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Mark Twain

Mark Twain Quotes

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Famous Mark Twain Quotes

“It is a time when one’s spirit is subdued and sad, one knows not why; when the past seems a storm-swept desolation, life a vanity and a burden, and the future but a way to death. It is a time when one is filled with vague longings; when one dreams of flight to peaceful islands in the remote solitudes of the sea, or folds his hands and says, What is the use of struggling, and toiling and worrying any more? let us give it all up.”

KnowsWayGivingUseDreamHandsSeemsPastSpiritWorryStruggleSeaSolitudeFilledLongingBurdenStormFlightPeacefulVanityIslandsVagueFoldsDesolationToiling
Book:The Complete Works of Mark Twain: All 13 Novels, Short Stories, Poetry and Essays
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“It's spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you've got it, you want—oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!”

KnowsWantHeartNamesSpringAcheFeverSpringtimeSpring PoemsApril And SpringSpring FlowersSpring SeasonSpring TimeHeart AcheThink SpringSpring InspirationalFirst Day Of SpringWelcome SpringSpring GardeningSpringtime InspirationalFunny SpringHappy SpringSpring BreakSpring In Your Step
Book:10 Books in 1
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“The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creatures that cannot.”

KnowsMenFactsHumanityCan DoAnimalMoralProveCreaturesIntellectualIntelligentRecoveryVegetarianVeganAnimal RightsSuperiorityVeganismInferiorityAnimal WelfareHuman AnimalHumans And AnimalsAnimal CompassionInferiority ComplexAnimal EthicsVivisectionKindness To AnimalsImpertinenceMoral SuperiorityIntellectual Superiority
Book:Mark Twain’s Book of Animals
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“It is just like man's vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions. Heaven is by favor; if it were by merit your dog would go in and you would stay out. Of all the creatures ever made he (man) is the most detestable. Of the entire brood, he is the only one...that possesses malice. He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain. The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot.”

IfsKnowsMenMadeFactsPainHeavenSportsCan DoAnimalMoralKnowingDogHe ManProveCreaturesPerceptionIntellectualFavorsVanityDumbMeritDullSuperiorityMaliceInferiorityHumans And AnimalsImpertinenceIntellectual Superiority
Author:Mark Twain
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“You know that kind of quiver that trembles around through you when you are seeing something so strange and enchanting and wonderful that it is just a fearful joy to be alive and look at it; and you know how you gaze, and your lips turn dry and your breath comes short, but you wouldn't be anywhere but there, not for the world.”

KnowsWorldLooksKindJoyTurnsKnow HowAliveWonderfulSeeingStrangeBreathsLipsDryFearfulEnchantingQuiver
Book:The Mysterious Stranger and Other Stories
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“Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.”

KnowsMenLoveHas BeensSeemsTimeGrowthMemoriesPerfectLove IsMarriageCenturyLove YouMarriedDivorceMy WifeQuartersInspirational LoveWeddingBeing MarriedMarriage AdviceFunny MarriageGetting MarriedHappy MarriageLove And MarriageMarriage LifePerfect LovePositive MarriageGood MarriageMarriage LoveInspiring LoveWedding AnniversaryMarried ManGreat MarriageMarried WomenWedding MarriageInspirational MarriageBest MarriageWedding ToastLasting MarriageWeddings And MarriageNewlywedsWeddings And LoveWedding LoveHappy DivorceMarriage DivorcePerfect WomanGreat WeddingMarriage And Love InspirationalMarried LoveQuarter Of A CenturyWives LoveMarriage AnniversaryPerfect MarriageGreat WifeWedding SentimentsHappy Marriage AdviceMarriage ToastMarriage Advice For NewlywedsMarriage EngagementMarriage Wisdom50th Wedding AnniversaryParents MarriagePerfect HusbandWhat Is MarriagePerfect Wife
Book:The Complete Works of Mark Twain (Illustrated Edition): Novels, Short Stories, Memoir, Travel Books, Letters, Biography, Articles & Speeches: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn, Life on the Mississippi, Yankee in King Arthur's Court…
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“You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. That book was made by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. That is nothing. I never seen anybody but lied one time or another, without it was Aunt Polly, or the widow, or maybe Mary. Aunt Polly—Tom's Aunt Polly, she is—and Mary, and the Widow Douglas is all told about in that book, which is mostly a true book, with some stretchers, as I said before.”

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Author:Mark Twain
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“The mind that becomes soiled in youth can never again be washed clean. I know this by my own experience, & to this day I cherish an unappeased bitterness against the unfaithful guardians of my young life, who not only permitted but compelled me to read an unexpurgated Bible through before I was 15 years old. None can do that and ever draw a clean sweet breath again on this side of the grave.”

