happened or not.
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There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
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The ancients stole all our ideas from us.
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Whose property is my body? Probably mine. I so regard it. If I experiment with it, who must be answerable? I, not the State. If I choose injudiciously, does the state die? Oh, no.
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I wasn't worth a cent two years ago, and now I owe two million dollars.
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