H. L. Mencken on fear

No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.

Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration⁠—courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth.

We must repsect the other fellow’s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children are smart.

Fear is your best friend or your worst enemy. It’s like fire. If you can control it, it can cook for you; it can heat your house. If you can’t control it, it will burn everything around you and destroy you. If you can control your fear, it makes you more alert, like a deer coming across the lawn.

Mike Tysonborn 1966

As a rule, men worry more about what they can’t see than about what they can.

Julius Caesar100–44 BC

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself⁠—nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.

Franklin D. Roosevelt1882–1945Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inaugural Address (1933)