Great Throughts Treasury

"As soon as someone is identified as an unsung hero, he no longer is."

"At a formal dinner party, the person nearest death should always be seated closest to the bathroom."

"At one time there existed a race of people whose knowledge consisted entirely of gossip."

"Atheism is a non-prophet organization."

"Avoid teams at all cost. Keep your circle small. Never join a group that has a name."

"Attending college at a place called Bob Jones University is like putting your money in Nick & Tony's Bank."

"Be careful whom you befriend. They will eventually ask you for something."

"Baseball is the only major sport that appears backward in a mirror."

"Because of my abuse of drugs, I neglected my business affairs and had large arrears with the IRS, and that took me eighteen to twenty years to dig out of. I did it honorably, and I don't begrudge them. I don't hate paying taxes, and I'm not angry at anyone, because I was complicit in it. But I'll tell you what it did for me: It made me a way better comedian. Because I had to stay out on the road and I couldn't pursue that movie career, which would have gone nowhere, and I became a really good comic and a really good writer."

"Because we were a poor area, the school had a small budget and was unable to teach the second half of the alphabet."

"Beethoven was so hard of hearing he thought he was a painter."

"Birth control pills are still on prescription. You still need a note to get laid."

"Before they invented drawing boards, what did they go back to?"

"Blacks are deliberately kept down. Poor communities are deliberately underfunded."

"Bipartisan usually means that a larger-than-usual deception is being carried out."

"Boxing is a more sophisticated form of hockey."

"But when you're in front of an audience and you make them laugh at a new idea, you're guiding the whole being for the moment. No one is ever more him/herself than when they really laugh. Their defenses are down. It's very Zen-like, that moment. They are completely open, completely themselves when that message hits the brain and the laugh begins. That's when new ideas can be implanted. If a new idea slips in at that moment, it has a chance to grow."

"Bullshit is truly the American soundtrack."

"Bowling is not a sport because you have to rent the shoes."

"Boy, these conservatives are really something, aren't they? They're all in favor of the unborn. They will do anything for the unborn. But once you're born, you're on your own. Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to nine months. After that, they don't want to know about you. They don't want to hear from you. No nothing. No neonatal care, no day care, no head start, no school lunch, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing. If you're preborn, you're fine; if you're preschool, you're f**ked."

"But you know, the longer you listen to this abortion debate, the more you hear this phrase 'sanctity of life'. You've heard that. Sanctity of life. You believe in it? Personally, I think it's a bunch of shit. Well, I mean, life is sacred? Who said so? God? Hey, if you read history, you realize that God is one of the leading causes of death. Has been for thousands of years. Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Christians all taking turns killing each other 'cause God told them it was a good idea. The sword of God, the blood of the land, vengeance is mine. Millions of dead motherfuckers. Millions of dead motherfuckers all because they gave the wrong answer to the God question. 'You believe in God?' 'No.' Boom. Dead. 'You believe in God?' 'Yes.' 'You believe in my God? 'No.' Boom. Dead. 'My God has a bigger dick than your God!'"

"Can anyone explain to me the need for one-hour photo finishing? You just saw the fuckin' thing!"

"California is a small woman saying, 'Fuck me.' New York is a large man saying, 'Fuck you!"

"Can placebos cause side effects? If so, are the side effects real?"

"Can you transport love across the state line?"

"Capitalism tries for a delicate balance: It attempts to work things out so that everyone gets just enough stuff to keep them from getting violent and trying to take other people’s stuff."

"Catholic kids are stupid; they don't know how to handle a pedophile priest. Here's what you do: First of all, you don't get all scared and do whatever he tells you. Who wants to get sucked off by a forty-three-year-old clergyman with beard stubble? Not me. Instead, what you do is kick him in the nuts. You kick him squarely in the nuts, and you get the fuck out of there as fast as you can, and you go tell somebody right away; you tell as many grown-up people as you can––one of them is bound to believe you. That's what you do. You don't wait thirty years. You kick the priest in the nuts and say, "Fuck you, Father, I don't do that shit"... And you're out the door."

"Censorship that comes from the outside assumes about people an inability to make reasoned choices."

"Cigarette companies market heavily to young people. They need young customers because their product kills the older ones. It is the only product that, if used as intended, kills the consumer."

"Catholic — which I was until I reached the age of reason."

"Catholics and other Christians are against abortions and they're against homosexuals. Well who has less abortions than homosexuals? Leave these fucking people alone for Christ's sake. Here is an entire class of people guaranteed never to have an abortion and the Catholics and the Christians are just tossing them aside. You'd think they'd make natural allies. Go look for consistency in religion."

"Comedy is filled with surprise, so when I cross a line... I like to find out where the line might be and then cross it deliberately, and then make the audience happy about crossing the line with me."

"Consumption. This is the new national pastime. Fuck baseball, it's consumption, the only true, lasting American value that's left... buying things... People spending money they don't have on things they don't need... So they can max out their credit cards and spend the rest of their lives paying 18 percent interest on something that cost $12.50. And they didn't like it when they got it home anyway. Not too bright, folks, not too fuckin' bright."

"Conservatives want live babies so they can train them to be dead soldiers."

"Cloud nine gets all the publicity, but cloud eight actually is cheaper, less crowded, and has a better view."

"Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money."

"Contrary to popular belief, Babe Ruth did not call his famous home run shot. He was actually giving the finger to a hot dog vendor who had cheated him out of twelve cents."

"Cosmologists are just now beginning to accept the possibility that the big bang was actually caused by a huge explosion in a meth lab."

"Could it be that all those trick-or-treaters wearing sheets aren't going as ghosts but as mattresses?"

"'Cough drops' have grown up and turned into 'throat lozenges,' some even calling themselves 'pastilles' or 'troches.' Guess what? Right! Two dollars more for lozenges, pastilles and troches."

"Death is caused by swallowing small amounts of saliva over a long period of time."

"Did you ever eat a whole box of cookies right in a row? Did you ever do that? I don't mean take them into your bedroom or something. I mean open them right up in the kitchen as soon as you get home from the store and eat 'em while you're standing there? Just stare at the toaster while you're eatin' a whole goddamn box of cookies?"

"Deep Throat: Think about it. There is actually a semi-important figure in American history who is named for a blow-job movie. How do school teachers handle this?"

"Did you ever dial the phone and forget who you're calling? Don't you feel dumb? You don't know whether to hang on and hope you remember the voice or not.. Then when you remember who it was, you have to call back, so you change your voice so they don't think you're a moron."

"Do pediatricians play miniature golf on Wednesdays?"

"Do you ever get that strange feeling of vuja de? Not deja vu, vuja de. It's the distinct sense that somehow, something that just happened has never happened before. Nothing seems familiar. And then suddenly the feeling is gone. Vuja de."

"Did you ever notice that printed right on the cookie box it says, "Open here." Well, what did they think I was gonna do? Move to Hong Kong to open up their fuckin' cookies?"

"Did you ever look at yourself in store windows when you're walking past the stores? "Hey, I look cool in the store window, man! [lukewarm audience reaction] Have I done these jokes before tonight? Please tell me."

"Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery?"

"Do they have reserved parking for non-handicapped people at the Special Olympics?"