H.a.l. Quotes & Sayings

The average man never really thinks from end to end of his life. The mental activity of such people is only a mouthing of cliches. What they mistake for thought is simply a repetition of what they have heard. My guess is that well over 80 percent of the human race goes through life without having a single original thought. — H.L. Mencken

The life of man in this world is like the life of a fly in a room filled with 100 boys, each armed with a fly-swatter. — H.L. Mencken

It reminds me of a string of wet sponges; it reminds me of tattered washing on the line; it reminds me of stale bean soup, of college yells, of dogs barking idiotically through endless nights. It is so bad that a sort of grandeur creeps into it. It drags itself up out of the dark abyss of pish and crawls insanely up the topmost pinnacle of posh. It is rumble and bumble. It is flap and doodle. It is balder and dash. — H.L. Mencken

I've never seen a more exquisite sight than you when you're all turned on, darlin'. You know that? — L. H. Cosway

All great religions, in order to escape absurdity, have to admit a dilution of agnosticism. It is only the savage, whether of the African bush or the American gospel tent, who pretends to know the will and intent of God exactly and completely. — H.L. Mencken

The chief difference between free capitalism and State socialism seems to be this: that under the former a man pursues his own advantage openly, frankly and honestly, whereas under the latter he does so hypocritically and under false pretenses. — H.L. Mencken

There is a saying in Baltimore that crabs may be prepared in fifty ways and that all of them are good. — H.L. Mencken

You've got a wonderful way with words, disgusting but wonderful. — L. H. Cosway

It isn't a coincidence that governments everywhere want to educate children. Government education, in turn, is supposed to be evidence of the state's goodness and its concern for our well-being. The real explanation is less flattering. If the government's propaganda can take root as children grow up, those kids will be no threat to the state apparatus. They'll fasten the chains to their own ankles. H.L. Mencken once said that the state doesn't just want to make you obey. It tries to make you want to obey. And that's one thing the government schools do very well. — Llewellyn Rockwell

A tin horn politician with the manner of a rural corn doctor and the mien of a ham actor — H.L. Mencken

L.P. So your work must fight religion?
J.H. No, not at all! It fights the unconsciousness, the blindness, that all myth creates about itself. You never can see the actual myth you are in or only through a glass darkly. — James Hillman

Two simple principles lie at the bottom of the whole matter, and they may be precipitated into two rules. The first is that, when there is a choice, the milder drink is always the better-not merely the safer but the better. The second is that no really enlightened drinker ever takes a drink at a time when he has any work to do. There is, of course, more to it than this; but these are sufficient for the beginner, and even the virtuoso never outgrows them. — H.L. Mencken

If ever a man is to achieve anything like dignity, it can happen only if superior men are given absolute freedom to think what they want to think and say what they want to say. — H.L. Mencken

Annie, Tom, Tom, Annie," I said, making the introductions.

Annie smiled widely, her attention no longer on her phone. In fact, she seemed overjoyed to be making Tom's acquaintance. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Tom. I eat here all the time. You're an amazing chef."

Fuck me. Was she fangirling him? — L. H. Cosway

Cruelty is easy, and it breeds only misery. Kindness is harder, and you have to be brave to give it. To be cruel, you can stay closed off from everyone, wear a mask, but to be kind, in essence, to show love, you have to make yourself vulnerable, show your true self to someone and open yourself up to rejection. — L. H. Cosway

A Puritan is not against bullfighting because of the pain it gives the bull, but because of the pleasure it gives the spectators. — H.L. Mencken

Thus she is almost always a failure as a lawyer, for the law requires only an armament of hollow phrases and stereotyped formulae, and a mental habit which puts these phantasms above sense, truth and justice; and she is almost always a failure in business, for business, in the main, is so foul a compound of trivialities and rogueries that her sense of intellectual integrity revolts against it. — H.L. Mencken

There is no record in the history of a nation that ever gained anything valuable by being unable to defend itself. — H.L. Mencken

There is only one person in the world, aside from your dog, who has any hope of liking you regardless of your success or failure. That's you. I think it's worth a little of your time to get to know that person better. — H.L. Stephens

I have a history of trying to fix that which is broken, and I still don't think I've fully learned that people can't be fixed, they have to fix themselves. — L. H. Cosway

