Mark Twain Life Quotations

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.

Apparently there is nothing that cannot happen today.

Never argue with stupid people, they will drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

There was never yet an uninteresting life. Such a thing is an impossibility. Inside of the dullest exterior there is a drama, a comedy, and a tragedy.

The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.

Part of the secret of a success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence, and then success is sure.

You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.

Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.

Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.

Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.

In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.

Never put off till tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.

When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.

Why is it that we rejoice at a birth and grieve at a funeral? It is because we are not the person involved.

When your friends begin to flatter you on how young you look, it's a sure sign you're getting old.

It's no wonder that truth is stranger than fiction. Fiction has to make sense.

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.

When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet in his private heart no man much respects himself.

I was seldom able to see an opportunity until it had ceased to be one.

Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I've done it thousands of times.

Drag your thoughts away from your troubles... by the ears, by the heels, or any other way you can manage it.

A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval.

Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint.

Only one thing is impossible for God: To find any sense in any copyright law on the planet.

Noise proves nothing. Often a hen who has merely laid an egg cackles as if she laid an asteroid.

Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.

One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.

It put our energies to sleep and made visionaries of us - dreamers and indolent... It is good to begin life poor; it is good to begin life rich - these are wholesome; but to begin it prospectively rich! The man who has not experienced it cannot imagine the curse of it.

'Classic.' A book which people praise and don't read.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

When angry, count to four; when very angry, swear.

I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

A man is never more truthful than when he acknowledges himself a liar.

I can live for two months on a good compliment.

The only way to keep your health is to eat what you don't want, drink what you don't like, and do what you'd rather not.

To be good is noble; but to show others how to be good is nobler and no trouble.

The more you explain it, the more I don't understand it.

Obscurity and competence - that is the life that is best worth living

Obscurity and competence: That is the life that is worth living.

Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the storm of thought that is forever flowing through one's head.

Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside

Life should begin with age and its privileges and accumulations, and end with youth and its capacity to splendidly enjoy such advantages.

It is a pity that we cannot escape from life when we are young.

It is not likely that any complete life has ever been lived which was not a failure in the secret judgment of the person that lived it

We recognize that there are no trivial occurences in life

We can't reach old age by another man's road. My habits protect my life but they would assassinate you.

There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy's life that he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure

We must annex those people. We can afflict them with our wise and beneficent government. We can introduce the novelty of thieves, all the way up from street-car pickpockets to municipal robbers and Government defaulters, and show them how amusing it is to arrest them and try them and then turn them loose -- some for cash and some for ''political influence.'' We can make them ashamed of their simple and primitive justice. We can make that little bunch of sleepy islands the hottest corner on earth, and array it in the moral splendor of our high and holy civilization. Annexation is what the poor islanders need. ''Shall we to men benighted, the lamp of life deny?''

What a wee little part of a person's life are his acts and his words! His real life is led in his head, and is known to none but himself

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.

The Ganges front is the supreme showplace of Benares. Its tall bluffs are solidly caked from water to summit, along a stretch of three miles, with a splendid jumble of massive and picturesque masonry, a bewildering and beautiful confusion of stone platforms, temples, stair flights, rich and stately palaces....soaring stairways, sculptured temples, majestic palaces, softening away into the distances; and there is movement, motion, human life everywhere, and brilliantly costumed - streaming in rainbows up and down the lofty stairways, and massed in metaphorical gardens on the mile of great platforms at the river's edge.

The first half of life consists of the capacity to enjoy without the chance; the last half consists of the chance without the capacity.

Each person is born to one possession which outvalues all his others-his last breath.

Oh Death where is thy sting! It has none. But life has.

Only when a republic's life is in danger should a man uphold his government when it is wrong. There is no other time.

Life is short, Break the Rules. Forgive quickly, Kiss SLOWLY. Love truly. Laugh uncontrollably And never regret ANYTHING That makes you smile.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and starting on the first one.

The more I learn about people, the more I like my dog.

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.

No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session.

