Mark Twain

What is there that confers the noblest delight? What is that which swells a man’s breast with pride above that which any other experience can bring to him? Discovery! To know that you are walking where none others have walked; that you are beholding what human eye has not seen before; that you are breathing a virgin atmosphere. To give birth to an idea, to discover a great thought – an intellectual nugget, right under the dust of a field that many a brain-plough had gone over before. To find a new planet, to invent a new hinge, to find a way to make the lightning carry your messages. To be the first – that is the idea.

Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do.

From his cradle to his grave a man never does a single thing which has any FIRST AND FOREMOST object but one – to secure peace of mind, spiritual comfort, for HIMSELF.

He liked to like people, therefore people liked him.

I never let schooling interfere with my education.

If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning. And If it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.

It is just good practice to do a situational scan and have situational awareness when you are out in the world.

I can visualize the time when almost every family will have a small plane in their back yard.

The human race has one really effective weapon, and that is laughter.

The little I know I owe to my ignorance.

We all have different reasons for forgetting to breathe.

Life did not stop, and one had to live.

To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream, not only plan, but also believe.

By the time a man realizes that maybe his father was right, he usually has a son who thinks he’s wrong.

The things you own end up owning you.

People will try to fix world but world will fix people.

There is no script. Live your life. Soak it all in.

There have been times when I’ve been around people I wouldn’t care to be around, and if I could get away I would. We have a word in Mississippi – we just don’t seem to set horses. In other words, this person is always saying something that gets your goat, y’understand? But when people treat you mean, you dislike them for that, but not because of their person, who they are. I was born and raised in a segregated society, but when I left there I had nobody I disliked other than the people that’d mistreated me, and that only lasted for as long as they were mistreating me.

A mistake is to commit a misunderstanding.

To err is human, to forgive divine.

Words are only painted fire; a look is the fire itself.