“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
“finding that she was determined to get to the bottom of what seemed to him a very trivial affair, extricated himself without hesitation or compunction by advising her to apply to Vincent for information, since he was the instigator of the quarrel. Before he could make good his retreat, however, he was incensed and appalled by a command to go immediately to Vincent's room, and to inform him that his mama desired to have speech with him before he went down to breakfast. Since it was the time-honoured practice of the brothers to sacrifice each other in such situations as now confronted Claud, it was not fear of Vincent's wrath at finding himself betrayed which prompted Claud to despatch Polyphant on the errand, but the knowledge that not even a messenger bearing gifts of great price would meet with anything but the rudest of receptions from Vincent at this hour of the morning.”
― Georgette Heyer, quote from The Unknown Ajax
“Clue in, Ally,” he immediately volleyed, “Watchin’ the Rock Chicks, I know exactly what does and does not fly with you, and just like every one of those men when their women serves up attitude, I don’t give a shit. And, just sayin’, that attitude, just like with them, is why I’m with you.”
“What?” I bit out.
“Babe, every one of those guys had pussy lined up at the door. Bitches were gagging for it. They’d do anything to get their hooks into those men and those men knew it. They didn’t want a woman who’d do anything. They wanted a woman who knew her own mind and wouldn’t do anything. Not a single one of your posse lets their man walk all over them. And not a single one lets them get away with shit. At least not without dishin’ up a fair amount of attitude before they let them get away with it which is the definition of not letting them get away with it.”
― Kristen Ashley, quote from Rock Chick Revolution
“Then I pace the floor, rocking him softly in my arms, patting his ass. You know I must be really desperate—because I try singing: Hush, little baby, don’t say a word Daddy’s gonna buy you a . . . I stop—because why the fuck would any baby want a mockingbird? None of those nursery rhymes make any goddamn sense. I don’t know any other lullabies, so I go for the next best thing, “Enter Sandman” by Metallica: Take my hand, We’re off to never-never land . . .”
― Emma Chase, quote from Tied
“The Fae book was definitely filled with the same stories as hers, but this one was filled with picture after picture of Jared. She couldn’t help but flip backward a few pages and see magical images come to life: of Jared defending her in an alley. Sitting in art class with Mina, spinning on the pottery wheel. There was another one of Jared by the lake, teaching her to fight. Jared and her in the storage room, laughing, before their tickling fight. She flipped forward and saw the last page filled with a motion-captured image of Jared and her sharing a kiss.”
― Chanda Hahn, quote from Fable
“A bashful smile ghosted his lips and his tense shoulders relaxed. “We’re in fuckin’ deep, aren’t we, Shakespeare?”
― Tillie Cole, quote from Sweet Home
Ashes of Midnight
Winter's Heart
Disney after Dark
Struck By Lightning:...
Best Served Cold
Death and the Dervis...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.