Good judgement is the result of experience and experience the result of bad judgement.

Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option.

God created war so that Americans would learn geography.

What would men be without women? Scarce, sir...mighty scarce.

Humor is mankind's greatest blessing.

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.

It is wiser to find out than to suppose.

The miracle or the power that elevates the few is to be found in their industry, application and perseverance under the promptings of a brave, determined spirit.

We are discreet sheep; we wait to see how the drove is going, and then go with the drove.

Sing like no one is listening, LOVE LIKE YOU'VE NEVER BEEN HURT, dance like nobody's watcbing, and live like it's heaven on earth.

I've had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.

Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.

I can teach anybody how to get what they want out of life. The problem is that I can't find anybody who can tell me what they want.

Let us live so that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry.

The Bible has noble poetry in it... and some good morals and a wealth of obscenity, and upwards of a thousand lies.

In religion and politics people’s beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten at second-hand, and without examination, from authorities who have not themselves examined the questions at issue but have taken them at second-hand from other non-examiners, whose opinions about them were not worth a brass farthing.

There are two times in a man's life when he should not speculate: when he can't afford it, and when he can.

The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.

Never tell the truth to people who are not worthy of it.

Of all the animals, man is the only one that is cruel. He is the only one that inflicts pain for the pleasure of doing it.

A myriad of men are born; they labor and sweat and struggle; ...they squabble and scold and fight; they scramble for little mean advantages over each other; age creeps upon them; infirmities follow; ...those they love are taken from them, and the joy of life is turned to aching grief. It comes at last--the only unpoisoned gift earth ever had for them--and they vanish from a world where they were of no consequence, ...a world which will lament them a day and forget them forever.

When in doubt tell the truth.

In a good bookroom you feel in some mysterious way that you are absorbing the wisdom contained in all the books through your skin, without even opening them.

Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts or happenings. It consist mainly of the storm of thoughts that is forever flowing through one's head.

The proper office of a friend is to side with you when you are in the wrong. Nearly anybody will side with you when you are in the right.

To get the full value of joy You must have someone to divide it with. After all these years I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning; it is better to live outside the Garden with her than inside it without her.

I've lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.

To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.

Life was a fairy-tale, then, it is a tragedy now. When I was 43 and John Hay 41 he said life was a tragedy after 40, and I disputed it. Three years ago he asked me to testify again: I counted my graves, and there was nothing for me to say. I am old; I recognize it but I don't realize it. I wonder if a person ever really ceases to feel young - I mean, for a whole day at a time.

A man cannot be comfortable without his own approval. There is nothing more satisfying than that sense of being completely "at home" in your own skin. When you achieve that as a natural state of "being", then you can finally look beyond yourself and fully contribute all your talents to the world.

Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear - not absence of fear. So many look to eradicate fear from their lives, when that is an impossible task. You can certainly experience moments in absence of fear, however accept that fear will be with you whenever you are in the process of living creatively. The challenge is to go ahead regardless, simply notice the feeling and manage being courageous.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live. To live a fulfilled life, we need to keep creating the "what is next", of our lives. Without dreams and goals there is no living, only merely existing, and that is not why we are here.

Habit is habit and not to be flung out of the window by any man, but coaxed downstairs a step at a time. You cannot eliminate habits that no longer serve you. You can only replace them with new habits that support your goals. Moment by moment, you need to live with awareness and structure the habits that you include or exclude in your days.

It usually takes more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech. Overnight success is a fallacy. It is preceded by a great deal of preparation. Ask any successful person how they came to this point in their lives, and they will have a story to tell.

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. As in the words of Wayne Dyer, when you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. Sometimes to know with certainty that a particular thing is "true", will actually be the very thing that keeps you from attaining the things you seek to achieve.

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure. You can "already know for sure" things that could actually impede progress. Always be on the lookout for the things you did not know, that you did not know. Secondly, work on strengthening personal belief that a particular will be achieved regardless of any adversity that may show up, or evidence to the contrary.