The way to deal with superstition is not to be polite to it, but to tackle it with all arms, and so rout it, cripple it, and make it forever infamous and ridiculous. Is it, perchance, cherished by persons who should know better? Then their folly should be brought out into the light of day, and exhibited there in all its hideousness until they flee from it, hiding their heads in shame.
Interpretation
Superstition should be confronted aggressively rather than ignored or treated with respect.
In this quote, H. L. Mencken asserts that superstition is a phenomenon that deserves not just calm dismissal but a fierce and dedicated opposition. He emphasizes that it must be exposed and ridiculed so that those who cling to such beliefs, often despite better knowledge, can see the folly of their ways. Only through rigorous confrontation can society rid itself of these irrational beliefs and reveal their absurdity to those who may hold them dear.
In practice
During a public debate on science education, one might quote Mencken to emphasize the importance of confronting erroneous beliefs.
I know a good many men of great learning-that is, men born with an extraordinary eagerness and capacity to acquire knowledge. One and all, they tell me that they can't recall learning anything of any value in school. All that schoolmasters managed to accomplish with them was to test and determine the amount of knowledge that they had already acquired independently-and not infrequently the determination was made clumsily and inaccurately.
It takes a long while for a naturally trustful person to reconcile himself to the idea that after all God will not help him
It is the theory of all modern civilized governments that they protect and foster the liberty of the citizen; it is the practice of all of them to limit its exercise, and sometimes very narrowly.
The central belief of every moron is that he is the victim of a mysterious conspiracy against his common rights and true deserts.
The cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy.
It is my conviction that no normal man ever fell in love, within the ordinary meaning of the term, after the age of thirty.
A man is not saved against his will, but he is made willing by the operation of the Holy Ghost. A mighty grace which he does not wish to resist enters into the man, disarms him, makes a new creature of him, and he is saved.
Mathematicians are like managers - they want improvement without change.
I love life - that’s my real weakness. I love it so much that I am incapable of imagining what is not life.
Man is so constituted that he then only excels other things when he knows himself.
When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Cambrian system was deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled.
God makes me play well. That is why I always make the sign of a cross when I walk out on to the pitch. I feel I would be betraying him if I didn't.
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