The objection to Puritans is not that
by H. L. Mencken

The objection to Puritans is not that
they try to make us think as they do,
but that they try to make us do as they think.
- H. L. Mencken

Related topics: Cynical Religion

I believe that it is better to tell the truth than a lie.
I believe it is better to be free than to be a slave.
And I believe it is better to know than to be ignorant.
- H.L. Mencken

We must respect the other fellow's religion,
but only in the sense and to the extent
that we respect his theory that
his wife is beautiful and his children smart.
- H. L. Mencken

Legend: A lie that has attained the dignity of age.
- H. L. Mencken

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Thank you for joining me on this journey we call life,
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person
to reconcile himself to the idea that
after all God will not help him
- H. L. Mencken

For every complex problem,
there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
- H.L. Mencken

Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief
in the occurrence of the improbable.
- H. L. Mencken

For centuries, theologians have been explaining
the unknowable in terms of the-not-worth-knowing.
- H. L. Mencken

A cynic is a man who, when he smells flowers,
looks around for a coffin.
- H. L. Mencken

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence.
- H. L. Mencken

The urge to save humanity is almost always
a false front for the urge to rule.
- H. L. Mencken

Morality is the theory that every human act
must be either right or wrong,
and that 99 % of them are wrong.
- H. L. Mencken

Life is a constant oscillation
between the sharp horns of dilemmas.
- H. L. Mencken

A good politician is quite as unthinkable as an honest burglar.
- H. L. Mencken

Criticism is prejudice made plausible.
- H. L. Mencken

Love is like war: easy to begin but very hard to stop.
- H. L. Mencken

Puritanism. The haunting fear that
someone, somewhere, may be happy.
- H. L. Mencken

Marriage is a wonderful institution,
but who would want to live in an institution?
- H. L. Mencken

Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband
a month before she marries him
and what she thinks of him a year afterward,
and you will have the truth about him.
- H. L. Mencken

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.
- H. L. Mencken

Conscience is a mother-in-law whose visit never ends.
- H. L. Mencken

Love is the delusion that one woman differs from another.
- H. L. Mencken

Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.
- H. L. Mencken

The believing mind is eternally impervious to evidence.
- H. L. Mencken

Happiness is the china shop; love is the bull.
- H. L. Mencken

The worst government is often the most moral.
One composed of cynics is often very tolerant and humane.
But when fanatics are on top there is no limit to oppression.
- H. L. Mencken

Lord, grant that I might not so much
seek to be loved as to love.
- St. Francis of Assisi

Everything has beauty,
but not everyone sees it.
- Confucius

Love does not claim possession, but gives freedom.
- Rabindranath Tagore

The question is not what you look at, but what you see.
- Henry David Thoreau

I am not afraid of storms
for I am learning how to sail my ship.
- Louisa May Alcott

Stand Tall, Stand Proud.
Know that you are unique and magnificent.
You do not need the approval of others.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

One does not discover new lands without consenting
to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.
- Andre Gide

The world is perfect. It's a mess.
It has always been a mess.
We are not going to change it.
Our job is to straighten out our own lives.
- Joseph Campbell

To the people who love you,
you are beautiful already.
This is not because they're
blind to your shortcomings
but because they so clearly see your soul.
- Victoria Moran

Love one another but make not a bond of love.
Let it rather be a moving sea
between the shores of your souls.
- Khalil Gibran

Love means not ever having to say you're sorry.
- Erich Segal

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.
- Lao Tzu

Riches do not exhilarate us so much with their possession
as they torment us with their loss.
- Epicurus

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us.
- Marianne Williamson

Life is not supposed to be fair.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The mind is not a vessel to be filled
but a fire to be kindled.
- Plutarch

A good traveler has no fixed plans,
and is not intent on arriving.
- Lao Tzu

Don't underestimate the value of Doing Nothing,
of just going along,
listening to all the things you can't hear,
and not bothering.
- A. A. Milne (Winnie-The-Pooh)

It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.
- Edmund Hillary

A ship in harbor is safe -
but that is not what ships are for.
- John A. Shedd

You do not need anyone's permission to be your true self.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

We are not held back by the love we didn't receive in the past,
but by the love we're not extending in the present.
- Marianne Williamson

To know yet to think that one does not know is best;
Not to know yet to think that one knows
will lead to difficulty.
- Lao Tzu

The butterfly counts not months but moments, and has time enough.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Do not blame the thistle that you see no beauty.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

A bird does not sing because it has an answer.
It sings because it has a song.
- Chinese Proverb

Adventure is not outside man; it is within.
- George Eliot

The true meaning of life is to plant trees,
under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
- Nelson Henderson

One can not reflect in streaming water.
Only those who know internal peace can give it to others.
- Lao Tzu

I do not need anyone's permission to be my true self.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Self-respect is not a function of size, age, or wealth.
Breathe deep, sing loud and sweet,
"I am me, I am unique, I am magnificent."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle,
and the life of the candle will not be shortened.
Happiness never decreases by being shared.
- The Buddha

Every child comes with the message
that God is not yet discouraged of man.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Do not let Sunday be taken from you.
If your soul has no Sunday, it becomes an orphan.
- Albert Schweitzer

You will not be punished for your anger,
you will be punished by your anger.
- The Buddha

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant.
If we did not sometimes taste of adversity,
prosperity would not be so welcome.
- Anne Bradstreet

Sometimes we need the fog to remind ourselves
that all of life is not black and white.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

I am not a slave to my thoughts or emotions.
- Richard Carlson

Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek,
but a means by which we arrive at that goal.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

The ache for home lives in all of us,
the safe place where we can
go as we are and not be questioned.
- Maya Angelou

Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations.
I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty,
believe in them, and try to follow where they lead.
- Louisa May Alcott

Feeling sorry for yourself, and your present condition,
is not only a waste of energy
but the worst habit you could possibly have.
- Dale Carnegie

The possession of knowledge does not
kill the sense of wonder and mystery.
There is always more mystery.
- Anais Nin

Let parents bequeath to their children
not riches, but the spirit of reverence.
- Plato

The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible.
- Oscar Wilde

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May the world be kind to you, and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie