Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations

By Mark Twain

"It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt."
"When in doubt, tell the truth."
"Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."
One of America's greatest storytellers, Samuel Clemens had something witty and wise to say on just about every topic. Gathered from his classic novels, diary entries, newspaper articles, and correspondence, this collection of wry quips and quotes reflects his keen observations on animals, critics, doctors, laughter, politics, youth, and other topics. Arranged alphabetically — "Abroad to Ax," for example, along with "Madness to Mystery" and "Uncle to Utah" — the subjects are also conveniently indexed and cross-referenced by topic. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Release date: Jul 12, 2012
• ISBN: 9780486123318

Mark Twain

Mark Twain, who was born Samuel L. Clemens in Missouri in 1835, wrote some of the most enduring works of literature in the English language, including The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc was his last completed book—and, by his own estimate, his best. Its acquisition by Harper & Brothers allowed Twain to stave off bankruptcy. He died in 1910. 

Book preview

MATERIAL

A

ABROAD

[See ASS, FORGETFULNESS, OPINION]

To go abroad has something of the same sense that death brings. I am no longer of ye—what ye say of me is now of no consequence —but of how much consequence when I am with ye and of ye. I know you will refrain from saying harsh things because they can’t hurt me, since I am out of reach and cannot hear them. This is why we say no harsh things of the dead.

Going abroad we let up on the weight and wear and responsibility of housekeeping—we go and board with somebody, who is suffering it but it troubles us not ... to go abroad is the true rest—you cease wholly to keep house, then, both national and domestic.

P. 131—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

ACCIDENT

[See DOG]

I am not able to conceive of such a thing as the thing which we call an accident—that is to say, an event without a cause. Each event has its own place in the eternal chain of circumstances, and whether it be big or little it will infallibly cause the next event, whether the next event be the breaking of a child’s toy or the destruction of a throne ... But I like that word accident, although it is, in my belief, absolutely destitute of meaning. I like it because it is short and handy and because it answers so well and so conveniently, and so briefly, in designating happenings which we should otherwise have to describe as odd, curious, interesting, and so on ...

P. 386—Mark Twain in Eruption [1940 ed.]

(ACCIDENT)

One million of us ... die annually. Out of this million ten or twelve thousand are stabbed, shot, drowned, hanged, poisoned, or meet a similarly violent death in some other popular way ... The Erie Railroad kills from 23 to 46; the other 845 railroads kill an average of one-third of a man each; and the rest of that million, amounting in the aggregate to the appalling figure of nine hundred and eighty-seven thousand six hundred and thirty-one corpses, die naturally in their beds!

You will excuse me from taking any more chances on those beds. The railroads are good enough for me.

P. 260—The $30,000 Bequest, Etc., "The Danger

of Lying in Bed"

Name the greatest of all the inventors. Accident.

P. 374—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

ACHIEVEMENT

When we do not know a person—and also when we do—we have to judge his size by the size and nature of his achievements, as compared with the achievements of others in his special line of business—there is no other way.

P. 102—Christian Science, Chapt. I, Book II

ACQUIREMENT

There is some dignity about an acquirement, because it is a product of your own labor. It is wages earned, whereas to be able to do a thing merely by the grace of God, and not by your own effort, transfers the distinction to our heavenly home—where possibly it is a matter of pride and satisfaction, but it leaves you naked and bankrupt.

P. 257—Mark Twain’s Autobiography [1924 ed.], Vol. II

ADAM

[See COPYRIGHT, EDEN, GARDEN OF, FORBID, NAME, TEMPERAMENT, TOMB]

Adam and Eve had many advantages, but the principal one was, that they escaped teething.

P. 38—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. IV,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

(ADAM)

It was not that Adam ate the apple for the apple’s sake, but because it was forbidden. It would have been better for us—oh infinitely better for us—if the serpent, had been forbidden.

P. 275—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world.

P. 30—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. III,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

What a good thing Adam had—when he said a good thing he knew nobody had said it before.

P. 67—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

Let us be grateful to Adam our benefactor. He cut us out of the blessing of idleness, and won for us the curse of labor.

P. 320—Following the Equator, Chapt. XXXIII, Vol. I,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s New Calendar

ADVERSITY

By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man’s, I mean.

P. 35—Following the Equator, Chapt. III, Vol. II, Pudd’nhead Wilson’s New Calendar

ADVERTISING

[See THINGS]

ADVICE

[See CUSTOM, EGG, MARRIAGE, WALL STREET]

[Letter, Hartford, Conn., Jan. 16, 1881]: How can I advise another man wisely, out of such a capital as a life filled with mistakes? Advise him how to avoid the like? No—for opportunities to make the same mistakes do not happen to any two men. Your own experiences may possibly teach you, but another man’s can’t. I do not know anything for a person to do but just peg along, doing the things that offer, and regretting them the next day. It is my way and everybody’s.

P. 12—Mark Twain, His Life and Work—Will Clemens

[An admonition for the general betterment of the race’s condition]: Diligently train your ideals upward and still upward toward a summit where you will find your chiefest pleasure in conduct which, while contenting you, will be sure to confer benefits upon your neighbor and the community.

(ADVICE)

P. 54—What Is Man? and Other Essays [1917 ed.], Chapt. IV

You mustn’t volunteer advice to a slave-driver unless you want to damage the cause you are arguing for.

P. 322—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XXXV

He had only one vanity, he thought he could give advice better than any other person.

P. 21—The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg, Etc., Chapt. I

If you are of any account, stay at home and make your way by faithful diligence; but if you are no account go away from home, and then you will have to work, whether you want to or not. Thus you become a blessing to your friends by ceasing to be a nuisance to them—if the people you go among suffer by the operation.

P. 339—Roughing It, Chapt. XXXVIII, Vol. II

[Always obey your parents—when they are present.

