Ah, Youth

Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children.

George Bernard Shaw

You’re only young once, but you can be immature forever.

Germaine Greer

Blessed are the young for they shall inherit the national debt.

Herbert Hoover   

What is youth except a man or a woman before it is ready or fit to be seen?

Evelyn Waugh

I am not young enough to know everything.

James M. Barrie

It is the malady of our age that the young are so busy teaching us that they have no time left to learn.

Eric Hoffer 

Youth is a disease from which we all recover.

Dorothy Fuldheim

We are only young once. That is all society can stand.

Bob Bowen

To get back my youth I would do anything in the world except take exercise, get up early or be respectable.

Oscar Wilde

Young men think old men are fools; but old men know young men are fools.

George Chapman

… there is no fool like an old fool, except a young fool. But the young fool has first to grow up to be an old fool to realize what a damn fool he was when he was a young fool.

Harold Macmillan

Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.

Sydney Harris

At 16 I was stupid, confused and indecisive. At 25 I was wise, self confident, prepossessing and assertive. At 45 I am stupid, confused, insecure and indecisive. Who would have supposed that maturity is only a short break in adolescence?

Jules Feiffer

In conclusion:

Age must give way to youth, no doubt. But not yet, not yet.

Mason Cooley

And our grand finale:

Life would be infinitely happier if we could only be born at the age of 80 and gradually approach 18.

Mark Twain

Adapted from: Jon Winokur

Graduation Speech

Conan O’Brien, at Harvard, 2000

“I’d like to thank the Class Marshalls for inviting me here today. The last time I was invited to Harvard it cost me $110,000, so you’ll forgive me if I’m a bit suspicious…

So what can you expect out there in the real world? Let me tell you.

As you leave these gates and re-enter society, one thing is certain: Everyone there is going to hate you. Never tell anyone in a roadside diner that you went to Harvard. In most situations the correct response to “Where did you go to school?” is “School? Why, I never had much in the way of 'larnin’ and such.” Then, get in your BMW and get the hell out of there.

You see, you’re in for a lifetime of “And you went to Harvard?” Accidentally give the wrong amount of change in a transaction and it’s “And you went to Harvard?” Forget just once that your underwear goes inside your pants and it’s “And you went to Harvard?” Get your head stuck in your niece’s dollhouse because you wanted to see what it was like to be a giant and it’s “Uncle Conan, you went to Harvard?”

Extracted from: Funny Times