A few fly bites cannot stop a spirited horse.

— Mark Twain

After all these years, I see that I was mistaken about Eve in the beginning; it is better to live outside the Garden with her than inside it without her.

— Mark Twain

After a long time and many questions, Satan said, "The spider kills the fly, and eats it; the bird kills the spider and eats it; the wildcat kills the goose; the -- well, they all kill each other. It is murder all along the line. Here are countless multitudes of creatures, and they all kill, kill, kill, they are all murderers. And they are not to blame, Divine One?

— Mark Twain

Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.

— Mark Twain

Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.

— Mark Twain

Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.

— Mark Twain

A gentleman is someone who knows how to play the banjo and doesn't.

— Mark Twain

A God who could make good children as easily a bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave is angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice, and invented hell--mouths mercy, and invented hell--mouths Golden Rules and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people, and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites his poor abused slave to worship him!

— Mark Twain

A half-truth is the most cowardly of lies.

— Mark Twain

Ah, Antonio, it IS the noblest sport that ever was. I would give a year of my life to see it. Is the bull always killed?"  "Yes. Sometimes a bull is timid, finding himself in so strange a place, and he stands trembling, or tries to retreat. Then everybody despises him for his cowardice and wants him punished and made ridiculous; so they though him from behind, and it is the funniest thing in the world to see him hobbling around on his severed legs; the whole vast house goes into hurricanes of laughter over it; I have laughed till the tears ran down my cheeks to see it. When he has furnished...

— Mark Twain