Quotes from Mark Twain

Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whiskey is barely enough.

He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever.

The government is merely a servant?merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn't. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them.

Human beings can be awful cruel to one another.

The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much; if he is an optimist after it he knows too little.

Ignorant people think it is the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so; it is the sickening grammar that they use.

A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval.

When I am king they shall not have bread and shelter only, but also teachings out of books, for a full belly is little worth where the mind is starved.

Write without pay until somebody offers to pay.

Good judgement is the result of experience and experience the result of bad judgement.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and starting on the first one.

It is by the goodness of god that in our country we have those 3 unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.

When red-headed people are above a certain social grade their hair is auburn.

Noise proves nothing. Often a hen who has laid an egg cackles as if she had laid an asteroid.

Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.

Don't wake up a woman in love. Let her dream, so that she does not weep when she returns to her bitter reality

what is joy without sorrow? what is success without failure? what is a win without a loss? what is health without illness? you have to experience each if you are to appreciate the other. there is always going to be suffering. it's how you look at your suffering, how you deal with it, that will define you.

When a man loves cats, I am his friend and comrade, without further introduction.

What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for sure that just ain't so.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

Summer is the time when it is too hot to do the job that it was too cold to do last winter.

Darwin abolished special creations, contributed the Origin of Species and hitched all life together in one unbroken procession.

Let us so live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.

Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I've done it thousands of times.