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I thought it was Mark Twain.


I did a little more digging, and I think it was Pascal. Here's the most informative page that I found, which discusses the origin of the quote: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/04/28/shorter-letter/


Mark Twain did say “I never could make a good impromptu speech without several hours to prepare it.”

I’ve also always been fond of Winston Churchill’s version: “I’m going to give a long speech today. I haven’t had time to prepare a short one.”


I'm sure they were both quite familiar with Pascal


Give them both credit, just to be safe.

(Pascal's Wager)




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