Be respectful to your superiors, if you have any.

Get up with the lark.

Begin the practice of the art of lying, early.

Never handle firearms carelessly.

Read good books, Innocents Abroad, etc.]

Build your character thoughtfully and painstakingly upon these precepts, and by and by, when you have got it built, you will be surprised and gratified to see how nicely and sharply it resembles everybody else’s.

P. 104—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.], Advice to Youth

[Advice for a proper frame of mind for undergoing a surgical operation]: Console yourself with the reflection that you are giving the doctor pleasure, and that he is getting paid for it.

P. 115—Mark Twain—Henderson

AFFECTION

[See FRIEND]

Praise is well, compliment is well, but affection—that is the last and final and most precious reward that any man can win, whether by character or achievement...

(AFFECTION)

P. 343—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.], "Books,

Authors and Hats"

AFRICA

[See CLOCK]

AGE

[See ASS, BIRTHDAY, DISAPPOINTMENT, IGNORANCE, METHUSELAH, YOUTH]

Neither a man nor a boy ever thinks the age he has is exactly the best one—he puts the right age a few years older or a few years younger than he is.

P. 246—The Mysterious Stranger, Etc. [1922 ed.], "Extract

from Captain Stormfield’s Visit to Heaven"

Whatever a man’s age may be, he can reduce it several years by putting a bright-colored flower in his buttonhole.

P. 174—The American Claimant, Etc., Chapt. XX

Age enlarges and enriches the powers of some musical instruments—notably those of the violin—but it seems to set a piano’s teeth on edge. P. 290—Tom Sawyer Abroad, Etc., "Rambling

Notes of an Idle Excursion"

At that time I thought old age valuable, I do not know why. All young people think it, I believe, they being ignorant and full of superstitions. P. 13—Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc,

Chapt. XXIX, Book II, Vol. II

Age has taught me charity of speech.

P. 253—Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc,

Chapt. XVI, Book III, Vol. II

Seventy is old enough. After that there is too much risk.

P. 295—Following the Equator, Chapt. XXIX, Vol. I

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

P. 431—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1910 ed.],

Seventieth Birthday

(AGE)

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

P. 1086—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. II—Paine

Lord save us all from old age and broken health and a hope tree that has lost the faculty of putting out blossoms.

P. 546—Mark Twain’s Letters [1917 ed.], Vol. II

I saw men whom thirty years had changed but slightly; but their wives had grown old. These were good women; it is very wearing to be good.

P. 407—Life on the Mississippi, Chapt. LV

... age is not determined by years, but by trouble and by infirmities of mind and body.

P. 79—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.],

Unconscious Plagiarism

Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of 80 and gradually approach 18.

P. 965—Autobiography with Letters—William L. Phelps

But I am seventy; seventy, and would nestle in the chimney corner, and smoke my pipe, and read my book, and take my rest, wishing you well in all affection, and that when you in your turn shall arrive at pier No. 70 you may step aboard your waiting ship with a reconciled spirit, and lay your course toward the sinking sun with a contented heart.

P. 262—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.],

Seventieth Birthday

If I had been helping the Almighty when he created man, I would have had him begin at the other end, and start human beings with old age. How much better to start old and have all the bitterness and blindness of age in the beginning!

P. 1440—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. III—Paine

Life should begin with age and its privileges and accumulations, and end with youth and its capacity to splendidly enjoy such advantages. P. 709—Mark Twain’s Letters [1917 ed.], Vol. II

ALARM

[See FRIGHT]

ALPHABET

[See SPELLING]

I myself am a simplified speller. I belong to that unhappy guild that is patiently and hopefully trying to reform our drunken old alphabet by reducing his whiskey.

P. 262—What Is Man? and Other Essays [1917 ed.],

A Simplified Alphabet

ALPS

[See MOUNTAIN]

AMAZEMENT

Well, sir, his head-lights were bugged out like tompions; and his mouth stood that wide open that you could have laid a ham in it without him noticing it.

P. 261—Tom Sawyer Abroad, Etc., "Rambling Notes

of an Idle Excursion"

R. did not answer. Her faculties were caked, she had not yet found her voice.

P. 239—Pudd’nhead Wilson, Those Extraordinary Twins

AMERICA

[See ARMY, ENGLAND, FOURTH OF JULY, GIRL, HOME, HUMOR, ICE-STORM, INVENTION, LAW, MONEY, MOTTO, POLITENESS, POLITICS, STOVE, WASHINGTON, D.C.]

[An Englishman is] a person who does things because they have been done before. [An American is] a person who does things because they haven’t been done before.

P. 169—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

Just in this one matter lies the main charm of life in Europe—comfort. In America, we hurry—which is well; but when the day’s work is done, we go on thinking of losses and gains, we plan for the morrow, we even carry our business cares to bed with us ... we burn up our energies with these excitements, and either die early or drop into a lean and mean old age at a time of life which they call a man’s prime in Europe ... What a robust people, what a nation of thinkers we might be, if we would only lay ourselves on the shelf occasionally and renew our edges!

P. 241—The Innocents Abroad, Chapt. XIX, Vol. I

(AMERICA)

... there is only one thing that can be called by the wide name American. That is the national devotion to ice-water.

P. 154—Literary Essays, What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us

ANCESTOR

[See PRIDE, RELIGION]

I was never able to persuade myself to call a gibbet by its right name when accounting for other ancestors of mine, but always spoke of it as the platform—puerilely intimating that they were out lecturing when it happened.

P. 105—Christian Science, Chapt. I, Book II

[In Heidelberg castle]: There are many aged portraits ... I bought a couple ... I bought them to start a portrait gallery of my ancestors with. I paid a dollar and a half for the duke and two and a half for the princess. One can lay in ancestors at even cheaper rates than these, in Europe, if he will mouse among old picture shops and look out for chances.

P. 283—A Tramp Abroad, Appendix B, Vol. II

Well, General, I suppose life can never get entirely dull to an American, because whenever he can’t strike up any other way to put in his time he can always get away with a few years trying to find out who his grandfather was!

... I was back at him as quick as a flash: "Right, Your Excellency! But I reckon a Frenchman’s got his little stand-by for a dull time, too; because when all other interests fail he can turn in and see if he can’t find out who his father was!"

P. 163—Literary Essays, What Paul Bourget Thinks of Us

ANGEL

[See TRAVEL]

The walls were hung with pious pictures ... pictures historically commemorative of curative miracles which had been achieved by the waters when nobody was looking. That is, nobody but angels; they are always on deck when there is a miracle to the fore—so as to get put in the picture, perhaps. Angels are as fond of that as a fire company; look at the old masters.

P. 185—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XXII

ANGER

[See TEMPER]

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

P. 89—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. X, "Pudd’nhead

Wilson’s Calendar"

Her eyes blazed up, and she jumped for him like a wild-cat, and when she was done with him she was rags and he wasn’t anything but an allegory.

P. 167—The Mysterious Stranger, Etc. [1922 ed.],

A Horse’s Tale

ANIMAL

[See BRUTALITY, CAMEL, CAT, CONGRESSMAN, DOG, FLEA, HORSE, MAN, MONKEY, MULE]

It is just like man’s vanity and impertinence to call an animal dumb because it is dumb to his dull perceptions.

P. 84—What Is Man? and Other Essays [1917 ed.], Chapt. VI

No brute ever does a cruel thing—that is the monopoly of those with the moral sense. When a brute inflicts pain he does it innocently.

P. 50—The Mysterious Stranger, Etc. [1922 ed.], Chapt. IV

ANSWER

[See CONVERSATION, KNOWLEDGE]

ANT

[See SLEEP]

It seems to me that in the matter of intellect the ant must be a strangely overrated bird. During many summers, now, I have watched him, when I ought to have been in better business, and I have not yet come across a living ant that seemed to have any more sense than a dead one. I refer to the ordinary ant, of course; I have had no experience of those wonderful Swiss and African ones which vote, keep drilled armies, hold slaves, and dispute about religion. Those particular ants may be all that the naturalist paints them, but I am persuaded that the average ant is a sham. I admit his industry, of course; he is the hardest working creature in the world—when anybody is looking—but his leather-headedness is the point I make against him. He goes out foraging, he makes a capture, and then what does he do? Go home? No—he goes anywhere but home. He doesn’t know where home is. His home may be only three feet away—no matter, he can’t find it. He makes his capture, as I have said; it is generally something which can be of no sort of use to himself or anybody else; it is usually seven times bigger than it ought to be; he hunts out the awkwardest place to take hold of it; he lifts it bodily up in the air by main force, and starts; not toward home, but in the opposite direction; not calmly and wisely, but with a frantic haste which is wasteful of his strength; he fetches up against a pebble, and instead of going around it, he climbs over it backwards dragging his booty after him, tumbles down on the other side, jumps up in a passion, kicks the dust off his clothes, moistens his hands, grabs his property viciously, yanks it this way, then that, shoves it ahead of him a moment, turns tail and lugs it after him another moment, gets madder and madder, then presently hoists it into the air and goes tearing away in an entirely new direction; comes to a weed; it never occurs to him to go around it; no, he must climb it; and he does climb it, dragging his worthless property to the top—which is as bright a thing to do as it would be for me to carry a sack of flour from Heidelberg to Paris by way of Strasburg steeple; when he gets up there he finds that that is not the place; takes a cursory glance at the scenery and either climbs down again or tumbles down, and starts off once more—as usual, in a new direction. At the end of half an hour, he fetches up within six inches of the place he started from and lays his burden down; meantime he has been over all the ground for two yards around, and climbed all the weeds and pebbles he came across. Now he wipes the sweat from his brow, strokes his limbs, and then marches aimlessly off, in as violent a hurry as ever. He traverses a good deal of zig-zag country, and by and by stumbles on his same booty again. He does not remember to have ever seen it before; he looks around to see which is not the way home, grabs his bundle and starts; he goes through the same adventures he had before; finally stops to rest, and a friend comes along. Evidently the friend remarks that a last year’s grasshopper leg is a very noble acquisition, and inquires where he got it. Evidently the proprietor does not remember exactly where he did get it, but thinks he got it around here somewhere. Evidently the friend contracts to help him freight it home. Then, with a judgment peculiarly antic (pun not intentional), they take hold of opposite ends of that grasshopper leg and begin to tug with all their might in opposite directions. Presently they take a rest and confer together. They decide that something is wrong, they can’t make out what. Then they go at it again, just as before. Same result. Mutual recriminations follow. Evidently each accuses the other of being an obstructionist. They warm up, and the dispute ends in a fight. They lock themselves together and chew each other’s jaws for a while; then they roll and tumble on the ground till one loses a horn or a leg and has to haul off for repairs. They make up and go to work again in the same old insane way, but the crippled ant is at a disadvantage; tug as he may, the other one drags off the booty and him at the end of it. Instead of giving up, he hangs on, and gets his shins bruised against every obstruction that comes in the way. By and by, when that grasshopper leg has been dragged all over the same old ground once more, it is finally dumped at about the spot where it originally lay, the two perspiring ants inspect it thoughtfully and decide that dried grasshopper legs are a poor sort of property after all, and then each starts off in a different direction to see if he can’t find an old nail or something else that is heavy enough to afford entertainment and at the same time valueless enough to make an ant want to own it.

