At 50, a man can be an ass without being an optimist but not an optimist without being an ass

You can't pray a lie -- I found that out.

Every time you stop a school, you will have to build a jail. What you gain at one end you lose at the other. It's like feeding a dog on his own tail. It won't fatten the dog.

By and by when each nation has 20,000 battleships and 5,000,000 soldiers we shall all be safe and the wisdom of statesmanship will stand confirmed.

Conscience, man's moral medicine chest.

The minute we get reconciled to a person, how willing we are to throw aside little needless punctilios and pronounce his name right.

I have attended operas, whenever I could not help it, for fourteen years now; I am sure I know of no agony comparable to the listening to an unfamiliar opera.