To Produce A Mighty Book, You Must

I Do Not Think I Have Any Uncharitable Prejudice Against The Rattlesnake, Still, I Should Not Like To Be One.

It Is Not The Purpose Of Literature To Purvey News. For News Consult The Almanac De Gotha.

At Sea A Fellow Comes Out. Salt Water Is Like Wine, In That Respect.

Nature Has Not Implanted Any Power In Man That Was Not Meant To Be Exercised At Times, Though Too Often Our Powers Have Been Abused. The Privilege, Inborn And Inalienable, That Every Man Has Of Dying Himself, And Inflicting Death Upon Another, Was Not Given To Us Without A Purpose. These Are The Last Resources Of An Insulted And Unendurable Existence.

A Good Laugh Is A Mighty Good Thing, And Rather Too Scarce A Good Thing; The More's The Pity. So, If Any One Man, In His Own Proper Person, Afford Stuff For A Good Joke To Anybody, Let Him Not Be Backward, But Let Him Cheerfully Allow Himself To Spend And Be Spent In That Way. And The Man That Has Anything Bountifully Laughable About Him, Be Sure There Is More In That Man Than You Perhaps Think For.