(ANT)

(ANT)

Science has recently discovered that the ant does not lay up anything for winter use. This will knock him out of literature, to some extent. He does not work, except when people are looking, and only then when the observer has a green, naturalistic look, and seems to be taking notes. This amounts to deception, and will injure him for the Sunday-schools. He has not judgment enough to know what is good to eat from what isn’t. This amounts to ignorance, and will impair the world’s respect for him. He cannot stroll around a stump and find his way home again. This amounts to idiocy, and once the damaging fact is established, thoughtful people will cease to look up to him, the sentimental will cease to fondle him. His vaunted industry is but a vanity and of no effect, since he never gets home with anything he starts with. This disposes of the last remnant of his reputation and wholly destroys his main usefulness as a moral agent, since it will make the sluggard hesitate to go to him any more. It is strange, beyond comprehension, that so manifest a humbug as the ant has been able to fool so many nations and keep it up so many ages without being found out.

(ANT)

P. 217—A Tramp Abroad, Chapt. XXI, Vol. I

APPROVAL

We can secure other people’s approval, if we do right and try hard; but our own is worth a hundred of it, and no way has been found out of securing that.

P. 149—Following the Equator, Chapt. XIV, Vol. I,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s New Calendar

ARGUMENT

[See TALK, TEMPER, THEORY]

Arguments have no chance against petrified training; they wear it as little as the waves wear a cliff.

P. 137—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XVII

When you can’t cure a disaster by argument, what is the use to argue?

P. 342—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XXXVII

There is nothing like instances to grow hair on a bald-headed argument.

From an unpublished manuscript, British Copyright

ARK

[See BED, NOAH]

Oh, this infernal Human Race! I wish I had it in the Ark again—with an auger!

P. 37—The American Academy of Arts and Letters

pamphlet, In Memory of Samuel Langhorne Clemens

I am the only man living who understands human nature; God has put me in charge of this branch office; when I retire there will be no-one to take my place. I shall keep on doing my duty, for when I get over on the other side, I shall use my influence to have the human race drowned again, and this time drowned good, no omissions, no Ark.

Mark Twain—Macy

ARKANSAS

[See MOSQUITO, WEATHER]

ARMOR, SUIT OF

[See ITCH, SLEEP]

A man that is packed away like that is a nut that isn’t worth the cracking, there is so little of the meat, when you get down to it by comparison with the shell.

P. 90—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XI

ARMY

[See MASSES]

America [invented] arbitration, the eventual substitute for that enslaver of nations, the standing army.

P. 204—Europe and Elsewhere [1923 ed.],

Queen Victoria’s Jubilee

ART

[See CRITIC, INSPIRATION, MIRACLE, PAINTING]

It is a gratification to me to know that I am ignorant of art, and ignorant also of surgery. Because people who understand art find nothing in pictures but blemishes, and surgeons and anatomists see no beautiful women in all their lives, but only a ghastly stack of bones with Latin names to them, and a network of nerves and muscles and tissues.

P. 238—Mark Twain’s Travels with Mr. Brown [1940],

Academy of Design

ASS

[See CHARACTER, MAN, MIND, REMARK, RIDICULE, STATESMANSHIP]

The gentle reader will never, never know what a consummate ass he can become until he goes abroad. I speak now, of course, in the supposition that the gentle reader has not been abroad, and therefore is not already a consummate ass. If the case be otherwise, I beg his pardon and extend to him the cordial hand of fellowship and call him brother.

P. 299—The Innocents Abroad, Chapt. XXIII, Vol. I

Concerning the difference between man and the jackass; some observers hold that there isn’t any. But this wrongs the jackass.

P. 347—Mark Twain’s Notebook [1935 ed.]

I have been an author for 20 years and an ass for 55.

P. 543—Mark Twain’s Letters [1917 end.], Vol. II

(ASS)

... it is no harm to be an ass, if one is content to bray and not kick ...

P. 126—Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc,

Chapt. III, Book II, Vol. I

Even the most gifted human being is merely an ass, and always an ass, when his forbears have furnished him an idol to worship.

Mark Twain—Macy

[The knights in armor]: What a pity ... that men with such superb strength—strength enabling them to stand up cased in cruelly burdensome iron and drenched with perspiration, and hack and batter and bang each other for six hours on a stretch—should not have been born at a time when they could put it to some useful purpose. Take a jackass, for instance: a jackass has that kind of strength, and puts it to a useful purpose, and is valuable to the world because he is a jackass; but a nobleman is not valuable because he is a jackass. It is a mixture that is always ineffectual, and should never have been attempted in the first place.

P. 119—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XV

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

P. 5—More Maxims of Mark [1927]

None but an ass pays a compliment and asks a favor at the same time. There are many asses.

P. 11—More Maxims of Mark [1927]

ASTONISHMENT

He was astonished clear down to his corns.

P. 199—A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court,

Chapt. XXIII

ASTRONOMY

An occultation of Venus is not half so difficult as an eclipse of the sun, but because it comes seldom the world thinks it’s a grand thing.

P. 11—More Maxims of Mark [1927]

AUDIENCE

[See EXPERIENCE]

An audience likes a speaker with the same weaknesses and the same virtues as they themselves have. If the lecturer’s brow is too high and the brows of the audience are too low, look out. Or, if a high-brow audience sees a low-brow lecturer there’s trouble.

(AUDIENCE)

P. 53—Mark Twain and I—Opie Read

Remember, the audience most surely and powerfully stirred is the small audience, when you’ve learned all the deep arts of your trade. They rise in their might when you let them see that theirs are welcome faces and that you are not ashamed of them for being a small house.

*From an unpublished letter to Clara Clemens,

March 5, 1907

AUSTRALIA

[See FORGETFULNESS, KNOWLEDGE, MEASUREMENT, TREE]

AUSTRIA

[See DUEL, ROYALTY]

AUTHOR

[See ASS, EXPERIENCE]

I never saw an author who was aware that there is any dimensional difference between a fact and a surmise.

