I was young and foolish then; now I am old and foolisher.

A pessimist is a well-informed optimist.

But we love the Old Travelers. We love to hear them prate and drivel and lie.

Consider the average intelligence of the common man, then realize 50% are even stupider.

In the small town of Hannibal, Missouri, when I was a boy, everybody was poor, but didn't know it; and everybody was comfortable and did know it.

You cannot have a theory without principles. Principles is another name for prejudices.

I thought tamarinds were made to eat, but that was probably not the idea. I ate several, and it seemed to me that they were rather sour that year. They pursed up my lips, till they resembled the stem-end of a tomato, and I had to take my sustenance through a quill for twenty-four hours. They sharpened my teeth till I could have shaved with them, and gave them a 'wire edge' that I was afraid would stay; but a citizen said 'no, it will come off when the enamel does' - which was comforting, at any rate. I found, afterward, that only strangers eat tamarinds - but they only eat them once.