"I notice that you use plain, simple language, short words and brief sentences. That is the way to write English―it is the modern way and the best way. Stick to it; don't let fluff and flowers and verbosity creep in. When you catch an adjective, kill it. No, I don't mean utterly, but kill most of them―then the rest will be valuable. They weaken when they are close together. They give strength when they are wide apart. An adjective habit, or a wordy, diffuse, flowery habit, once fastened upon a person, is as hard to get rid of as any other vice."

"When red-headed people are above a certain social grade their hair is auburn."

"It is by the goodness of god that in our country we have those 3 unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them."

"When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I cannot remember any but the things that never happened. It is sad to go to pieces like this but we all have to do it."

"Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer."]"

"The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."

"A successful book is not made of what is in it, but what is left out of it."

"What is Man? Man is a noisome bacillus whom Our Heavenly Father created because he was disappointed in the monkey."

"In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then he made school boards."

"Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day."

"Adam was but human—this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple's sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent."

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

"I must have a prodigious amount of mind; it takes me as much as a week, sometimes, to make it up!"

"I have found out that there ain't no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them."

"I didn't have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead."

"April 1. This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four."

"A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain."

"A clear conscience is the sure sign of a bad memory."

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

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

"When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years."

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