P. 86—My Father · Mark Twain—Clara Clemens

There are three infallible ways of pleasing an author, and the three form a rising scale of compliment: 1, To tell him you have read one of his books; 2, To tell him you have read all of his books; 3, To ask him to let you read the manuscript of his forthcoming book. No. 1 admits you to his respect; No. 2 admits you to his admiration; No. 3 carries you clear into his heart.

P. 96—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. XI,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

AUTHORITY

[See statesmanship]

He showed off—making a deal of the sputter and fuss that insect authority delights in.

P. 42—The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Chapt. IV

AUTOBIOGRAPHY

[See LIFE, WRITING]

AX

[See BEGGAR]

There is no man so poor but what at intervals some man comes to him with an ax to grind. By and by the ax’s aspect becomes familiar to the proprietor of the grindstone. He perceives that it is the same old ax. If you are a governor you know that the stranger wants an office. The first time he arrives you are deceived; he pours out such noble praises of you and your political record that you are moved to tears; there’s a lump in your throat and you are thankful that you have lived for this happiness. Then the stranger discloses his ax, and you are ashamed of yourself and your race. Six repetitions will cure you.

P. 1422—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. III—Paine

B

BABY

[See FATHER]

The idea that a baby doesn’t amount to anything! Why, one baby is just a house and a front yard full by itself. One baby can furnish more business than you and your whole Interior Department can attend to. He is enterprising, irrepressible, brimful of lawless activities. Do what you please, you can’t make him stay on the reservation. Sufficient unto the day is one baby. As long as you are in your right mind don’t you ever pray for twins. Twins amount to a permanent riot. And there ain’t any real difference between triplets and an insurrection.

P. 60—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.], The Babies

Tom was a bad baby from the very beginning of his usurpation. He would cry for nothing; he would burst into storms of devilish temper without notice, and let go scream after scream and squall after squall, then climax the thing with holding his breath —that frightful specialty of the teething nursling, in the throes of which the creature exhausts its lungs, then is convulsed with noiseless squirmings and twistings and kickings in the effort to get its breath, while the lips turn blue and the mouth stands wide and rigid, offering for inspection one wee tooth set in the lower rim of a hoop of red gums; and when the appalling stillness has endured until one is sure the lost breath will never return, a nurse comes flying, and dashes water in the child’s face, and—presto! the lungs fill, and instantly discharge a shriek, or a yell, or a howl which bursts the listening ear and surprises the owner of it into saying words which would not go well with a halo if he had one.

P. 38—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. IV

(BABY)

Howells had favorably reviewed The Innocents Abroad, and after the first moment of their introduction had passed Clemens said: When I read that review of yours I felt like the woman who said that she was so glad that her baby had come white.

P. 166—Mark Twain’s Letters [1917 end.], Vol. I

The girl who was rebuked for having borne an illegitimate child excused herself by saying, "But it is such a little one."

P. 285—Europe and Elsewhere [1923 ed.],

To My Missionary Critics

BADNESS

[See BABY, LANGUAGE, NATURE]

BALLOON

Thing to take meteoric observations and commit suicide with.

P. 6—More Maxims of Mark [1927]

BANQUET

A banquet is probably the most fatiguing thing in the world except ditchdigging. It is the insanest of all recreations. The inventor of it overlooked no detail that could furnish weariness, distress, harassment, and acute and long-sustained misery of mind and body.

P. 320—Mark Twain in Eruption [1940 ed.]

At the first banquet mentioned in history that other prodigal son who came back from his travels was invited to stand up and have his say. They were all there, his brethren, David and Goliath, —and if he had had such experience as I have had he would have waited until those other people got through talking. He got up and testified to all his failings. Now if he had waited before telling all about his riotous living until the others had spoken he might not have given himself away as he did...

P. 162—Mark Twain’s Speeches [1923 ed.],

Lotus Club Dinner

BARBER

All things change except barbers, the ways of barbers, and the surroundings of barbers. These never change.

P. 340—Sketches New and Old, About Barbers

A barber seldom rubs you like a Christian.

P. 344—Sketches New and Old, About Barbers

(BARBER)

I always had a yearning to be a king. This may never be, I suppose, but, at any rate, it will always be a satisfaction to me to know that, if I am not a king, I am the next thing to it. I have been shaved by the king’s barber.

P. III—Mark Twain’s Letters [1917 ed.], Vol. I

BATH

[See ENGLAND, FLEA, POETRY]

The doctor said I was a grand proof of what these baths could do; said I had come here as innocent of disease as a grindstone, and inside of three weeks these baths had sluiced out of me every important ailment known to medical science, along with considerable more that were entirely new and patentable.

P. 108—Europe and Elsewhere [1923 ed.],

Aix, Paradise of Rheumatics

It is a mistake that there is no bath that will cure people’s manners. But drowning would help.

P. 126—Europe and Elsewhere [1923 ed.],

Marienbad—A Health Factory

What I have been through in these two weeks would free a person of pretty much everything in him that wasn’t nailed there—any loose thing, any unattached fragment of bone, or meat or morals, or disease or propensities or accomplishments, or what not.

P. 119—Europe and Elserohere [1923 ed.],

Marienbad—A Health Factory

Here endeth my experience of the celebrated Turkish bath, and here also endeth my dream of the bliss the mortal revels in who passes through it. It is a malignant swindle. The man who enjoys it is qualified to enjoy anything that is repulsive to sight or sense ...

