“He had developed in the most wonderful way the distinctive silliness of man without losing one jot of the natural folly of a monkey.”

— H. G. Wells, book The Island of Doctor Moreau

Source: The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), Ch. 21: The Reversion of the Beast Folk

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H. G. Wells142

English writer 1866–1946

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“The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him.”

Robert Benchley (1889–1945) American comedian

Source: "Quick Quotations" in My Ten Years in a Quandary and How They Grew (1936)
Context: 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.