This fighting, no doubt, makes for human progress, for it favors the strong and the brave. Even the most logical religion starts out with patently false assumptions. #Love … Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”, “The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. -- H. L. Mencken . Mencken. Mencken's Smart Set Criticism”, p.222, Regnery Publishing. Explore the best of H. L. Mencken Quotes, as voted by our community. Mencken "Notes On Journalism". Religion is doing what you are told, no matter what is right. ″There is no other Jew in Baltimore who seems suitable,″ he said. Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. On the subject of Jews, Mencken wrote in December 1943 that the Maryland Club had decided against admitting any more Jewish members after the only one on its rolls died. Goodreads helps you follow your favorite authors. “In the present case it is a little inaccurate to say I hate everything. #Art #World #Puritan Put it in his hand and it's good-bye to the Bill of Rights. “Love is like war: easy to begin but very hard to stop.” -- H. L. Mencken. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair.”, “On one issue, at least, men and women agree: they both distrust women.”, “Conscience is the inner voice that warns us somebody may be looking.”, “Where is the graveyard of dead gods? Santa Claus makes children good in precisely the same way, and yet no one would argue seriously that the fact proves his existence. Explore 76 quotes by H. L. Mencken, American Writer, born September 12, 1880, died January 29, 1956. A school is a hopper into which children are heaved while they are still young and tender; therein they are pressed into certain standard shapes and covered from head to heels with official rubber-stamps. Occupation Journalist, essayist, satirist, social critic Notable credit(s) The Baltimore Sun Spouse(s) Sara Haardt (1930–1935, her death) Parent(s) August Mencken Sr. (father) Relatives August Mencken … “Minority Report”, p.209, Knopf, H.L. Simply one who never says, does or thinks anything that is unusual. H. L. Mencken Quotes (127) - Poetry Has Done Enough When It Charm... - Quotes One Of The Most Mawkish Of Human Delusions Is The Notion That Friendship Should Be Eternal, Or, At All Events, Life-long, And That Any Act Which Puts A Term To It Is Somehow Discreditable. #Men #Average #Made “The great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom even ordinarily respectable.”-- H. L. Mencken . In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker. Famous quotes of H.L. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron. Quotes Did H. L. Mencken Say the ‘White House Will Be Adorned by a Downright Moron’? Gary Galles examines Mencken's thought. The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth. Share with your friends. Updated for 2021. “Minority Report”, p.250, Knopf. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane and intolerable, and so, if he is romantic, he tries to change it. All it can see in an original idea is potential change, and hence an invasion of its prerogatives. This makes me forever ineligible to any public office of trust or profit in the Republic. The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to put down dissent and originality. Indeed, it would not be far wrong to describe the best as the common enemy of all decent citizens. But I do not repine, for I am a subject of it only by force of arms.”, “A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin.”, “If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some sinner and wink your eye at some homely girl.”, “Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. Their principal device to that end is to search out groups who pant and pine for something they can't get and to promise to give it to them. Enjoy the best H. L. Mencken quotes and picture quotes! It also makes for beauty, for lesser men try to escape from a hopeless and intolerable world by creating a more lovely one of their own. Happiness is the china shop; love is the bull. All [zoos] actually offer to the public in return for the taxes spent upon them is a form of idle … The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant, in this field as in all others. They greatly prefer security, which means protection by some class above them. There has never been a really good one, and even those that are most tolerable are arbitrary, cruel, grasping and unintelligent. Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under. They achieve this collaring by buying votes with other people's money. It means that happiness is as fragile as a store … Donald Trump Was Predicted as President in 1926 by H.L. Why, then, do they expect to find honesty and humanity in government, a congeries of institutions whose modus operandi consists of lying, cheating, stealing, and if need be, murdering those who resist? – H. L. Mencken Rate it: The most dangerous man, to any government, is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. That is its aim in the United States, whatever the pretensions of politicians, pedagogues and other such mountebanks, and that is its aim everywhere else.”, “It is often argued that religion is valuable because it makes men good, but even if this were true it would not be a proof that religion is true. H. L. Mencken Sayings and Quotes. Download free high quality (4K) pictures and wallpapers with H. L. Mencken Quotes. Mencken, H.L. Mencken on Religion 5 likes Mencken (2013). Schools are maintained in order to bring this uniformity up to the highest possible point. Henry Louis Mencken famous quotes and aphorisms 2. Nothing could be further from the truth. The only liberty an inferior man really cherishes is the liberty to quit work, stretch out in the sun, and scratch himself. Nine times out of ten that promise is worth nothing. – H.L. He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. Chicago Tribune, September 19, 1926. “What Mencken most strongly objected to in religion was not the expression of nonsensical views—these could easily be combated by rebuttal from the other side—but the inveterate tendency of religion to seek the enforcement of its views by the power of the government.” ― H.L. There is a mistake in the text of this quote. H. L. Mencken Quotes "The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." Liberty is of small value to the lower third of humanity. H. L. Mencken The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. If it be aristocratic in organization, then it seeks to protect the man who is superior only in law against the man who is superior in fact; if it be democratic, then it seeks to protect the man who is inferior in every way against both. Mencken (2013). Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. The main thing that every political campaign in the United States demonstrates is that the politicians of all parties, despite their superficial enmities, are really members of one great brotherhood. School teachers, taking them by and large, are probably the most ignorant and stupid class of men in the whole group of mental workers. What lingering mourner waters their mounds? H.L. The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary. He is forever entering bold exceptions to the rulings of the bench of gods. Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats. His culture is based on "I am not too sure.”, “Truth would quickly cease to be stranger than fiction, once we got as used to it.”, “Happiness is the china shop; love is the bull.”, “Explanations exist; they have existed for all time; there is always a well-known solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong.”, “I am suspicious of all the things that the average people believes.”, “You can't do anything about the length of your life, but you can do something about its width and depth.”, “The most erroneous assumption is to the effect that the aim of public education is to fill the young of the species with knowledge and awaken their intelligence, and so make them fit to discharge the duties of citizenship in an enlightened and independent manner. H. L. Mencken Quotes September 12, 1880 – January 29, 1956 Henry Louis Mencken (12 September 1880 – 29 January 1956), better known as H. L. Mencken, was a twentieth-century journalist, satirist, social critic, cynic, and freethinker, known as the "Sage of Baltimore" and the "American Nietzsche". He is, more likely, one who likes his country more than the rest of us, and is thus more disturbed than the rest of us when he sees it debauched. Sometimes the idiots outvote the sensible people. “ No matter how happily a woman may be married, it always pleases her to discover that there is a nice man who wishes that she were not. And even if he is not romantic personally he is very apt to spread discontent among those who are.”, “Civilization, in fact, grows more maudlin and hysterical; especially under democracy it tends to degenerate into a mere combat of crazes; the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, and intolerable...”, “In the present case it is a little inaccurate to say I hate everything. That would be an extension of pragmatism beyond endurance. "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." Every theologian spends a large part of his time and energy trying to prove that religions for which multitudes of honest men have fought and died are false, wicked, and against God.”, “All government, in its essence, is a conspiracy against the superior man: its one permanent object is to oppress him and cripple him. 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. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all. The defense of religion is full of such logical imbecilities. The (Baltimore) Evening Sun, where Mencken once worked, published excerpts Monday. In other words, government is a broker in pillage, and every election is sort of an advance auction sale of stolen goods. Mencken (2012). — H. L. Mencken “ The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself. Mencken. It is the classic fallacy of our time that a moron run through a university and decorated with a Ph.D. will thereby cease to be a moron. “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.145, Vintage, H. L. Mencken (2000). “Notes On Democracy”, p.76, Knopf, H. L. Mencken, Marion Elizabeth Rodgers (2010). Mencken quotes illustrate why he's America's most famed cultural critic. Every day we present the best quotes! It is often argued in support of this or that one that men are so devoted to it that they are willing to die for it. Below you will find our collection of inspirational, wise, and humorous old h. l. mencken quotes, h. l. mencken sayings, and h. l. mencken proverbs, collected over the years from a variety of sources. “H.L. The State doesn't just want you to obey, it wants to make you WANT to obey. Quotations by H. L. Mencken, American Writer, Born September 12, 1880. Mencken's Notebooks (222), 1956. #Truth #Opposites #Errors “If the average man is made in God's image, then such a man as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God.”-- H. L. Mencken . H. L. Mencken Freedom Order Men A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man. If a politician found he had cannibals among his constituents, he would promise them missionaries for dinner. Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it … “H.L. Their principal, and indeed their sole, object is to collar public office, with all the privileges and profits that go therewith. Other men are just as devoted to manifestly false religions, and just as willing to die for them. Mencken. He is not a bad citizen turning to crime; he is a good citizen driven to despair. Religion is a conceited effort to deny the most obvious realities. H.L. There is no idea so stupid that you can't find a professor who will believe it. Philosophy consists very largely of one philosopher arguing that all others are jackasses. The aim is to make 'good' citizens, which is to say, docile and uninquisitive citizens. They have, taking one with another, no special talent for the business of government; they have only a talent for getting and holding office. The plain fact is that education is itself a form of propaganda - a deliberate scheme to outfit the pupil, not with the capacity to weigh ideas, but with a simple appetite for gulping ideas ready-made. Donald Trump Was Predicted as President in 1926 by H.L. There's a delightful exercise in the imagination of how H. L. Mencken, the iconic iconoclast of the early 20th Century, would have viewed the election of … Mencken (2012). Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard. He usually proves it, and I should add that he also usually proves that he is one himself. They are always in favor of despots who promise to feed them. There was a time when Jupiter was the king of the gods, and any man who doubted his puissance was, “The best teacher is not the one who knows most but the one who is most capable of reducing knowledge to that simple compound of the obvious and wonderful.”, “A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.”, “We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.”, “Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. If you want to know more or withdraw your consent to all or some of the cookies, please refer to the, H.L. Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account. Let us know what’s wrong with this preview of. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty and common decency. The demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots. The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule. No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Mencken. H.L. Sourced quotations by the American Journalist H. L. Mencken (1880 — 1956) about man, human and government. Aiden Mason 4 years ago. The are now begun by first throwing a mob into a panic; they are ended only when it has spent its ferine fury.”, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard.”, “The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth.”, We’d love your help. The government consists of a gang of men exactly like you and me. "On Politics: A Carnival of Buncombe". The tenth time is made good by looting A to satisfy B. And a major theme of his writings was that "Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under." “The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.” ~ H. L. Mencken. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. — … Welcome back. No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Mencken: Prejudices: First, Second, and Third Series”, Hubsta Ltd, H.L. And what is a good citizen? "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." The theologians, taking one with another, are adept logicians, but every now and then they have to resort to sophistries so obvious that their whole case takes on an air of the ridiculous. Mencken was perhaps America's most outspoken defender of liberty in the first half of the 20th Century. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. H.L. A detractor of democracy, religion, and social norms, these H.L. People do not expect to find chastity in a whorehouse. Book by H L. Mencken, 1956. I am strongly in favor of … The notion that a radical is one who hates his country is naïve and usually idiotic. “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.29, Vintage, H. L. Mencken (1924). "Charting the Candidates '72" by Ronald Van Doren, 1972. “Prejudices Fourth Series”. The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out... without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Minority Report : H.L. The only good bureaucrat is one with a pistol at his head. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at … One of its primary functions is to regiment men by force, to make them as much alike as possible and as dependent upon one another as possible, to search out and combat originality among them. That, of course, is as silly as the Santa Claus proof. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.”, “Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.”, “An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it makes a better soup.”, “Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.”, “The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. For every problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. 9. Morality is doing what is right, no matter what you are told. Mencken. Mencken (2013). The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Wars are no longer waged by the will of superior men, capable of judging dispassionately and intelligently the causes behind them and the effects flowing out of them. 8. Government is actually the worst failure of civilized man. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable. H. L. Mencken Mencken in 1928 Born Henry Louis Mencken (1880-09-12) September 12, 1880 Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. Died January 29, 1956 (1956-01-29) (aged 75) Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. Socialist: A man suffering from an overwhelming conviction to believe what is not true. Improve yourself, find your inspiration, share with friends, This website or its third-party tools use cookies, which are necessary to its functioning and required to achieve the purposes illustrated in the cookie policy. “I know some who are constantly drunk on books as other men are drunk on whiskey.”, “The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.”, “As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. • Rex Tillerson’s alleged comment that President Trump was “a moron” (G2, 12 October) brings to reality the words of HL Mencken in … It is the classic fallacy of our time that a moron run through a university and … Henry Louis (H.L.) Be the first to learn about new releases!

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