“Racism is pervasive. The pretense that it belongs solely to poor people who talk slow lets the rest of us off the hook.” Rebecca Solnit, The Encyclopedia of Trouble and Spaciousness.

“Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.” George Eliot.

“Only little people pay taxes.” Leona Helmsley.

“I’ll not listen to reason. . . . Reason always means what someone else has got to say.” Elizabeth Gaskell.

“To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance.” Oscar Wilde.

“It is a general error to imagine the loudest complainers for the public to be most anxious for its welfare.” Edmund Burke.

“Those who despise mankind believe themselves great men.” Marquis Luc de Clapiers Vauvenargues.

“You cannot have power for good without having power for evil too. Even mother’s milk nourishes murderers as well as heroes.” George Bernard Shaw.

“The popularity of a bad man is as treacherous as he is himself.” Pliny the Younger.

“One always speaks badly when one has nothing to say.” Voltaire.

“Hypocrisy is the most difficult and nerve-racking vice that any man can pursue; it needs an unceasing vigilance and a rare detachment of spirit. It cannot, like adultery or gluttony, be practiced at spare moments; it is a whole-time job.” Somerset Maugham.

“It is not in human nature to deceive others, for any long time, without, in a measure, deceiving ourselves.” J.H. Newman.

“One of the most striking differences between a cat and a lie is that a cat has only nine lives.” Mark Twain.

“We find it easy to believe that praise is sincere: why should anyone lie in telling us the truth?” Jean Rostand.

“A fool always finds someone more foolish than he is to admire him.” Nicolas Boileau.

“The first step towards madness is think oneself wise.” Fernando de Rojas.

“A man should not be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.” Jonathan Swift.

“Nothing hath an uglier look to us than reason, when it is not on our side.” Marquess of Halifax.

“Those who never retract their opinions love themselves more than they love the truth.” Joseph Joubert.

“A bigot delights in public ridicule, for he begins to think he is a martyr.” Sydney Smith.

“There is nothing makes a man suspect much, more than to know little.” Sir Francis Bacon.

“Trump: His mother did not have him tested.” R. Jonakait.