Altruism and Cynicism

I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: "O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous." And God granted it.

Voltaire, in Altruism and Cynicism

A narcissist is someone better looking than you are.

Gore Vidal, in Altruism and Cynicism

Black, white, brown, yellow or even red, we piss with our pants down, and go naked to bed.

Mark van Essen, in Altruism and Cynicism

The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot.

Mark Twain, What is Man?, 1906, in Altruism and Cynicism

I'd never join a club that would allow a person like me to become a member.

Groucho Marx, in Altruism and Cynicism

I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it.

Groucho Marx, in Altruism and Cynicism

Never tell the truth to those unworthy of it.

Mark Twain, in Altruism and Cynicism

Man is the only animal that blushes -- or needs to.

Mark Twain, in Altruism and Cynicism

I have discovered that all human evil comes from this, man's being unable to sit still in a room.

Blaise Pascal, in Altruism and Cynicism

If you want to imagine the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face forever.

George Orwell, 1984, in Altruism and Cynicism

Everybody wants to save the earth; nobody wants to help Mom do the dishes.

P. J. O'Rourke, All the Trouble in the World, in Altruism and Cynicism and Work and Recreation

All lies are told with a straight face. It is truth that's said with a dismissive giggle.

P. J. O'Rourke, in Altruism and Cynicism

Hope is nature's veil for hiding truth's nakedness.

Alfred Nobel, in Altruism and Cynicism

Welcome thy neighbor into thy fallout shelter. He'll come in handy if you run out of food.

Dean McLaughlin, in Altruism and Cynicism

I don't necessarily agree with everything I say.

Marshall McLuhan, in Altruism and Cynicism

Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves.

Abraham Lincoln, in Altruism and Cynicism

All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.

Martin Luther King, Jr., in Altruism and Cynicism

Television has proved that people will look at anything rather than each other.

Ann Landers, in Altruism and Cynicism

Eulogy: Praise of a person who has either the advantages of wealth and power, or the consideration to be dead.

Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, in Altruism and Cynicism

Politeness: The most acceptable hypocrisy.

Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, in Altruism and Cynicism