There is, in fact, no reason to believe that any given natural phenomenon, however marvelous it may seem today, will remain forever inexplicable. Soon or late the laws governing the production of life itself will be discovered in the laboratory, and man may set up business as a creator on his own account. The thing, indeed, is not only conceivable; it is even highly probable. — H.L. Mencken

Kiss me, Jack," I begged, forcing myself to ask for what I truly wanted for once. "I can't," he replied with a sigh of frustration. "Please," I whimpered desperately. "When I kiss you, it will be everywhere. When I kiss you, I won't stop there. If I taste you, I'll want to taste everything. — L. H. Cosway

When a sin comes back (its memory) you absolutely must bury it. How to bury the memory of a sin that comes from a distant past? I shut it up in a clay pot. Then I dug right into the cold hard ground, deep down. Without of course telling anyone what I had in the pot,then I stuck this pot the size of a little quart saucepan into the ground and I covered the hole in the ground with ice for a long time, and that despite the presence of people who had no inkling what I was ridding myself of in this little improvised coffin. — Helene Cixous

Christ, I need you," he swears. "If you don't stop me now, I'm going to fuck you, darlin'."
He licks a line from my neck to my earlobe, taking it into his mouth and sucking, his tongue flickering.
"Jay," I moan his name, and an appreciative groan rumbles up out of his chest. "Yes. Please. — L. H. Cosway

Has the art of politics no apparent utility? Does it appear to be unqualifiedly ratty, raffish, sordid, obscene, and low down, andits salient virtuosi a gang of unmitigated scoundrels? Then let us not forget its high capacity to soothe and tickle the midriff, its incomparable services as a maker of entertainment. — H.L. Mencken

There's a smile in his voice when he goes on, "What are you doing in there, baby?"
"Nothing," I answer, a little too quickly.
"Okay, you keep on doing nothing. I'll just sit here while you're at it. This spot is surprisingly comfortable. — L. H. Cosway

But he needed to be certain before committing to something so - the word, certain, arrested his thoughts. A person can't be absolutely certain about anything, not certainty in the sense of a mathematical proof. He wasn't certain about Kate. He saw her, observed her, wanted to be with her. Somehow, he just knew. For reasons already set in his heart, the way he was wired, Josh knew Kate was a person he wanted in his life. She was the proof. Would it be the same way with God? — H.L. Wegley

And what is a good citizen? Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. Schools are maintained in order to bring this uniformity up to the highest possible point. A school is a hopper into which children are heaved while they are still young and tender; therein they are pressed into certain standard shapes and covered from head to heels with official rubber-stamps. — H.L. Mencken

A professor must have a theory as a dog must have fleas. — H.L. Mencken

The flowers' beauty drew her closer to them like a magnetic force. She felt compelled to walk a little faster. — H. L. Balcomb

If the average man is made in God's image, then such a man as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God ... — H.L. Mencken

I recall the story of the philosopher and the theologian... The two were engaged in disputation and the theologian used the old quip about a philosopher resembling a blind man, in a dark room, looking for a black cat - which wasn't there. 'That may be,' said the philosopher, 'but a theologian would have found it. — Julian Huxley

No matter how much a woman loved a man, it would still give her a glow to see him commit suicide for her. — H.L. Mencken

The truth is that the scientific value of Polar exploration is greatly exaggerated. The thing that takes men on such hazardous trips is really not any thirst for knowledge, but simply a yearning for adventure ... A Polar explorer always talks grandly of sacrificing his fingers and toes to science. It is an amiable pretention, but there is no need to take it seriously. — H.L. Mencken

The Low Church rectors, in the main, struggle with poor congregations, born to the faith but deficient in buying power. As bank accounts increase the fear of the devil diminishes, and there arises a sense of beauty. This sense of beauty, in its practical effects, is identical with the work of the Paulist Fathers. — H.L. Mencken

Morality and honor are not to be confused. The difference between a moral man and a man of honor is that the latter regrets a discreditable act, even when it has worked and he has not been caught. — H.L. Mencken

College football would be much more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms, legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the loss of humanity. — H.L. Mencken

When we consider the fact that the spectroscope has enabled us to make a chemical analysis of the sun, that the telephone has enabled us to hear 2,000 miles and that the x-rays have enabled us to see through flesh and bone, we must admit without reservation, that our power of perception, at some future day, may be infinite. And if we admit this we must admit the essential possibility of the superman. — H.L. Mencken

