Age is strictly a case of
mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.
— Mark Twain
There are three things which I consider excellent advice. First, don't smoke to access. Second,
don't drink to excess. Third, don't marry to excess.
— Mark Twain
Fleas can be taught nearly anything that a congressman can.
— 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
It could probably be shown by facts and figures that there is no distinctly native American criminal
class except Congress.
— Mark Twain
Few of us can stand prosperity — another man's, I mean.
— Mark Twain
It is my belief that nearly any invented quotation, played with
confidence, stands a good chance to deceive.
— Mark Twain
I am opposed to millionaires, but it would be dangerous to offer me
the position.
— Mark Twain
There are two times in a man's life when he should not
speculate: when he can't afford it, and when he can.
— Mark Twain
When your friends begin to flatter you on how young you look,
it's a sure sign you're getting old.
— Mark Twain
I don't think there ever was a lazy man in this world. Every man has some sort of gift, and
he prizes that gift beyond all others. He may be a professional billiard-player, or a Paderewski, or a
poet — I don't care what it is. But whatever it is, he takes a native delight
in exploiting that gift, and you will find it is difficult to beguile
him away from it. Well, there are thousands of other interests occupying other men, but those interests
don't appeal to the special tastes of the billiard champion or Paderewski. They are set down, therefore, as
too lazy to do that or do this — to do, in short what they have no taste or inclination to do. In that
sense, then I am phenomenally lazy. But when it comes to writing a book — I am not lazy. My family find it
difficult to dig me out of my chair.
— Mark Twain, quoted in Sydney Morning Herald, 9/17/1895
He charged nothing for his preaching and it was worth it
too.
— Mark Twain
Of course, no man is entirely in his right mind at any time.
— Mark Twain
Keep away from people who
try to belittle your ambition. Small people always do that,
but the really great make you feel that you, too, can
become great.
— Mark Twain
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure.
— Mark Twain
I don't give a damn for any man who can spell a word only one
way.
— Mark Twain
It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a
good impromptu speech.
— Mark Twain
Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often.
— Mark Twain
I am no lazier now than I was forty years ago, but that is
because I reached the limit forty years ago. You can't go beyond possibility.
— Mark Twain
What work I have done I have done because it has been play.
If it had been work I shouldn't have done it. Who was it who said, "Blessed is the man who has found his
work"? Whoever it was he had the right idea in his mind. Mark you, he says his work — not somebody else's
work. The work that is really a man's own work is play and not work at all. Cursed is the man who has found
some other man's work and cannot lose it. When we talk about the great workers of the world we really mean
the great players of the world. The fellows who groan and sweat under the weary load of toil that they bear
never can hope to do anything great. How can they when their souls are in a ferment of revolt against the
employment of their hands and brains? The product of slavery, intellectual or physical, can never be
great.
— Mark Twain
You can't reach old age by another man's road. My habits protect my life
but they would assassinate you.
— Mark Twain, 70th birthday speech, 1905
Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at
the age of 80 and gradually approach 18.
— Mark Twain
There's always something about your success that displeases even your best
friends.
— Mark Twain
Men and women — even man and wife are foreigners. Each has reserves that the other cannot
enter into, nor understand. These have the effect of frontiers.
— Mark Twain
In the first place God made idiots. That was for practice.
Then he made school boards.
— Mark Twain
Forgiveness is the fragrance the violet sheds on
the heel
that has crushed it.
— Mark Twain
Be careless in your dress if you will, but keep a tidy
soul.
— Mark Twain
There are several good protections against temptation, but the surest is cowardice.
— Mark Twain
It's a good idea to obey all the rules when you're young just
so you'll have the strength to break them when you're old.
— Mark Twain
Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of joy you must have somebody to
divide it with.
— Mark Twain
Never tell the truth to people who are not worth of it.
— Mark Twain
The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much; if he is an optimist after it, he
knows too little.
— Mark Twain
Too much of anything is bad, but too much of good whiskey is barely enough.
— Mark Twain
We ought never to do wrong when people are looking.
— Mark Twain
Let us not be too particular: it is better to hav old secondhand diamonds than none at
all.
— Mark Twain
Do something every day that you don't want to do; this is the
golden rule for acquiring the habit of doing your duty without pain.
— Mark Twain
Have a place for everything and keep the thing somewhere else; this is not a piece of
advice, it is merely a custom.
— Mark Twain
Always acknowledge a fault. This will throw those in authority off their guard and give you
an opportunity to commit more.
— Mark Twain
Let us endeavor so to live that
when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.
—
Mark Twain
I have found out that there ain't no surer way to find out whether
you like people or hate them than to travel with them.
That joke was lost on the foreigner — guides cannot
master the subtleties of the American joke.
— Mark Twain
Be virtuous and you will be eccentric.
— Mark Twain
It is the epitome of life. The first half of life consists of
the capacity to enjoy without the chance; the last half consists of the chance without the capacity.
— Mark Twain
Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the
ideal life.
— Mark Twain
Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as possible.
— Mark Twain
He has been a doctor a year now and has had two patients, no, three, I think — yes, it was
three; I attended their funerals.
— Mark Twain
To be good is noble; but to show others how to be good is nobler and no trouble.
— Mark Twain
Never run after you own hat — others will be delighted
to do it; why spoil their fun?
— Mark Twain
If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. this is the
principal difference between a man and a dog.
— Mark Twain
Training is everything. The peach was once a bitter almond; cauliflower is nothing but
cabbage with a college education.
— Mark Twain
If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he
will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a man and a dog.
— Mark Twain
Being rich ain't what it's cracked up to be. It's just worry
and worry, and sweat and sweat, and a-wishing you was dead all the time.
— Mark Twain
The offspring of riches: Pride, vanity, ostentation,
arrogance, tyranny.
— Mark Twain
If all men were rich, all men would be poor.
— Mark Twain
It is easier for a needle to go through a camel's eye than
for a rich woman to sprain her ancle & keep it out of the papers.
— Mark Twain
Some men worship rank, some worship heroes, some worship
power, some worship God, & over these ideals they dispute & cannot unite — but they all worship
money.
— Mark Twain
I have been an author for 20 years and an ass for 55.
— Mark Twain
An author values a compliment even when it comes from a
source of doubtful competency.
— Mark Twain
Education consists mainly in what we have unlearned.
— Mark Twain
Heaven goes by favor; if it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in.
— Mark Twain
What a man misses most in heaven is company.
— Mark Twain
Be respectful to your superiors, if you have any.
— Mark Twain, Advice to Young People speech, 15 April 1882