Mark Twain – 100 Quotes – The Quote List

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100 Quotes by Mark Twain

Work is a necessary evil to be avoided.

– Mark Twain

Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.

– Mark Twain

When in doubt tell the truth.

– Mark Twain

Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities. Truth isn’t.

– Mark Twain

If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.

– Mark Twain

Truth is the most valuable thing we have. Let us economize it.

– Mark Twain

It’s no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.

– Mark Twain

Why shouldn’t truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense.

– Mark Twain

Truth is mighty and will prevail. There is nothing wrong with this, except that it ain’t so.

– Mark Twain

Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities Truth isn’t.

– Mark Twain

I have made it a rule never to smoke more that one cigar at a time.

– Mark Twain

A round man cannot be expected to fit in a square hole right away. He must have time to modify his shape.

– Mark Twain

Substitute ‘damn’ every time you’re inclined to write ‘very’ your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be.

– Mark Twain

A person with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds.

– Mark Twain

All you need is ignorance and confidence and the success is sure.

– Mark Twain

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.

– Mark Twain

The finest clothing made is a person’s own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.

– Mark Twain

When people do not respect us we are sharply offended yet in his private heart no man much respects himself.

– Mark Twain

Principles have no real force except when one is well-fed.

– Mark Twain

Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress but I repeat myself.

– Mark Twain

Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.

– Mark Twain

Sometimes too much to drink is barely enough.

– Mark Twain

The secret of getting ahead is getting started.

– Mark Twain

The lack of money is the root of all evil.

– Mark Twain

The Christian’s Bible is a drug store. Its contents remain the same, but the medical practice changes.

– Mark Twain

Wit is the sudden marriage of ideas which before their union were not perceived to have any relation.

– Mark Twain

When you fish for love, bait with your heart, not your brain.

– Mark Twain

To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.

– Mark Twain

When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.

– Mark Twain

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

– Mark Twain

What a wee little part of a person’s life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself.

– Mark Twain

I must have a prodigious quantity of mind it takes me as much as a week sometimes to make it up.

– Mark Twain

You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

– Mark Twain

Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing.

– Mark Twain

The secret source of humor is not joy but sorrow there is no humor in Heaven.

– Mark Twain

Humor must not professedly teach and it must not professedly preach, but it must do both if it would live forever.

– Mark Twain

Everything human is pathetic. The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow. There is no humor in heaven.

– Mark Twain

Lord save us all from a hope tree that has lost the faculty of putting out blossoms.

– Mark Twain

The very ink with which history is written is merely fluid prejudice.

– Mark Twain

Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.

– Mark Twain

The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don’t want, drink what you don’t like, and do what you’d rather not.

– Mark Twain

There are people who can do all fine and heroic things but one – keep from telling their happiness to the unhappy.

– Mark Twain

Laws control the lesser man… Right conduct controls the greater one.

– Mark Twain

My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.

– Mark Twain

I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.

– Mark Twain

My books are like water those of the great geniuses are wine. (Fortunately) everybody drinks water.

– Mark Twain

Loyalty to the country always. Loyalty to the government when it deserves it.

– Mark Twain

Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.

– Mark Twain

Golf is a good walk spoiled.

– Mark Twain

I can live for two months on a good compliment.

– Mark Twain

Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.

– Mark Twain

Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.

– Mark Twain

Thunder is good, thunder is impressive but it is lightning that does the work.

– Mark Twain

To be good is noble but to show others how to be good is nobler and no trouble.

– Mark Twain

There are several good protections against temptation, but the surest is cowardice.

– Mark Twain

It’s good sportsmanship to not pick up lost golf balls while they are still rolling.

– Mark Twain

The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them.

– Mark Twain

What a good thing Adam had. When he said a good thing he knew nobody had said it before.

– Mark Twain

Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.

– Mark Twain

Man was made at the end of the week’s work when God was tired.

– Mark Twain

God made the Idiot for practice, and then He made the School Board.

– Mark Twain

Man – a creature made at the end of the week’s work when God was tired.

– Mark Twain

Only one thing is impossible for God: To find any sense in any copyright law on the planet.

– Mark Twain

All generalizations are false, including this one.

– Mark Twain

Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.

– Mark Twain

Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.

– Mark Twain

By trying we can easily endure adversity. Another man’s, I mean.

– Mark Twain

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

– Mark Twain

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.

– Mark Twain

Part of the secret of a success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.

– Mark Twain

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.

– Mark Twain

Don’t let schooling interfere with your education.

– Mark Twain

I never let schooling interfere with my education.

– Mark Twain

Education consists mainly of what we have unlearned.

– Mark Twain

I’ve never let my school interfere with my education.

– Mark Twain

I have never let my schooling interfere with my education.

– Mark Twain

Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.

– Mark Twain

In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.

– Mark Twain

Soap and education are not as sudden as a massacre, but they are more deadly in the long run.

– Mark Twain

The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

– Mark Twain

Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain.

– Mark Twain

I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

– Mark Twain

The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.

– Mark Twain

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.

– Mark Twain

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.

– Mark Twain

A man’s character may be learned from the adjectives which he habitually uses in conversation.

– Mark Twain

Prophesy is a good line of business, but it is full of risks.

– Mark Twain

It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.

– Mark Twain

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.

– Mark Twain

Prosperity is the best protector of principle.

– Mark Twain

We have the best government that money can buy.

– Mark Twain

Honesty is the best policy – when there is money in it.

– Mark Twain

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.

– Mark Twain

It is not best that we should all think alike it is a difference of opinion that makes horse races.

– Mark Twain

If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.

– Mark Twain

When angry, count to four when very angry, swear.

– Mark Twain

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.

– Mark Twain

Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been.

– Mark Twain

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

– Mark Twain

Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of eighty and gradually approach eighteen.

– Mark Twain