What is the function that a clergyman performs in the world? Answer: He gets his living by assuring idiots that he can save them from an imaginary hell. — H.L. Mencken

Sometimes it feels like I have so much to say, yet none of the ability to actually articulate it. So I remain silent, a quiet observer of human life as it orbits around me, so bright and fascinating. It catches right in my lungs, this need to express myself, and burns like a river of fire up to my vocal chords, stunting everything that's inside, struggling to break out.
Florence Vaine, A Vision of Green — L. H. Cosway

Stop looking at me like that," I say, frowning and rubbing at my chest. He has this habit of making my heart sore, making my lungs feel like there's not enough air.
He tilts his head attractively, which only makes matters worse. "Like what?"
"Like you're molesting me with your eyes," I blurt out.
His answering laugh is long and deep. I can barely handle the affection in his gaze. "Okay, I'll try to stop. But if it all gets to be too much for you, this apartment happens to have a very nice bathroom. You can go rub one out again to take the edge off. I'll come listen, too, if that will help."
There he goes again, pushing me.
I do a slow blink at him before coming out with a rather masterful comeback. And when I say "masterful," I mean shit. "Why don't you go and rub one out?"
He cocks an eyebrow. "I don't rub out, darlin'. I jack off. — L. H. Cosway

I didn't go to high school, and I didn't go to grade school either. Education, I think, is for refinement and is probably a liability. — H. L. Hunt

One cannot enter a State legislature or a prison for felons without becoming, in some measure, a dubious character. — H.L. Mencken

If a politician found he had cannibals among his constituents, he would promise them missionaries for dinner. — H.L. Mencken

What are the hallmarks of a competent writer of fiction? The first, it seems to me, is that he should be immensely interested in human beings, and have an eye sharp enough to see into them, and a hand clever enough to draw them as they are. The second is that he should be able to set them in imaginary situations which display the contents of their psyches effectively, and so carry his reader swiftly and pleasantly from point to point of what is called a good story. — H.L. Mencken

He sailed through American history like a steel ship loaded with monoliths of granite. — H.L. Mencken

I let out a loud bark of a laugh and teased, "Well, you're no Gandy." Jack shot me a confused glance. "And thank fuck for that. Who wants to look like a little old bald man with John Lennon glasses? — L. H. Cosway

Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him. — H.L. Mencken

What restrains us from killing is partly fear of punishment, partly moral scruple, and partly what may be described as a sense of humor — H.L. Mencken

A woman usually respects her father, but her view of her husband is mingled with contempt, for she is of course privy to the transparent devices by which she snared him. — H.L. Mencken

Nora, your self-pity monitor is beeping, it's telling me you're feeling sorry for yourself over something trivial and need to get a life. — L. H. Cosway

It seems to me that society usually wins. There are, to be sure, free spirits in the world, but their freedom, in the last analysis, is not much greater than that of a canary in a cage. They may leap from perch to perch; they may bathe and guzzle at their will; they may flap their wings and sing. But they are still in the cage, and soon or late it conquers them. — H.L. Mencken

His Nana's prayers were moving toward his mother like little butterflies of thoughts wrapped in the most beautiful colors. Each prayer looked like a mini-rainbow. — H. L. Balcomb

Each party steals so many articles of faith from the other, and the candidates spend so much time making each other's speeches, that by the time election day is past there is nothing much to do save turn the sitting rascals out and let a new gang in. — H.L. Mencken

If what I may believe - about gall-stones, the Constitution, castor oil, or God - is conditioned by law, then I am not a free man. — H.L. Mencken

You're too cute sometimes. I mean, seriously too cute."
"I'm not cute. I'm aloof and manly." I lifted a disdainful eyebrow at the idea of me as cute. Ridiculous. — L. H. Cosway

College football is a game which would be much more interesting if the faculty played instead of the students, and even more interesting if the trustees played. There would be a great increase in broken arms, legs, and necks, and simultaneously an appreciable diminution in the loss to humanity. — H.L. Mencken

You know, you should think about getting in touch with Gabriel, he's your half-brother and also a really good guy." Delilah looks at me cynically. "Gabriel despises me." "He despises Ethan, you I think he might just have some time for. After all, you're both dhamphirs." "That's like me telling you you'll get along with George Bush because you're both human." Delilah replies snidely. I get her point, but still I grin and respond. "You're right, we would definitely get along. He'd make me feel all intelligent and shit. — L. H. Cosway

