Mark Twain Quotes

Savage peoples are ruled by passion, civilized peoples by the mind. The difference lies not in the respective natures of savagery and civilization, but in their attendant circumstances, institutions, and so forth. The difference, therefore, does not operate in every sense, but it does in most of them. Even the most civilized peoples, in short, can be fired with passionate hatred for each other.

We made civilization in order to impress our girlfriends.

The civilized man is a larger mind but a more imperfect nature than the savage.

The more we study the Indian's character the more we appreciate the marked distinction between the civilized being and the real savage.

Civilization is the lamb's skin in which barbarism masquerades.

Without civilization, we would not turn into animals, but vegetables.

Next to the striking of fire and the discovery of the wheel, the greatest triumph of what we call civilization was the domestication of the human male.

Give civilized man time to gather all his machines about him, and he will no doubt easily beat the savage; but if you would see a still more unequal contest, set them together naked and unarmed, and you will soon see the advantage of having all our forces constantly at our disposal, of being always prepared for every event

There is no fundamental difference in the ways of thinking of primitive and civilized man. A close connection between race and personality has never been established.

Civilization largely consists in hiding human nature. When the barbarian learns to hide it we account him enlightened.

Since the same human mire remains beneath, does not all civilization reduce itself to the superiority of smelling nice and living well?

Are we savages or what?

The crucial differences which distinguish human societies and human beings are not biological. They are cultural.

Is it possible that nobody has ever known that there never has been a completely civilized man, and won't be for another thousand years?

All the accoutrements that distinguish us from animal existence were put in place when we had a different kind of mind than we have now. We didn't have a mind that favored role specialization, and male dominance, and anxiety over female sexual activity related to feelings of male ownership. That all came later.

What if culture itself is nothing but a halt, a break, a respite, in the pursuit of barbarity?

Barbarism is the natural state of mankind.

Without the restraints of religion and social worship, men become savages much sooner than savages become civilized by means of religion and civil government.

It is inherent in human consciousness to improve. So there is nothing unique about a people searching for and creating ways to make their life better - all civilizations throughout history have done this. What is unique about us in America is the accelerated rate at which we continually search for novelty and progress.

Rousseau defined civilizations as when people build fences.

The civilized man is a more experienced and wiser savage.

Barbarianism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is the whim of circumstance. And barbarianism must ultimately triumph

Every fairly intelligent person is aware that the price of respectability is a muffled soul bent on the trivial and the mediocre.

I groaned. Man and his codes! Even in a lawless inferno, man has to give himself some honor, he's so desperate to separate himself from the beasts.

Man perfected by society is the best of all animals; he is the most terrible of all when he lives without law, and without justice.