Artemus Ward Quotes

Artemus Ward delivers witty, quirky musings that poke fun at politics and everyday life.

24 quotes

  1. I am not a politician, and my other habits are good, also.

  2. The prevailin' weakness of most public men is to Slop over. G. Washington never slopt over.

  3. I can't sing. As a singist I am not a success. I am saddest when I sing. So are those who hear me. They are sadder even than I am.

  4. Did you ever have the measels, and if so, how many?

  5. The Puritans nobly fled from a land of despotism to a land of freedim, where they could not only enjoy their own religion, but could prevent everybody else from enjoyin his.

  6. Why is this thus? What is the reason of this thusness?

  7. He is dreadfully married. 'He's the most married man I ever saw in my life.'

  8. Let us all be happy and live within our means, even if we have to borrow the money to do it with.

  9. The sun has a right to 'set' where it wants to, and so, I may add, has a hen.

  10. They cherish his mem'ry, and them as sell picturs of his birthplace, etc., make it prof'tible cherishin' it.

  11. I now bid you a welcome adoo.

  12. ...their eyes sparkled like diminds, their cheeks was like roses, and they was charmin enuff to make a man throw stuns at his granmother, if they axed him to.

  13. My pollertics, like my religion, being of an exceedin' accommodatin' character.

  14. The fack can't be no longer disgised that a Krysis is onto us.

  15. N.B. This is rote sarcastikul.

  16. The female woman is one of the greatest institooshuns of which this land can boste.

  17. I have given two cousins to war and I stand ready to sacrifice my wife's brother.

  18. My wife is one of the best wimin on this Continent, altho' she isn't always gentle as a lamb with mint sauce.

    #18 Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

  19. The happy married man dies in good stile at home, surrounded by his weeping wife and children. The old bachelor don't die at all - he sort of rots away, like a pollywog's tail.

    #19 Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

  20. They drink with impunity, or anybody who invites them.

    #20 Attribution disputed; shown as originally published.

  21. Why don't you show us a statesman who can rise up to the emergency, and cave in the emergency's head?

  22. It ain't so much the things we don't know that get us into trouble, it's the things we do know that just ain't so.

  23. “I have never heard any of your lectures, but from what I can learn I should say that for people who like the kind of lectures you deliver, they are just the kind of lectures such people like. Yours respectfully, O. Abe.”

  24. “I am happiest when I am idle. I could live for months without performing any kind of labor, and at the expiration of that time I should feel fresh and vigorous enough to go right on in the same way for numerous more months.”