In the superman Nietzsche gave the world a conceivable and possible goal for all human effort. But there still remained a problem and it was this: When the superman at last appears on earth, what then? Will there be another super-superman to follow and another super-super-superman after that? In the end, will man become the equal of the creator of the universe, whoever or whatever He may be? Or will a period of decline come after, with return down the long line, through the superman down to man again, and then on to the anthropoid ape, to the lower mammals, to the asexual cell, and, finally, to mere inert matter, gas, ether, and empty space? — H.L. Mencken

Relationship. R-E-L-A-T-I-O-N-S-H-I-P means this: Really exciting love affair turns into overwhelming nightmare. Sobriety hangs in peril. — Gary Busey

I wanted to high-five the fuck out of myself then do a victory dance. But I didn't, because, you know, manly. — L. H. Cosway

Of all the classes of men, I dislike the most those who make their livings by talking - actors, clergymen, politicians, pedagogues, and so on ... It is almost impossible to imagine a talker who sticks to the facts. Carried away by the sound of his own voice and the applause from the groundlings, he makes inevitably the jump from logic to mere rhetoric. — H.L. Mencken

Life without sex might be safer but it would be unbearably dull. It is the sex instinct which makes women seem beautiful, which they are once in a blue moon, and men seem wise and brave, which they never are at all. Throttle it, denaturalize it, take it away, and human existence would be reduced to the prosaic, laborious, boresome, imbecile level of life in an anthill. — H.L. Mencken

I believe that any man who takes the liberty of another into his keeping is bound to become a tyrant, and that any man who yields up his liberty, in however slight the measure, is bound to become a slave. — H.L. Mencken

You never push a noun against a verb without trying to blow up something. — H.L. Mencken

No man could bring himself to reveal his true character, and, above all, his true limitations as a citizen and a Christian, his true meannesses, his true imbecilities, to his friends, or even to his wife. Honest autobiography is therefore a contradiction in terms: the moment a man considers himself, even in petto, he tries to gild and fresco himself. Thus a man's wife, however realistic her view of him, always flatters him in the end, for the worst she sees in him is appreciably better, by the time she sees it, than what is actually there. — H.L. Mencken

Unionism, seldom if ever, uses such powers as it has to ensure better work; almost always it devotes a large part of that power to safeguard bad work. — H.L. Mencken

It takes no more actual sagacity to carry on the everyday hawking and haggling of the world, or to ladle out its normal doses of bad medicine and worse law, than it takes to operate a taxicab or fry a pan of fish. — H.L. Mencken

By profession a biologist, [Thomas Henry Huxley] covered in fact the whole field of the exact sciences, and then bulged through its four fences. Absolutely nothing was uninteresting to him. His curiosity ranged from music to theology and from philosophy to history. He didn't simply know something about everything; he knew a great deal about everything. — H.L. Mencken

After all is said and done, a hell lot of a lot more is said than done. — H.L. Mencken

When I hear artists or authors making fun of businessmen, I think of a regiment in which the band makes fun of the cooks. — H.L. Mencken

Women have a hard enough time in this world: telling them the truth would be too cruel. — H.L. Mencken

So why not live with the magic? Be a kid again and believe in the fantastical. Life is more fun with a little smoke and mirrors. — L. H. Cosway

A man always blames the woman who fools him. In the same way he blames the door he walks into in the dark. — H.L. Mencken

The best client is a scared millionaire. — H.L. Mencken

A free citizen in a free state, it seems to me, has an inalienable right to play with whomsoever he will, so long as he does not disturb the general peace. If any other citizen, offended by the spectacle, makes a pother, then that other citizen, and not the man exercising his inalienable right, should be put down by the police. — H.L. Mencken

A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin. — H.L. Mencken

14Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise h partook of the same things, that i through death he might j destroy k the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, 15and deliver all those who l through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. 16For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he m helps the offspring of Abraham. 17Therefore he had n to be made like his brothers in every respect, o so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest p in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. 18For because he himself has suffered q when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted. — Anonymous

I'm happy for you Agastya,you're leaving for a more meaningful context. This place is like a parody, a complete farce, they're trying to build another Cambridge here. At my old University I used to teach Macbeth to my MA English classes in Hindi.English in India is burlesque. But now you'll get out of here to somehow a more real situation. In my time I'd wanted to give this Civil Service exam too, I should have. Now I spend my time writing papers for obscure journals on L. H. Myers and Wyndham Lewis, and teaching Conrad to a bunch of half-wits. — Upamanyu Chatterjee

