Josh Billings

“Half of the troubles of this life can be traced to saying yes too quickly and not saying no soon enough.”

“The wheel that squeaks the loudest is the one that gets the grease.”

“In the whole history of the world there is but one thing that money cannot buy...to wit--the wag of a dog's tail.”

“There is one kind of laugh that I always did recommend; it looks out of the eye first with a merry twinkle, then it creeps down on its hands and knees and plays around the mouth like a pretty moth around the blaze of a candle, then it steals over into the dimples of the cheeks and rides around in those whirlpools for a while, then it lights up the whole face like the mellow bloom on a damask rose, then it swims up on the air, with a peal as clear and as happy as a dinner-bell, then it goes back again on gold tiptoes like an angel out for an airing, and it lies down on its little bed of violets in the heart where it came from.”

“The best way to convince a fool that he is wrong is to let him have his own way.”

“I haven't got as much money as some folks, but I've got as much impudence as any of them, and that's the next thing to money.”

“One of the greatest victories you can gain over someone is to beat him at politeness.”

“Love looks through a telescope; envy, through a microscope.”

“You'd better not know so much, than to know so many things that ain't so.”

“When a man comes to me for advice, I find out the kind of advice he wants, and I give it to him.”

“Knowledge is like money: the more he gets, the more he craves.”

“If a man should happen to reach perfection in this world, he would have to die immediately to enjoy himself.”

“Marrying for love may be a bit risky, but it is so honest that God can't help but smile on it.”

“There's a great power in words, if you don't hitch too many of them together.”

“In youth we run into difficulties. In old age difficulties run into us.”

“Advice is like castor oil, easy enough to give but dreadful uneasy to take.”

“As a general thing, when a woman wears the pants in a family, she has a good right to them.”

“There is no revenge so complete as forgiveness.”

“the squeeky wheel gets the grease.”

“I think when the full horror of being fifty hits you, you should stay home and have a good cry.”