The most costly of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.
- H.L. Mencken

To think ill of mankind and not wish ill to them, is perhaps the highest wisdom and virtue.
- Willian Hazklett

Of all the creatures that were made he [man] is the most detestable. Of the entire brood he is the only one – the solitary one – that possesses malice. That is the basest of all instincts, passions, vices – the most hateful...He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain...
- Mark Twain

By outward show let's not be cheated; An ass should like an ass be treated.
- John Gay

My country is the world; my countrymen are mankind.
- William Lloyd Garrison

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.
- George Bernard Shaw