Anyone will be glad to admit that he knows nothing…

Anyone will be glad to admit that he knows nothing about beagling, or the Chinese stock market, or ballistics, but there is not a man or woman alive who does not claim to know how to cure hiccoughs.

Sourced

“Stop Those Hiccoughs!”, My Ten Years in a Quandary and How They Grew (1936)

Other Robert Benchley Quotes

There is no such place as Budapest. Perhaps you are thinking of Bucharest, and there is no such place as Bucharest, either. - View Quote Details on There is no such place as Budapest. Perhaps you are…
A great many people have come up to me and asked how I manage to get so much work done and still keep looking so dissipated. - View Quote Details on A great many people have come up to me and…
Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing. - View Quote Details on Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I…
The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him. That remark in itself wouldn’t make any sense if quoted as it stands. - View Quote Details on The surest way to make a monkey of a man…
So who’s in a hurry? - View Quote Details on So who’s in a hurry?
At fifteen one is first beginning to realize that everything isn’t money and power in this world, and is casting about for joys that do not turn to dross in one’s hands. - View Quote Details on At fifteen one is first beginning to realize that everything…
A baby is shown sitting on the floor. He appears to be about a year and a half old. Incidentally, he is a very plain baby. Strewn about him on the floor are the toys that he has been playing with. There are a ball, a rattle, a ring, a doll, a bell and a pair of roller-skates. Evidently, the candidate is supposed to be aghast at the roller-skates in the possession of such a small child.
The man who drew that picture had evidently never furnished playthings for a small child. I can imagine nothing that would delight a child of a year and a half more than a pair of roller-skates to chew and spin and hit himself in the face with. They could also be dropped on Daddy when Daddy was lying on the floor in an attempt to be sociable. Of all the toys arranged before the child, the roller-skates are the most logical…. That is my great trouble in taking tests and examinations of any kind. I always want to argue with the examiner, because the examiner is always so obviously wrong. - View Quote Details on A baby is shown sitting on the floor. He appears…
The way to go to the circus, however, is with someone who has seen perhaps one theatrical performance before in his life and that in the High School hall…. The scales of sophistication are struck from your eyes and you see in the circus a gathering of men and women who are able to do things as a matter of course which you couldn’t do if your life depended on it. - View Quote Details on The way to go to the circus, however, is with…
There seems to be no lengths to which humorless people will not go to analyze humor. It seems to worry them. - View Quote Details on There seems to be no lengths to which humorless people…
Nine-tenths of the value of a sense of humor in writing is not in the things it makes one write but in the things it keeps one from writing. It is especially valuable in this respect in serious writing, and no one without a sense of humor should ever write seriously. For without knowing what is funny, one is constantly in danger of being funny without knowing it. - View Quote Details on Nine-tenths of the value of a sense of humor in…