Josh Billings
Josh Billings
Josh Billings was the pen name of 19th-century American humorist Henry Wheeler Shaw. He was a famous humor writer and lecturer in the United States, perhaps second only to Mark Twain, during the latter half of the 19th century...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth21 April 1818
CityLanesborough, MA
CountryUnited States of America
stupidity balls cannons
You can reach stupidity only with a cannon ball.
pedantry
Pedantry is paraded knowledge.
errors doorways sticks
Error will slip through a crack, while truth will stick in a doorway.
doubt cards doe
Zoroaster said, when in doubt abstain; but this does not always apply. At cards, when in doubt take the trick.
ears tails ends
Despatch is taking time by the ears; hurry is taking it by the end of the tail.
wicked world fool
The fools in this world make about as much trouble as the wicked do.
husband jealous thinking
Menny think tha luv their husbands almost tew deth, when in fack, tha are only jealous ov them.
pockets creeds
Sekts and creeds ov religion, are like pocket compesses, good enuff tu pinte out the direction, but the nearer the pole yu git thewuss tha wurk.
believe sides want
As a general rule, if you want to get at the truth - hear both sides and believe neither.
animal ridiculous reason
If animals had reason, they would act just as ridiculous as we menfolks do.
integrity humor liberty
Liberty, like chastity, once lost, can never be regained in its original purity.
age growing hardest
The easiest thing for our friends to discover in us, and the hardest thing for us to discover in ourselves, is that we are growing old.
parent age ancestry
Pedigrees seldom improve by age; the grandson is too often a weak infringement on the grandsire's parent.
appreciation eye men
Men are seldom underrated; the mercury in a man finds its true level in the eyes of the world just as certainly as it does in the glass of a thermometer.