P. 107—The Innocents Abroad, Chapt. VII, Vol. II

BEAUTY

[See CHANGE, COLOR, ENGLAND, FLEA, ICE-STORM, LAKE, NATURE, POETIC PROSE]

[The beauty of Lake Tahoe : In the early morning one watches the silent battle of dawn and darkness upon the waters of Tahoe with a placid interest; but when the shadows sulk away and one by one the hidden beauties of the shore unfold themselves in the full splendor of noon; when the still surface is belted like a rainbow with broad bars of blue and green and white, half the distance from circumference to center; when, in the lazy summer afternoon, he lies in a boat, far out to where the dead blue of the deep water begins, and smokes the pipe of peace and idly winks at the distant crags and patches of snow from under his cap-brim; when the boat drifts shoreward to the white water, and he lolls over the gunwhale and gazes by the hour down through the crystal depths and notes the colors of the pebbles and reviews the finny armies gliding in procession a hundred feet below; when at night he sees moon and stars, mountain ridges feathered with pines, jutting white capes, bold promontories, grand sweeps of rugged scenery topped with bald, glimmering peaks, all magnificently pictured in the polished mirror of the lake, in richest, softest detail, the tranquil interest that was born with the morning deepens and deepens, by sure degrees till it culminates at last in resistless fascination!

(BEAUTY)

P. 265—The Innocents Abroad, Chapt. XXI, Vol. II

A soap bubble is the most beautiful thing, and the most exquisite, in nature; .... I wonder how much it would take to buy a soap bubble, if there was only one in the world?

P. 183—A Tramp Abroad, Chapt. XIII, Vol. II

A thoroughly beautiful woman and a thoroughly homely woman are creations which I love to gaze upon, and which I cannot tire of gazing upon, for each is perfect in her own line, and it is perfection, I think, in many things, and perhaps most things, which is the quality that fascinates us.

P. 323—Mark Twain’s Autobiography [1924 ed.], Vol. I

[The ice-storm]: Here in London the other night I was talking with some Scotch and English friends, and I mentioned the ice-storm, using it as a figure—a figure which failed, for none of them had heard of the ice-storm. One gentleman, who was very familiar with American literature, said he had never seen it mentioned in any book. That is strange. And I, myself, was not able to say that I had seen it mentioned in a book; and yet the autumn foliage, with all other American scenery, has received full and competent attention.

(BEAUTY)

The oversight is strange, for in America the ice-storm is an event. And it is not an event which one is careless about. When it comes, the news flies from room to room in the house, there are hangings on the doors, and shoutings, The ice-storm! the ice-storm! and even the laziest sleepers throw off the covers and join the rush for the windows. The ice-storm occurs in mid-winter, and usually its enchantments are wrought in the silence and the darkness of the night. A fine drizzling rain falls hour after hour upon the naked twigs and branches of the trees, and as it falls it freezes. In time the trunk and every branch and twig are incased in hard pure ice; so that the tree looks like a skeleton tree made all of glass—glass that is crystal-clear. All along the under side of every branch and twig is a comb of little icicles—the frozen drip. Sometimes these pendants do not quite amount to icicles, but are round beads—frozen tears.

The weather clears, toward dawn, and leaves a brisk, pure atmosphere and a sky without a shred of cloud in it—and everything is still, there is not a breath of wind. The dawn breaks and spreads, the news of the storm goes about the house, and the little and the big, in wraps and blankets, flock to the window and press together there, and gaze intently out upon the great white ghost in the grounds, and nobody says a word, nobody stirs. All are waiting—waiting for the miracle. The minutes drift on and on, with not a sound but the ticking of the clock; at last the sun fires a sudden sheaf of rays into the ghostly tree and turns it into a white splendor of glittering diamonds. Everybody catches his breath, and feels a swelling in his throat and a moisture in his eyes—but waits again; for he knows what is coming: there is more yet. The sun climbs higher, and still higher, flooding the tree from its loftiest spread of branches to its lowest, turning it to a glory of white fire; then in a moment, without warning, comes the great miracle, the supreme miracle, the miracle without its fellow in the earth; a gust of wind sets every branch and twig to swaying, and in an instant turns the whole white tree into a spouting and spraying explosion of flashing gems of every conceivable color; and there it stands and sways this way and that, flash! flash! flash! a dancing and glancing world of rubies, emeralds, diamonds, sapphires, the most radiant spectacle, the most blinding spectacle, the divinest, the most exquisite, the most intoxicating vision of fire and color and intolerable and unimaginable splendor that ever any eye has rested upon in this world, or will ever rest upon outside of the gates of heaven.

(BEAUTY)

P. 277—Following the Equator, Chapt. XXIII, Vol. II

BED

[See ACCIDENT, EARLY]

In the matter of beds all ships have been badly edited, ignorantly edited, from the beginning. The selection of beds is given to some hearty, strong-backed, self-made man, when it ought to be given to a frail woman ... accustomed to backaches and insomnia ... In Noah’s Ark the beds were simply scandalous. Noah set the fashion, and it will endure in one degree of modification or another till the next flood.

P. 329—Following the Equator, Chapt. XXVIII, Vol. II

BEE

[See IDIOT, SOUL]

BEGGAR

... the coat of arms of the human race ought to consist of a man with an ax on his shoulder proceeding toward a grindstone, or it ought to represent the several members of the human race holding out the hat to one another; for we are all beggars, each in his own way. One beggar is too proud to beg for pennies, but will beg for an introduction into society; another does not care for society, but he wants a postmastership; another will inveigle a lawyer into conversation and then sponge on him for free advice. The man who wouldn’t do any of these things will beg for the Presidency. Each admires his own dignity and greatly guards it, but in his opinion the others haven’t any. Mendicancy is a matter of taste and temperament, no doubt.

P. 1421—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. III—Paine

(BEGGAR)

If the beggar instinct were left out of an Indian he would not go any more than a clock without a pendulum.

P. 155—Roughing It, Chapt. XIX, Vol. I

BEHAVIOR

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

P. 56—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. VI,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.

P. 182—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. XIX,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

BELIEF

[See BRAVERY]

BENEVOLENCE

We do no benevolences whose first benefit is not for ourselves.

