WIST Quotations

Shakespeare, William -- (Spurious)

Dave — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 07:07:39 +0000

What a terrible era in which the idiots govern the blind.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
(Spurious)

Frequently attributed to Shakespeare in social media posts (of all political stripes), but not found in any of his written works.

Joubert, Joseph -- Pensées [Thoughts], 1797 entry [tr. Auster (1983)]

Dave — Tue, 17 Jun 2025 18:07:48 +0000

When men are imbeciles, the one who is mad dominates the others.

Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French moralist, philosopher, essayist, poet
Pensées [Thoughts], 1797 entry [tr. Auster (1983)]
(Source)

I could not find an analog in other translations of the Pensées.

Twain, Mark -- The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, ch. 26 (1884)

Dave — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 12:50:08 +0000

Hain’t we got all the fools in town on our side? And ain’t that a big enough majority in any town?

Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, ch. 26 (1884)

Twain, Mark -- (Misattributed)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or by imbeciles who really mean it.

Mark Twain (1835-1910) American writer [pseud. of Samuel Clemens]
(Misattributed)

Not found in Twain's work, and the phrase "putting [someone] on" post-dates Twain.

The quotation actually appears to come from Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull, The Peter Principle, ch. 7 (1969). Peter writes that during a lecture, a Latin American student named Caesare Innocente, said to him:

Professor Peter, I'm afraid that what I want to know is not answered by all my studying. I don't know whether the world is run by smart men who are, how you Americans say, putting us on, or by imbeciles who really mean it.

More discussion: slang - What is the origin of "putting someone on" - English Language & Usage Stack Exchange.

Watterson, Bill -- Calvin and Hobbes (1989-07-15)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

CALVIN: People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don’t realize how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world.

Bill Watterson (b. 1958) American cartoonist
Calvin and Hobbes (1989-07-15)
(Source)