“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.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“A home without a cat — and a well-fed, well-petted and properly revered cat — may be a perfect home, perhaps, but how can it prove title?”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“There are those who scoff at the schoolboy, calling him frivolous and
shallow: Yet it was the schoolboy who said 'Faith is believing what you
know ain't so'.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“October: This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August and February.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“When ill luck begins, it does not come in sprinkles, but in showers.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“There is no character, howsoever good and fine, but it can be destroyed by ridicule, howsoever poor and witless. Observe the ass, for instance: his character is about perfect, he is the choicest spirit among all the humbler animals, yet see what ridicule has brought him to. Instead of feeling complimented when we are called an ass, we are left in doubt.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“As to the adjective: when in doubt, strike it out.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Behold, the fool saith, "Put not all thine eggs in the one basket" - which is but a matter of saying, "Scatter your money and your attention"; but the wise man saith, "Pull all your eggs in the one basket and - WATCH THAT BASKET." - Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“The true Southern watermelon is a boon apart, and not to be mentioned with commoner things. It is chief of this world'd luxuries, king by grace of God over all the fruits of the earth. When one has tasted it, he knows what the angels eat. It was not a Southern watermelon that Eve took: we know it because she repented.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“All say, ‘how hard it is that we have to die’ -- a strange complaint to come from the mouths of those who have had to live.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“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.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Statistics show that we lose more fools on this day than in all the other days of the year put together. This proves, by the number left in stock, that one Fourth of July per year is now inadequate, the country has grown so.
- Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Âdem, yalnızca bir insandı. Bu her şeyi açıklıyor. Elmayı, yemek için değil, yasak olduğu için istemişti. Asıl hata, yılanı yasaklamamış olmaktı. Çünkü o zaman onu yemek isteyecekti.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Better to keep your mouth closed and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“One must make allowances for a parental instinct that has been starving for twenty-five or thirty years. It is famished, it is crazed with hunger by that time, and will be entirely satisfied with anything that comes handy; its taste is atrophied, it can't tell mud cat from shad. A devil born to a young couple is measurably recognizable by them as a devil before long, but a devil adopted by an old couple is an angel to them, and remains so, through thick and thin.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“If I owned half of that dog, I would shoot my half.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“To all intents and purposes Roxy was as white as anybody, but the one sixteenth of her which was black outvoted the other fifteen parts and made her a Negro. She was a slave, and salable as such.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“I'll not go where there is any of that sort of thing going on, again. It's the sure way, and the only sure way;”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“THANKSGIVING DAY. Let us all give humble, hearty, and sincere thanks now, but the turkeys. In the island of Fiji they do not use turkeys; they use plumbers. It does not become you and me to sneer at Fiji.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"—a strange complaint to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Ain't you my chile? En does you know anything dat a mother won't do for her chile? Day ain't nothin' a white mother won't do for her chile. Who made 'em so? De Lord done it. En who made de niggers? De Lord made 'em. In de inside, mothers is all de same. De good lord he made 'em so.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“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. —Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Everybody granted that if "Tom" were white and free it would be unquestionably right to punish him--it would be no loss to anybody; but to shut up a valuable slave for life--that was quite another matter. As soon as the Governor understood the case, he pardoned Tom at once, and the creditors sold him down the river.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“. . . an enemy can partly ruin a man, but it takes a good-natured injudicious friend to complete the thing and make it perfect.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Ne kadar iyi ve nazik olursa olsun hiçbir kişilik yoktur ki -zayıf ve aptalca bile olsa- hicivle alt edilemesin. Mesela, merkep: Karakteri mükemmeldir, gösterişsiz hayvanlar içinde en mütevazı olanıdır ama bir de hiciv yüzünden başına gelene bakın. Biri bize merkep dediğinde bunu iltifat olarak görmek yerine şüpheye düşeriz.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry. —Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
“Whoever has lived long enough to find out what life is, knows how deep a debt of gratitude we owe to Adam, the first great benefactor of our race. He brought death into the world.”
― Mark Twain, quote from Pudd'nhead Wilson
Mark Twain
Born place: in Florida, Missouri, The United States
Born date November 30, 1835
See more on GoodReads
“[Tessa] knew about phantom limbs [....] Her cheek, where the Englishman's fingers had been, did not exactly ache ... but very strangely, most curiously ... it felt.”
― Eva Ibbotson, quote from The Reluctant Heiress
“Su suave risa resonó a través de mis oídos, y tuve el repentino impulso de echármela al hombro y salir corriendo de aquí. Asegurándome de que nunca le ocurriera nada malo. Respiré e intenté concentrarme a pesar del dolor que sentía por dentro. Ella no me conocía. Sabía que no me conocería, pero aun así se sentía como una patada en el estómago.”
― Julie Cross, quote from Tempest
“God has no need of cold people.”
― Boris Akunin, quote from Missions spéciales
“Modern novels. So difficult—all about such unpleasant people, doing such very odd things and not, apparently, even enjoying them. “Sex” as a word had not been mentioned in Miss Marple’s young days; but there had been plenty of it—not talked about so much—but enjoyed far more than nowadays, or so it seemed to her. Though usually labelled Sin, she couldn’t help feeling that that was preferable to what it seemed to be nowadays—a kind of Duty.”
― Agatha Christie, quote from A Caribbean Mystery
“Thoughts
thoughts. Are they not mine?
I think, I write, I type.
Thoughts. Are they wise?
Let truth be told in words, compiled together, create a page, a book.
Thoughts. Are they master piece?
Is it a prize winner?...An Alfred Nobel?
Thoughts. Are they not mine?
Gift of God?
they are not mine.”
― Edna Stewart, quote from The Call of the Christmas Pecan Tree
Four Past Midnight
The Collectors
Salt: A World Histor...
Broken Hart
Celebrity in Death
The Before Now and A...BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.
We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.
Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.
