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. – H.L. Mencken
Taxation, for example, is eternally lively; it concerns nine-tenths of us more directly than either smallpox or golf, and has just as much drama in it; moreover, it has been mellowed and made gay by as many gaudy, preposterous theories. – H.L. Mencken
Unquestionably, there is progress. The average American now pays out twice as much in taxes as he formerly got in wages. – H.L. Mencken
A Galileo could no more be elected president of the United States than he could be elected Pope of Rome. Both high posts are reserved for men favored by God with an extraordinary genius for swathing the bitter facts of life in bandages of self-illusion. – H.L. Mencken
Puritanism: the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy. – H.L. Mencken
It is impossible to believe that the same God who permitted His own son to die a bachelor regards celibacy as an actual sin. – H.L. Mencken
Immorality: The morality of those who are having a better time. – H.L. Mencken
Why assume so glibly that the God who presumably created the universe is still running it? It is certainly conceivable that He may have finished it and then turned it over to lesser gods to operate. – H.L. Mencken
If I ever marry, it will be on a sudden impulse — as a man shoots himself. – H.L. Mencken
Men have a much better time of it than women. For one thing, they marry later; for another thing, they die earlier. – H.L. Mencken
The way to hold a husband is to keep him a little jealous; the way to lose him is to keep him a little more jealous. – H.L. Mencken
No married man is genuinely happy if he has to drink worse whisky than he used to drink when he was single. – H.L. Mencken
A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married. – H.L. Mencken
The basic fact about human existence is not that it is a tragedy, but that it is a bore. It is not so much a war as an endless standing in line. – H.L. Mencken
We are here and now. Further than that, all knowledge is moonshine. – H.L. Mencken
Injustice is relatively easy to bear; it is justice that hurts. – H.L. Mencken
Judge: a law student who marks his own papers. – H.L. Mencken
Say what you will about the Ten Commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of them. – H.L. Mencken
Legend: A lie that has attained the dignity of age. – H.L. Mencken
Historian: an unsuccessful novelist. – H.L. Mencken