Purity of race does not exist. Europe is a continent of energetic mongrels. — H.A.L. Fisher

I also had the distinct impression that, when he'd leaned into my space, he'd tried to smell me, and he'd managed to do it without coming across as a creepy creeper. Admittedly, if he were less epically good-looking, he might have come across as a creepy creeper. But, as he had the body of a gladiator and the face of a movie star, I felt flustered, flattered, and turned on. The fact that I felt flattered made me feel like an idiot. I hated this about myself. I hated that, even though I knew better, good looks negated odd behavior. His odd behavior being that he was attempting to use all five of his senses to experience me while trapping us in an elevator; I didn't doubt that, if I'd given him any indication that I was in favor of his advances, he would have tried to taste me as well. I shivered at the thought, a wave of warmth spreading from my chest to the pit of my stomach, stinging and sudden, like a hot flash. — L. H. Cosway

And I had no one to talk to about it because I was a fucking hermit! — L. H. Cosway

A dull, dark, depressing day in Winter: the whole world looks like a Methodist church at Wednesday night prayer meeting. — H.L. Mencken

A man who knows a subject thoroughly, a man so soaked in it that he eats it, sleeps it and dreams it- this man can always teach it with success, no matter how little he knows of technical pedagogy. — H.L. Mencken

Poetry is a comforting piece of fiction set to more or less lascivious music. — H.L. Mencken

Sunday school: A prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents. — H.L. Mencken

I believe in only one thing and that thing is human liberty. If ever a man is to achieve anything like dignity, it can happen only if superior men are given absolute freedom to think what they want to think and say what they want to say. I am against any man and any organization which seeks to limit or deny that freedom ... the superior man can be sure of freedom only if it is given to all men. — H.L. Mencken

Without a doubt there are women who would vote intelligently. There are also men who knit socks beautifully. — H.L. Mencken

Los Angeles: nineteen suburbs in search of a metropolis. — H.L. Mencken

The more a man dreams, the less he believes. — H.L. Mencken

This Adonis in loveliness was a corpulent man of fifty. — H. L. Hunt

I was bleeding but hoped he wouldn't notice. I do this sometimes; a game I personally call, I have my period, let's see if I can hide it! A darkish room and quick condom removal (make it seem like you're just really nice and thorough, and use baby wipes to take it off) and even quicker moving of towels to cover any spots on the bed take care of this-though more than once I then saw smears on the pillowcase. Dirty! I love it. I want to not, like, ruby-shower heavy bleed on someone, but reach inside myself with a couple fingers and write my name on a dude's chest with it. C-h-l-o-e. Smiley face. — Kelley Kenney

So few men are really worth knowing, that it seems a shameful waste to let an anthropoid prejudice stand in the way of free association with one who is. — H.L. Mencken

Nicholas is gay, isn't he," she says, her voice dripping with dejection.
I shrug, again remembering his proposition from last night. "Not necessarily. The jury's still out. There's hope for a Christmas wedding yet," I tell her. — L. H. Cosway

Here is tragedy and here is America. For the curse of the country, as well of all democracies, is precisely the fact that it treats its best men as enemies. The aim of our society, if it may be said to have an aim, is to iron them out. The ideal American, in the public sense, is a respectable vacuum. — H.L. Mencken

A gentlemen is one who never strikes a woman without provocation. — H.L. Mencken

At a time when the respectable bourgeois youngsters of my generation were college freshmen, oppressed by simian sophomores and affronted with balderdash daily and hourly by chalky pedagogues, I was at large in a wicked seaport of half a million people, with a front seat at every public show, as free of the night as of day, and getting earfuls of instruction in a hundred giddy arcana, none of them taught in schools ... [But] if I neglected the humanities, I was meanwhile laying in all the worldly wisdom of a police lieutenant, a bartender, a shyster lawyer, or a midwife. — H.L. Mencken

I was just a person, and he was just a person, and together we were scrambling in the dark to try to understand each other. — L. H. Cosway

A metaphysician is one who, when you remark that twice two makes four, demands to know what you mean by twice, what by two, what by makes, and what by four. For asking such questions metaphysicians are supported in oriental luxury in the universities, and respected as educated and intelligent men. — H.L. Mencken

It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him — H.L. Mencken