Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer. Among his novels are The Adventures of Tom Sawyerand its sequel, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the latter often called "The Great American Novel"...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth30 November 1835
CountryUnited States of America
afflict amusing array arrest ashamed bunch cash civilization corner government high holy hottest introduce islands lamp life loose moral novelty poor primitive simple sleepy splendor turn wise
We must annex those people. We can afflict them with our wise and beneficent government. We can introduce the novelty of thieves, all the way up from street-car pickpockets to municipal robbers and Government defaulters, and show them how amusing it is to arrest them and try them and then turn them loose -- some for cash and some for ''political influence.'' We can make them ashamed of their simple and primitive justice. We can make that little bunch of sleepy islands the hottest corner on earth, and array it in the moral splendor of our high and holy civilization. Annexation is what the poor islanders need. ''Shall we to men benighted, the lamp of life deny?''
example few good harder
Few things are harder to put up with than a good example.
few minutes saved sermon sinners twenty
Few sinners are saved after the first twenty minutes of a sermon
believing faith
Faith is believing what you know ain't so.
belief believes delightful distort facts man please
Facts, or what a man believes to be facts, are always delightful - Get your facts first, and - then you can distort 'em as much as you please
acts himself known led life none wee
What a wee little part of a person's life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself
lightning thunder
Thunder is impressive, but it is lightning that does the work.
action lightning thunder work
Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does all the work
action firmly ground nose threw top
Thrusting my nose firmly between his teeth, I threw him heavily to the ground on top of me
learning trouble wages
What's the use you learning to do right, when it's troublesome to do right and ain't no trouble to do wrong, and the wages is just the same?
against dog home mama pack time trunk turns wife
When a man's dog turns against him it is time for a wife to pack her trunk and go home to mama
convict conviction known man people settled
When a man is known to have no settled convictions of his own he can't convict other people
again careful cat caution cold experience hot lest sit stop wisdom
We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it / and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again / and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.
century ghosts great half
Boy, can't you feel the ghosts of a century and a half of great thinkers, especially Twain?