Quote

The convention missionaries call modesty has no standard, and cannot have one, because it is opposed to nature and reason and is therefore an artificiality and subject to anybody's whim - anybody's diseased caprice.

Mark Twain

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Call
Conventions
Artificiality
Nature
Opposed
Caprice
Cannot
Standard
Missionaries
Reason
Subject
Diseased
Standards
Whim
Therefore
Convention
Anybody
Clothings
Subjects
Modesty

More quotes by Mark Twain

Image
Newport, Rhode Island, that breeding place-that stud farm, so to speak-of aristocracy aristocracy of the American type.
Mark Twain
Image
Sagebrush is a very fair fuel, but as a vegetable it is a distinguished failure. Nothing can abide the taste of it but the jackass and his illegitimate child the mule.
Mark Twain
Image
We regret the things we don't do more than the things we do.
Mark Twain
Image
Of course, no man is entirely in his right mind at any time.
Mark Twain
Image
If you have to swallow a frog, don't stare at it too long.
Mark Twain
Image
As an example to others, and not that I care for moderation myself, it has always been my rule never to smoke when asleep, and never to refrain from smoking when awake.
Mark Twain
Image
How empty is theory in the presence of fact!
Mark Twain
Image
I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time.
Mark Twain
Image
Every year you wait, long ago gets farther away.
Mark Twain
Image
It is hopeless for the occasional visitor to try to keep up with Chicago-she outgrows his prophecies faster than he can make them. She is always a novelty for she is never the Chicago you saw when you passed through the last time.
Mark Twain
Image
Grief can take care if itself, but to get the full value of a joy you must have somebody to divide it with.
Mark Twain
Image
He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever.
Mark Twain
Image
There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist.
Mark Twain
Image
I will remark in the way of general information, that in California, that land of felicitous nomenclature, the literary name of this sort of stuff is hogwash
Mark Twain
Image
Everything human is pathetic. The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow. There is no humor in heaven.
Mark Twain
Image
The piano may do for love-sick girls who lace themselves to skeletons, and lunch on chalk, pickles and slate pencils, but give me the banjo.
Mark Twain
Image
I find that the further I go back, the better things were, whether they happened or not.
Mark Twain
Image
I was born modest not all over, but in spots.
Mark Twain
Image
The proverb says that Providence protects children and idiots. This is really true. I know because I have tested it.
Mark Twain
Image
One thing at a time, is my motto - and just play that thing for all it is worth, even if it's only tto pair and a jack.
Mark Twain