I go on working for the same reason that a hen goes on laying eggs. There is in every living creature an obscure but powerful impulse to active functioning. Life demands to be lived. Inaction, save as a measure of recuperation between bursts of activity, is painful and dangerous to the healthy organism- in fact, it is almost impossible. Only the dying can be really idle.
H. L. MenckenIt 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. MenckenI know of no human being who has a better time than an eager and energetic young reporter.
H. L. MenckenCourtroom : A place where Jesus Christ and Judas Iscariot would be equals, with the betting odds favoring Judas.
H. L. MenckenOff goes the head of the king, and tyranny gives way to freedom. The change seems abysmal. Then, bit by bit, the face of freedom hardens, and by and by it is the old face of tyranny. Then another cycle, and another. But under the play of all these opposites there is something fundamental and permanent - the basic delusion that men may be governed and yet be free.
H. L. Mencken