Get Started
Home Authors Tags
Photo of h l mencken

H L Mencken Quotes

Biography

H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) was a prominent American journalist, essayist, and cultural critic. He is best known for his satirical reportage on the Scopes "Monkey" Trial, published in "The Baltimore Sun," and his influential book "The American Language" (1919), which documented and celebrated American English. more H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) was a prominent American journalist, essayist, and cultural critic. He is best known for his satirical reportage on the Scopes "Monkey" Trial, published in "The Baltimore Sun," and his influential book "The American Language" (1919), which documented and celebrated American English. During the 1920s, Mencken co-edited the literary magazine "The Smart Set" and co-founded "The American Mercury," a periodical that became a platform for some of the era's most incisive social criticism. Mencken's acerbic wit and keen observations made him a formidable figure in early 20th-century American letters. He remained a significant voice in American journalism until a stroke in 1948 left him unable to write. less

Popular Quotes

"It is now quite lawful for a Catholic woman to avoid pregnancy by a resort to mathematics."
Tags: Religion, Women's rights, Mathematics, Catholicism, Pregnancy
"Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt."
Tags: Philosophy, Wisdom, Self-awareness, Human nature, Belief
"A professor must have a theory as a dog must have fleas"
Tags: Wisdom, Knowledge, Humor, Education, Insight
"A man always remembers his first love with special tenderness, but after that he begins to bunch them"
Tags: Love, Relationships, Romance, Affection, Nostalgia
"A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier"
Tags: Communication, Ignorance, Bias, Public perception, Propaganda
"Sunday School: A prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents"
Tags: Criticism, Childhood, Children, Parental responsibility
"Every election is a sort of advance auction sale of stolen goods"
Tags: Politics, Government, Democracy, Satire, Cynicism
"The smallest deed is better than the grandest intention"
Tags: Inspiration, Ethics, Productivity, Action, Values
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed and hence clamorous to be led to safety by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary"
Tags: Leadership, Safety, Political strategy, Political manipulation
"A wealthy man is a slave to his employees"
Tags: Power, Wealth, Control, Authority, Capitalism
"Wealth, after all, is a relative thing, since he that has little, and wants less, is richer than he that has much, and wants more"
Tags: Philosophy, Happiness, Contentment, Wealth, Minimalism
"The chief value of money lies in the fact that one lives in a world in which it is overestimated"
Tags: Philosophy, Life, Perception, Society, Wealth
"A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers, looks around for a coffin"
Tags: Philosophy, Perspective, Human nature, Irony, Skepticism
"The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out"
Tags: Freedom, Critical thinking, Liberty, Government, Individualism
"No one ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public"
Tags: Money, Criticism, Pop culture, Taste, Consumer behavior
Instagram Icon Facebook Icon X Icon Threads Icon