KnowsYearsMindYoungSidesCan DoMy OwnYouthSweetDrawsBreathsCleanGravesThis DayCherishBitternessCompelledGuardianUnfaithfulYoung Life
Author:Mark Twain
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“So you see, the quality of humor is not a personal or a national monopoly. It's as free as salvation, and, I am afraid, far more widely distributed. But it has its value, I think. The hard and sordid things of life are too hard and too sordid and too cruel for us to know and touch them year after year without some mitigating influence, some kindly veil to draw over them, from time to time, to blur the craggy outlines, and make the thorns less sharp and the cruelties less malignant.”

ThinkingKnowsYearsHardHumorValuesQualityInfluenceDrawsSalvationCrueltyVeilsMonopolyThornsOutlinesBlur
Book:Mainly the truth: interviews with Mark Twain
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“All schools, all colleges, have two great functions: to confer, and to conceal, valuable knowledge. The theological knowledge which they conceal cannot justly be regarded as less valuable than that which they reveal. That is, when a man is buying a basket of strawberries it can profit him to know that the bottom half of it is rotten.”

KnowsMenTwoSchoolReligiousHalfKnowledgeCollegeFunctionBottomProfitEducationalValuableBuyingRottenTheologicalBasketsStrawberries
Book:Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations
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“The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also. I would not interfere with any one's religion, either to strengthen it or to weaken it. I am not able to believe one's religion can affect his hereafter one way or the other, no matter what that religion may be. But it may easily be a great comfort to him in this life-hence it is a valuable possession to him.”

KnowsMenWayBelieveMayMatterAbleReligionEasyMy OwnTeachComfortNo Matter WhatPossessionValuableOne WayThis LifeFollySuspectsInterfereAnother ManHereafterValuable Possessions
Author:Mark Twain
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“The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become until he goes abroad. I speak now, of course, in the supposition that the gentle reader has not been abroad, and therefore is not already a consummate ass. If the case be otherwise, I beg his pardon and extend to him the cordial hand of fellowship and call him brother.”

IfsKnowsHandsCoursesSpeakCasesBrotherReaderTravelAssGentleFellowshipPardonGreat TravelSuppositionTravel AbroadTravel ExperienceSpeak Now
Book:The Innocents Abroad
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“I am technically "boss" of the family which I am carrying along-but I am grateful to know that it is only technically - that the real authority rests on the other side of the house. It is placed there by a beneficent Providence, who foresaw before I was born, or, if he did not, he has found it out since - that I am not in any way qualified to travel alone.”

IfsKnowsWayRealFoundHouseSidesBornTravelAuthorityGratefulBossProvidenceQualifiedI Am Grateful
Book:Mark Twain Speaking
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“The self taught man seldom knows anything accurately, and he does not know a tenth as much as he could have known if he had worked under teachers, and besides, he brags, and is the means of fooling other thoughtless people into going and doing as he himself has done.”

PeopleIfsKnowsMenMeanDoeSelfDoneKnownLearningTeacherTaughtEducationalBragSelf Taught
Book:Stormfield Edition of the Writings of Mark Twain [pseud.].: What is man? and other essays
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“'Don't you worry, and don't you hurry.' I know that phrase by heart, and if all other music should perish out of the world it would still sing to me.”

IfsKnowsWorldShouldHeartStillsWorryPhrasesSarcastic
Book:MARK TWAIN Ultimate Collection: 370+ Titles in One Volume (Illustrated): The Adventures of Tom Sawyer & Huckleberry Finn, The Prince and the Pauper, The £1,000,000 Bank Note, A Horse’s Tale, Yankee in King Arthur's Court, The Innocents Abroad, Life on the Mississippi…
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“Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. As in the words of Wayne Dyer, when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. Sometimes to know with certainty that a particular thing is "true", will actually be the very thing that keeps you from attaining the things you seek to achieve.”

PeopleKnowsMenWayLooksLittlesSometimesEyeImaginationFocusInfluenceAchieveParticularHe ManInspirational LifeDependsClothesNakedCertaintyWayne
Author:Mark Twain
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“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure. You can "already know for sure" things that could actually impede progress. Always be on the lookout for the things you did not know, that you did not know. Secondly, work on strengthening personal belief that a particular will be achieved regardless of any adversity that may show up, or evidence to the contrary.”

KnowsNeedsMayShowsLife IsBeliefProgressIgnoranceParticularInspirational LifeEvidenceAdversityContraryThis LifeStrengtheningSure ThingPersonal Beliefs
Author:Mark Twain
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