Mark Twain Quotes About Judgment

• You can't depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.

  Mark Twain

  Life, Inspiring, Meaningful

  Mark Twain (1889). “A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court”, p.422, Createspace Independent Pub

• I hate to hear people say this Judge will vote so and so, because he is a Democrat -- and this one so and so because he is a Republican. It is shameful. The Judges have the Constitution for their guidance; they have no right to any politics save the politics of rigid right and justice when they are sitting in judgment upon the great matters that come before them.

  Mark Twain

  Hate, People, Justice

  Mark Twain (1960). “Mark Twain and the Government”

• Good judgment comes from experience. And where does experience come from? Experience comes from bad judgment.

  Mark Twain

  Doe, Judgment, Good Judgment

• A pilot must have a memory developed to absolute perfection. But there are two higher qualities which he also must have. He must have good and quick judgment and decision, and a cool, calm courage that no peril can shake.

  Mark Twain

  Memories, Two, Perfection

• A distinguished man should be as particular about his last words as he is about his last breath. He should write them out on a slip of paper and take the judgment of his friends on them. He should never leave such a thing to the last hour of his life, and trust to an intellectual spurt at the last moment to enable him to say something smart with his latest gasp and launch into eternity with grandeur.

  Mark Twain

  Death, Smart, Writing

  Mark Twain (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Mark Twain (Illustrated)”, p.3459, Delphi Classics

• No man has an appreciation so various that his judgment is good upon all varieties of literary work.

  Mark Twain

  Appreciation, Men, Editors

  Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.219, Courier Corporation

• I have no liking for novels or stories - none in the world; and so, whenever I read one - which is not oftener than once in two years, and even in these same cases I seldom read beyond the middle of the book - my distaste for the vehicle always taints my judgment of the literature itself, as a matter of course; and also of course makes my verdict valuless. Are you saying "You have written stories yourself." Quite true: but the fact that an Indian likes to scalp people is no evidence that he likes to be scalped.

  Mark Twain

  Book, Reading, Years

  Mark Twain (2016). “The Wit and Wisdom of Mark Twain”, p.57, Chartwell

• We are always hearing of people who are around seeking after the Truth. I have never seen a (permanent) specimen. I think he has never lived. But I have seen several entirely sincere people who thought they were (permanent) Seekers after the Truth. They sought diligently, persistently, carefully, cautiously, profoundly, with perfect honesty and nicely adjusted judgment- until they believed that without doubt or question they had found the Truth. That was the end of the search. The man spent the rest of his hunting up shingles wherewith to protect his Truth from the weather.

  Mark Twain

  Truth, Honesty, Men

• It is sound judgment to put on a bold face and play your hand for a hundred times what it is worth; forty-nine times out of fifty nobody dares to call it, and you roll in the chips.

  Mark Twain

  Hands, Play, Sound

  Mark Twain (1961). “Twain: Wit and Wisecracks”

• I told that girl, in the kindest, gentlest way, that I could not consent to deliver judgment upon any one's manuscript, because an individual's verdict was worthless. It might underrate a work of high merit and lose it to the world, or it might overrate a trashy production and so open the way for its infliction upon the world. I said that the great public was the only tribunal competent to sit in judgment upon a literary effort, and therefore it must be best to lay it before that tribunal in the outset, since in the end it must stand or fall by that mighty court's decision any way.

  Mark Twain

  Girl, Fall, Effort

  Mark Twain “Carnival of Crime in Ct”, Library of Alexandria

• If we read the words and attitudes of the past through the pompous "wisdom" of the considered moral judgments of the present, we will find nothing but error.

  Mark Twain

  Attitude, Past, Errors

• Always obey your parents. When they are present. This is the best policy in the long run. Because if you don't, they will make you. Most parents think they know better than you do, and you can generally make more by humoring that superstition than you can by acting on your own better judgment.

  Mark Twain

  Running, Thinking, Long

  Mark Twain (2004). “Mark Twain’s Helpful Hints for Good Living: A Handbook for the Damned Human Race”, p.135, Univ of California Press

• It isn't safe to sit in judgment upon another person's illusion when you are not on the inside. While you are thinking it is a dream, he may be knowing it is a planet.

  Mark Twain

  Dream, Thinking, Knowing

  Mark Twain (1966). “Mark Twain's "Which Was the Dream?" and Other Symbolic Writings of the Later Years”, p.492, Univ of California Press

• It is not in the least likely that any life has ever been lived which was not a failure in the secret judgment of the person who lived it.

  Mark Twain

  Failure, Secret, Judgment

  Mark Twain (2012). “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips: A Book of Quotations”, p.116, Courier Corporation

• If your mother tells you to do a thing, it is wrong to reply that you won't. It is better and more becoming to intimate that you will do as she bids you, and then afterwards act quietly in the matter according to the dictates of your better judgment.

  Mark Twain

  Mother, Matter, Becoming

  Mark Twain (2013). “Gold Miners & Guttersnipes: Tales of California”, p.70, Chronicle Books

• Experience comes from bad judgment.

  Mark Twain

  Learning Something New, Hiking, Climbing

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