H.L. Mencken Quotes

The older I grow the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.

We are here and it is now. Further than that all human knowledge is moonshine.

Giving every man a vote has no more made men wise and free than Christianity has made them good.

Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule—and both commonly succeed, and are right.

Democracy is the art of running the circus from the monkey cage.

Men are the only animals that devote themselves, day in and day out, to making one another unhappy. It is an art like any other. Its virtuosi are called altruists.

It is hard to tell if a man is telling the truth when you know you would lie if you were in his place.

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.