Josh Billings Quotes

Fools carry their daggers in their open mouths.

Reason often makes mistakes, but conscience never does.

The best creed we can have is charity toward the creeds of others.

There are lots of people who mistake their imagination for their memory.

Economy is a savings-bank, into which men drop pennies, and get dollars in return.

It's a wise man who profits by his own experience, but it's a good deal wiser one who lets the rattlesnake bite the other fellow.

There's one good thing about tight shoes; they make you forget your other troubles.

Habits are like the wrinkles on a man's brow; if you will smooth out the one, I will smooth out the other.

A witty writer is like a porcupine; his quill makes no distinction between friend and foe.

Genius ain't anything more than elegant common sense.

Wise men have but few confidants, and cunning ones none.

Human happiness konsists in having what yu want, and wanting what yu have.

There never yet was a mother who taught her child to be an infidel.

Metaphysics is the science of proving what we don't understand.

As a general rule, if you want to get at the truth - hear both sides and believe neither.

Liberty, like chastity, once lost, can never be regained in its original purity.

Self-made men are most always apt to be a little too proud of the job.

Man isn't a fool for his ignorance, but rather for believing things that are wrong.

If the world despises a hypocrite, what must they think of him in heaven?

Take all the fools out of this world and there wouldn't be any fun living in it, or profit.

Pedantry is paraded knowledge.

There is only one good substitute for the endearments of a sister, and that is the endearments of some other fellow's sister.

Poverty is one of them kind of misfortunes that we all of us dread but none of us pity.

Better make a weak man your enemy than your friend.

Lying is like trying to hide in a fog: If you move about you're in danger of bumping your head against the truth, and as soon as the fog blows off, you are gone anyhow.

Adam invented love at first sight, one of the greatest labor-saving machines the world ever saw.

The fools in this world make about as much trouble as the wicked do.

When the truth is in your way, you are on the wrong road.

Never work before breakfast; if you have to work before breakfast, eat your breakfast first.

One of the greatest victories you can gain over someone is to beat him at politeness.

The happiest time in any man's life is when he is in red-hot pursuit of a dollar with a reasonable prospect of overtaking it.

Peace is the soft and holy shadow that virtue casts.

Hunting after happiness is like hunting after a lost sheep in the wilderness--when you find it, the chances are that it is a skeleton.

I don't care how much a man talks, if he only says it in a few words.

No one can disgrace us but ourselves.

Plenty of folks are so contrary that if they should fall into the river, they would insist upon floating upstream.

I do not know of a better cure for sorrow than to pity somebody else.

Too many individuals are like Shakespeare's definition of "echo,"--babbling gossips of the air.

A good place to visit, but a poor place to stay.

There are people who are always anticipating trouble, and in this way they manage to enjoy many sorrows that never really happen to them.

Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just, But four times he who gets his blow in fust

Suicide is cheating the doctor out of job.

Young widows still bide their time.

Woman's influence is powerful, especially when she wants something.

If men were stubborn just in proportion as they were right, stubbornness would take her seat among the virtues; but men are generally stubborn just in proportion as they are ignorant and wrong.

Half of the troubles of this life can be traced to saying yes too quickly and not saying no soon enough.

The books are balanced in heaven, not here.

There is no limit to the vanity of this world. Each spoke in the wheel thinks the whole strength of the wheel depends upon it.