P. 315—Harper’s Magazine, "Unpublished Chapters from

the Autobiography of Mark Twain," Aug., 1922

BERLIN, GERMANY

[See EARTHQUAKE, HOUSE, NEWSPAPER, POLICEMAN, TRAVEL]

BERMUDA

[See MUSIC, ROAD]

BIBLE

[See CHANGE, ENGLAND, LEARNING, LIBRARY, LITERARY CRITICISM, MIND, MIRACLE, MISSISSIPPI RIVER, PUNISHMENT, STREET, WOMAN, WORDS]

[Huck and Nigger Jim discuss Solomon]: ... Don’t you know about the harem? Solomon had one: he had about a million wives!

"Why, yes, dat’s so; I—I’d done forgot it. A harem’s a bo‘d’n-house, I reck’n. Mos’ likely dey has rackety times in de nussery. En I reck’n de wives quarrels considable; en dat ’crease de racket. Yit dey say Sollermun de wises’ man dat ever live! I doan’ take no stock in dat. Bekase why: would a wise man want to live in de mids’ er sich a blim-blammin’ all de time? No—’deed he wouldn’t. A wise man ‘ud take en buil’ a biler-factry; en den he could shet down de biler-factry when he want to res’."

(BIBLE)

Well, but he was the wisest man, anyway; because the widow she told me so, her own self.

"I doan k‘yer what de widder say, he warn’t no wise man nuther. He had some er de dad-fetchedes’ ways I ever see. Does you know ’bout dat chile he ’uz gwyne to chop in two?"

Yes, the widow told me all about it.

"Well, den! Warn’ dat de beatenes’ notion in de worl’? You jes’ take en look at it a minute. Dah’s de stump, dah—dat’s one er de women; heah’s you—dat’s de yuther one; I’s Sollermun; en dish yer dollar bill’s de chile. Bofe un you claims it. What does I do? Does I shin aroun’ mongs’ de neighbors en fine out which un you de bill do belong to, en han’ it over to de right one, all safe en soun’, de way dat anybody dat had any gumption would? No: I take en whack de bill in two, en give half un it to you en de yuther half to de yuther woman. Dat’s de way Sollermun was gwyne to do wid de chile. Now I want to ask you; what’s de use er dat half a bill?—can’t buy nothin’ wid it. En what use is a half a chile? I wouldn’ give a dern for a million un um."

But hang it, Jim, you’ve clean missed the point—blame it, you’ve missed it a thousand mile.

"Who? Me? Go ‘long. Doan’ talk to me ‘bout yo’ pints. I reckon I knows sense when I sees it; en dey ain’ no sense in sich doin’s as dat. De ’spute warn’t ‘bout a half a chile, de ’spute was ‘bout a whole chile; en de man dat think he kin settle a ’spute ‘bout a whole chile wid a half a chile doan’ know enough to come in out’n de rain. Doan’ talk to me ’bout Sollermun, Huck, I knows him by de back."

But I tell you you don’t get the point.

"Blame de pint! I reck’n I knows what I knows. En mine you, de real pint is down furder—it’s down deeper. It lays in de way Sollermun was raised. You take a man dat’s got on‘y one or two chillen; is dat man gwyne to be wasteful o’ chillen? No, he ain’t; he can’t ‘ford it. He know how to value ’em. But you take a man dat’s got ‘bout five million chillen runnin’ roun’ de house, en it’s diffunt. He as soon chop a chile in two as a cat. Dey’s plenty mo’. A chile er two, mo’ er less, warn’t no consekens to Sollermun, dad fatch him!"

(BIBLE)

P. III—The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Chapt. XIV

The Christian’s Bible is a drug store. Its contents remain the same; but the medical practice changes ... The world has corrected the Bible. The Church never corrects it; and also never fails to drop in at the tail of the procession—and take the credit of the correction ... During many ages there were witches. The Bible said so. The Bible commanded that they should not be allowed to live. Therefore the Church, after eight hundred years, gathered up its halters, thumb-screws, and firebrands, and set about its holy work in earnest. She worked hard at it night and day during nine centuries and imprisoned, tortured, hanged, and burned whole hordes and armies of witches, and washed the Christian world clean with their foul blood.

Then it was discovered that there was no such thing as witches, and never had been. One does not know whether to laugh or to cry.

... There are no witches. The witch text remains; only the practice has changed. Hell fire is gone, but the text remains. Infant damnation is gone, but the text remains. More than two hundred death penalties are gone from the law books, but the texts that authorized them remain.

P. 387—Europe and Elsewhere [1923 ed.],

Bible Teaching and Religious Practice

BICYCLE

[See DOG, GERMAN LANGUAGE]

BILLIARDS

Once in Nevada I dropped into a billiard-room casually, and picked up a cue and began to knock the balls around. The proprietor, who was a red-headed man, with such hair as I have never seen anywhere except on a torch, asked me if I would like to play. I said, Yes. He said, Knock the balls around a little and let me see how you can shoot. So I knocked them around and thought I was doing pretty well, when he said, That’s all right; I’ll play you left-handed. It hurt my pride, but I played him. We banked for the shot and he won it. Then he commenced to play, and I commenced to chalk my cue to get ready to play, and he went on playing, and 1 went on chalking my cue; and he played and I chalked all through that game. When he had run his string out I said:

(BILLIARDS)

That’s wonderful! perfectly wonderful! If you can play that way left-handed what could you do right-handed?

Couldn’t do anything, he said. I’m a left-handed man.

