Quote

A story with a moral appended is like the bill of a mosquito. It bores you, and then injects a stinging drop to irritate your conscience.

O. Henry

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O. Henry
Age: 47 †
Born: 1862
Born: September 11
Died: 1910
Died: June 5
Journalist
Writer
Greensboro
North Carolina
William Sydney Porter
Olivier Henry
Oliver Henry
Stories
Mosquitoes
Like
Bores
Drop
Bill
Bills
Injects
Conscience
Stinging
Moral
Irritate
Story
Mosquito

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There is this difference between the grief of youth and that of old age youth's burden is lightened by as much of it as another shares old age may give and give, but the sorrow remains the same.
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I've got some of my best yarns from park benches, lamp posts and newspaper stands.
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The most notable thing about Time is that it is so purely relative. A large amount of reminiscence is, by common consent, conceded to the drowning man and it is not past belief that one may review an entire courtship while removing one's gloves.
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Beauty is Nature in perfection circularity is its chief attribute. Behold the full moon, the enchanting golf ball, the domes of splendid temples, the huckleberry pie, the wedding ring, the circus ring, the ring for the waiter, and the round of drinks.
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Hospitality in the prairie country is not limited. Even if your enemy passes your way, you must feed him before you shoot him.
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If you can't write a story that pleases yourself, you will never please the public. But in writing the story forget the public.
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A good story is like a bitter pill, with the sugar coating inside of it.
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There are a few editor men with whom I am privileged to come in contact. It has not been long since it was their habit to come in contact with me. There is a difference.
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History is bright and fiction dull with homely men who have charmed women.
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Except in streetcars one should never be unnecessarily rude to a lady.
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All of us have to be prevaricators, hypocrites, and liars every day of our lives otherwise the social structure would fall into pieces the first day. We must act in one another's presence just as we must wear clothes. It is for the best
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Whenever my patient begins to count the carriages in her funeral procession I subtract 50 per cent from the curative power of medicines.
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Now, girls, if you want to observe a young man hustle out after a pick and shovel, just tell him that your heart is in some other fellow's grave. Young men are grave-robbers by nature.
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Take of London fog 30 parts malaria 10 parts, gas leaks 20 parts, dewdrops gathered in a brickyard at sunrise 25 parts odor of honeysuckle 15 parts. Mix. The mixture will give you an approximate conception of a Nashville drizzle.
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It'll be a great place if they ever finish it.
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It ain't the roads we take it's what's inside of us that makes us turn out the way we do.
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If there ever was an aviary overstocked with jays it is that Yaptown-on-the-Hudson, call New York. Cosmopolitan they call it, you bet. So's a piece of fly-paper. You listen close when they're buzzing and trying to pull their feet out of the sticky stuff. Little old New York's good enough for us--that's what they sing.
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The lonesomest thing in all the world is a soul when it is making ready to go on its mysterious, far journey.
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Each of us, when our day's work is done, must seek our ideal, whether it be love or pinochle or lobster à la Newburg, or the sweet silence of the musty bookshelves.
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You can't appreciate home till you've left it, money till it's spent, your wife till she's joined a woman's club, nor Old Glory till you see it hanging on a broomstick on the shanty of a consul in a foreign town.
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