Clemens, Samuel Langhorne -- Pen name Mark Twain -- 1835-1910. American author and humorist who drew on his childhood along the Mississippi River to create masterpieces of humor and sarcasm, including Tom Sawyer (1876) and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884).
An average English word is four letters and a half. By hard, honest labor I've dug all the large words out of my vocabulary and shaved it down till the average is three and a half. . . . I never write metropolis for seven cents, because I can get the same money for city. I never write policeman, because I can get the same price for cop. . . . I never write valetudinarian at all, for not even hunger and wretchedness can humble me to the point where I will do a word like that for seven cents; I wouldn't do it for fifteen.
Pity is for living, envy is for dead.
There is no sadder sight than a young pessimist, except an old optimist.
Wit and Humor- if any difference, it is in duration- lightning and electric light. Same material, apparently; but one is vivid, and can do damage- the other fools along and enjoys elaboration.
O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief . . . for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
The true charm of pedestrianism does not lie in the walking, or in the scenery, but in the talking. The walking is good to time the movement of the tongue by, and to keep the blood and the brain stirred up and active; the scenery and the woodsy smells are good to bear in upon a man an unconscious and unobtrusive charm and solace to eye and soul and sense; but the supreme pleasure comes from the talk.