P. 1306—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. III—Paine

[Mark Twain] had experimented, a great many years before, with what was in the nature of a trick on some unsuspecting player. It consisted in turning out twelve pool-balls on the table with one cue-ball, and asking his guest how many caroms he thought he could make with all those twelve balls to play on. He had learned that the average player would seldom make more than thirty-one counts, and usually, before this number was reached, he would miss through some careless play or get himself into a position where he couldn’t play at all. The thing looked absurdly easy. It looked as if one could go on playing all day long, and the victim was usually eager to bet that he could make fifty or perhaps a hundred; but for more than an hour I tried it patiently, and seldom succeeded in scoring more than fifteen or twenty without missing. Long after the play itself ceased to be amusing to me, he insisted on my going on and trying it some more, and he would throw himself back and roar with laughter, the tears streaming down his cheeks, to see me work and fume and fail.

P. 1366—Mark Twain, a Biography, Vol. III—Paine

BIOGRAPHY

[See LIFE]

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 ... Biographies are but the clothes and buttons of the man —the biography of the man himself cannot be written.

P. 2—Mark Twain’s Autobiography [1924 ed.], Vol. I

BIRD

When I had stood ten minutes, thinking and imagining, and getting my spirit in tune with the place, and in the right mood to enjoy the supernatural, a raven suddenly uttered a hoarse croak over my head. It made me start; and then I was angry because I started. I looked up, and the creature was sitting on a limb right over me, looking down at me. I felt something of the same sense of humiliation and injury which one feels when he finds that a human stranger has been clandestinely inspecting him in his privacy and mentally commenting upon it. I eyed the raven, and the raven eyed me. Nothing was said during some seconds. Then the bird stepped a little way along his limb to get a better point of observation, lifted his wings, stuck his head far down below his shoulders toward me, and croaked again—a croak with a distinctly insulting expression about it. If he had spoken in English he could not have said any more plainly than he did say in raven, Well, what do you want here? I felt as foolish as if I had been caught in some mean act by a responsible being, and reproved for it. However, I made no reply; I would not bandy words with a raven. The adversary waited a while, with his shoulders still lifted, his head thrust down between them, and his keen bright eye fixed on me; then he threw out two or three more insults, which I could not understand, further than that I knew a portion of them consisted of language not used in church.

(BIRD)

I still made no reply. Now the adversary raised his head and called. There was an answering croak from a little distance in the wood,—evidently a croak of inquiry. The adversary explained with enthusiasm, and the other raven dropped everything and came. The two sat side by side on the limb and discussed me as freely and offensively as two great naturalists might discuss a new kind of bug. The thing became more and more embarrassing. They called in another friend. This was too much. I saw that they had the advantage of me, and so I concluded to get out of the scrape by walking out of it. They enjoyed my defeat as much as any low white people could have done. They craned their necks and laughed at me (for a raven can laugh just like a man), they squalled insulting remarks after me as long as they could see me. They were nothing but ravens—I knew that,—what they thought about me could be a matter of no consequence,—and yet when even a raven shouts after you, What a hat! Oh, pull down your vest! and that sort of thing, it hurts you and humililates you, and there is no getting around it with fine reasoning and pretty arguments.

(BIRD)

P. 22—A Tramp Abroad, Chapt. II, Vol. I

There’s more to a bluejay than any other creature. He has got more moods, and more different kinds of feelings than other creatures ; and, mind you, whatever a bluejay feels, he can put into language. And no mere commonplace language, either, but rattling, out-and-out book-talk—and bristling with metaphor, too—just bristling! And as for command of language—why you never see a bluejay get stuck for a word. No man ever did. They just boil out of him! And another thing: I’ve noticed a good deal, and there’s no bird, or cow, or anything that uses as good grammar as a bluejay. You may say a cat uses good grammar. Well, a cat does—but you let a cat get excited once; you let a cat get to pulling fur with another cat on a shed, nights, and you’ll hear grammar that will give you lockjaw ... Now I’ve never heard a jay use bad grammar but very seldom; and when they do, they are as ashamed as a human; they shut right down and leave.

You may call a jay a bird. Well, so he is, in a measure—because he’s got feathers on him, and don’t belong to no church, perhaps; but otherwise he is just as much a human as you be. And I’ll tell you why. A jay’s gifts, and instincts, and feelings, and interests, cover the whole ground. A jay hasn’t any more principle than a Congressman ... A jay can cry, a jay can laugh, a jay can feel shame, a jay can reason and plan and discuss, a jay likes gossip and scandal, a jay has got a sense of humor, a jay knows when he is an ass just as well as you do—maybe better. If a jay ain’t human, he better take in his sign.

P. 24—A Tramp Abroad, Chapt. II, Vol. I

BIRTHDAY

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

P. 82—Pudd‘nhead Wilson, Chapt. IX,

Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar

[Part of a speech delivered by Mark Twain at a dinner given at Delmonico’s, Dec. 5, 1905, to celebrate his seventieth birthday] :

(BIRTHDAY)

The seventieth birthday! It is the time of life when you arrive at a new and awful dignity; when you may throw aside the decent reserves which have oppressed you for a generation and stand unafraid and unabashed upon your seven-terraced summit and look down and teach—unrebuked. You can tell the world how you got there. It is what they all do. You shall never get tired of telling by what delicate arts and deep moralities you climb up to that great place ...

I have achieved my seventy years in the usual way: by sticking strictly to a scheme of life which would kill anybody else. It sounds like an exaggeration, but that is really the common rule for attaining old age. When we examine the programme of any of these garrulous old people we always find that the habits which have preserved them would have decayed us ... I will offer here, as a sound maxim, this: That we can’t reach old age by another man’s road.

Threescore and ten!

It is the Scriptural statute of limitations. After that, you owe no active duties; for you the strenuous life is over. You are a time-expired man, to use Kipling’s military phrase: You have served your term, well or less well, and you are mustered out. You are become an honorary member of the republic, you are emancipated, compulsions are not for you, nor any bugle call but lights out. You pay the time-worn duty bills if you choose, or decline if you prefer—and without prejudice—for they are not legally collectible.

The previous-engagement plea, which in forty years has