It is not materialism that is the chief curse of the world, as pastors teach, but idealism. Men get into trouble by taking their visions and hallucinations too seriously.

The marriage made national headlines and many were surprised that Mencken who once called marriage "the end of hope" and who was well known for mocking relations between the sexes had gone to the altar. In 1926 he deliberately had himself arrested for selling an issue of The American Mercury that was banned in Boston under the Comstock laws.

A keen cheerleader of scientific progress he was very skeptical of economic theories and particularly critical of anti-intellectualism bigotry populism fundamentalist Christianity creationism organized religion the existence of God and osteopathic/chiropractic medicine. Henry Louis "H. During and after World War I he was sympathetic to the Germans and was very distrustful of British propaganda.