Josh Billings
170 quotes
Biography
Henry Wheeler Shaw, better known by the pen name Josh Billings, was a 19th-century American humorist and lecturer.
"A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than you love yourself."
"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."
"Success does not consist in never making blunders, but in never making the same one a second time."
"I honestly beleave it iz better tew know nothing than two know what ain't so."
"The lion and the lamb may, possibly, sumtime lay down in this world together for a fu minnits, but when the lion kums tew git up, the lamb will be missing."
"It iz comparitively eazy tew repent ov the sins that we hav committed, but tew repent ov thoze which we intend to commit, is asking tew mutch ov enny man, now days."
"Tew bring up a child in the wa he should go—travel that wa yourself."
"Don't mistake vivacity for wit, thare iz about az mutch difference az thare iz between lightning and a lightning bug."
"Most people when they cum tew yu for advice cum tew hav their own opinyuns strengthened, not correkted."
"As in a game ov cards, so in the game ov life, we must play what is dealt tew us, and the glory consists, not so mutch in winning, as in playing a poor hand well."
"A secret ceases to be a secret if it is once confided—it is like a dollar bill, once broken, it is never a dollar again."
"Love is like the measles; we can't have it bad but once, and the later in life we have it the tougher it goes with us."
"Put an Englishman into the garden of Eden, and he would find fault with the whole blasted concern; put a Yankee in, and he would see where he could alter it to advantage; put an Irishman in, and he would want to boss the thing; put a Dutchman in, and he would proceed to plant it."
"Better make a weak man your enemy than your friend."
"Nature never makes blunders; when she makes a fool she means it."
"I don't care how much a man talks, if he only says it in a few words."
"Poverty is the stepmother of genius."
"Thrice is he armed that hath his quarrel just, But four times he who gets his blow in fust"
"When a man gits tew talking about himself, he seldum fails tew be eloquent, and often reaches the sublime."
""Familiarity breeds kontempt." This only applies tew men, not tew hot bukwheat slapkakes, well buttered and sugared."
"Dangers are sum like a kold bath, very dangerous while you stand stripped on the bank, but often not only harmless, but invigorating, if you pitch into them."
"I don't beleave in fighting; i am solemly aginst it; but if a man gits teu fighting, i am also solemly aginst hiz gitting licked. After a fight iz once opened, all the virtew thare iz in it iz tew lick the other party."
"I don't beleaf in bad luck being sot for a man, like a trap, but i hav known lots ov folks, who if thare waz enny fust rate bad luck lieing around loose, would be sure tew git one foot in it enny how."
"I don't kno az i want tew bet enny money, and giv odds, on the man, who iz alwus anxious tew pray out loud, every chance he kan git."
"It iz a darned sight eazier tew find six men who kan tell exactly how a thing ought tew be did than tew find one who will do it."