Quote Origin: Anger Is an Acid That Can Do More Harm To the Vessel In Which It’s Stored Than To Anything On Which It’s Poured

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Mark Twain? Ann Landers? Turkish Proverb? Mohandas Gandhi? Seneca the Younger? Frederica Mathewes-Green? Anonymous?

Picture of a campfire cauldron from Pixabay

Question for Quote Investigator: Intense feelings of anger affect the body and mind negatively. This notion can be expressed metaphorically:

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.

Mark Twain, Ann Landers, and Mohandas Gandhi have received credit for this saying, but I am skeptical because I have not seen any solid citations. Would you please explore this topic?

Reply from Quote Investigator: QI has found no substantive evidence that Mark Twain employed this saying. It does not appear on the Twain Quotes website edited by Barbara Schmidt,1 nor does it appear in the large compilation “Mark Twain at Your Fingertips” edited by Caroline Thomas Harnsberger.2

The earliest close match located by QI appeared in May 1955 within the “Daily News-Post” of Monrovia, California. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:3

Corrosive
Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it’s stored than to anything on which it’s poured.

The saying above also appeared on the same day in other newspapers such as the “San Pedro News-Pilot”4 of San Pedro, California and the “Evening Vanguard”5 of Venice, California. The creator was anonymous.

The central metaphor of this expression has a long history in the Turkish language. A compact instance appeared in “A Dictionary of Turkish Proverbs” compiled by Metin Yurtbaşı:6

Keskin sirke küpüne/kabına zarar.
Sour vinegar harms its jar.
[A bad temper harms its possessor most!]

The dictionary provided a nineteenth century citation and a twentieth century citation for this proverb in Turkish:

ÖAA 1402 < Ş 3037
Ş. = Şinasi, Durüb-ı Emsâl-i Osmaniyye (Ottoman Proverbs), Istanbul, 1863.
ÖAA = Ömer Asim Aksoy, Atasözleri Sözlüyü (Dictionary of Proverbs), Ankara, 1965.

Below are additional selected citations in chronological order.

In 1878 a French version of the saying above appeared in “Mille Et Un Proverbes Turcs” (“A Thousand And One Turkish Proverbs”) within a section about moderation:7

MODÉRATION
Vinaigre trop fort mine sa bouteille.

Here is one possible translation:

Vinegar which is too strong damages its bottle.

A thematically related saying appeared in 1913 within a column by Albert Ford Ferguson in “The Cincinnati Post” of Ohio. The saying used the term “grouch” which meant a mood of ill temper, sullenness, or resentment:8

How many times do you poison yourself with a grouch?

There is a separate Quote Investigator article about the thematically related saying “Resentment is like taking poison and waiting for the other person to die” available here.

A close match for the quotation under examination appeared in May 1955 as mentioned at the beginning of this article. In August 1955 the statement appeared in the widely distributed periodical “Reader’s Digest”:9

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it’s stored than to anything on which it’s poured. — Glendale, Calif., News-Press

In December 1955 the saying appeared in “The El Paso Times” of Texas:10

REMEMBER THIS:
Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it’s stored, than to anything on which it’s poured.
— The Wheel of Fortune

In 1962 a version of the saying appeared in the popular syndicated advice column of Ann Landers:11

Dear Nightmares: You are fighting a tough battle — and winning. I hope you will forgive your father, not for HIS sake, but for your own. Hatred does more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to the object on which it is poured.

In 1976 “The Ouachita Citizen” of West Monroe, Louisiana published an instance while acknowledging a cook book titled “Assembled Recipes of God’s Cooks”:12

Hate does more harm to the vessel in which it is contained than to the object on which it is poured.

In 1977 the collection “Quote Unquote” compiled by Lloyd Cory included the following item in a section about anger:13

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it’s stored than to anything on which it’s poured. (BAPTIST BEACON)

In 1981 “The Windsor Beacon” of Windsor, Colorado printed this short item with an anonymous attribution:14

Thought: “Anger is an acid that destroys its own container.” Anon

In 1989 “The Manager’s Book of Quotations” included this item:15

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it’s stored than to anything on which it’s poured.
Anonymous
How to Live With Life
(Reader’s Digest, 1965)

In March 2004 “The Ledger” of Lakeland, Florida printed a roundup of recent material from other publications. The following passage was derived from the periodical “U.S. Catholic”:16

Frederica Mathewes-Green counsels, “Anger is an acid that destroys its container.” She describes the rite of forgiveness practiced at her parish each Lent — “We need to do that to stay healthy.”

In June 2004 “Business Day” of Johannesburg, South Africa printed a piece which credited the expression to Mohandas Gandhi:17

True forgiveness involves forgetting, letting go and moving on. As Mahatma Gandhi once said: “Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it stands than to anything on which it is poured.”

In 2006 a message appeared in the Google Group called Devine Group which attributed the saying to Mark Twain:18

Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured.
— Mark Twain

In 2007 “The Phoenix” of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania printed an article by Don Meyer who was the president of a local college. The ancient sage Seneca received credit for the saying:19

But anger also harms the one who is angry. Seneca claimed that anger is an “acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than on anything on which it is poured.”

In conclusion, there is no substantive evidence that Mark Twain employed this saying. A closely matching anonymous instance appeared in 1955. A precursor Turkish proverb: “Sour vinegar harms its jar” was circulating by the 1800s.

Image Notes: Picture of a campfire cauldron from Ray_Shrewsberry at Pixabay. The image has been cropped.

Acknowledgement: Great thanks to Ben Hadad whose message led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Hadad was reminded of this saying by the related saying about resentment. He noted the attribution to Mark Twain and the existence of a Turkish proverb “Sharp vinegar harms its own container”.

Update History: On May 3, 2024 the format of the bibliographical notes was updated. Also, the full article was placed on this website.

  1. Website: TwainQuotes.com, Editor: Barbara Schmidt, (QI searched the website for quotations containing the phrase “anger is an acid” or the phrase “vessel in which”. No pertinent match was discovered), Description: Mark Twain quotations, articles, and related resources. (Searched January 28, 2023) link ↩︎
  2. 1948, Mark Twain at Your Fingertips by Caroline Thomas Harnsberger, (QI searched for quotations containing the phrase “anger is an acid” or the phrase “vessel in which”. No pertinent match was discovered), Cloud, Inc., Beechhurst Press, Inc., New York. (Verified with search) ↩︎
  3. 1955 May 16, Daily News-Post, Corrosive (Filler item), Quote Page 4, Column 1, Monrovia, California. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  4. 1955 May 16, San Pedro News-Pilot, Corrosive (Filler item), Quote Page 4, Column 1, San Pedro, California. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  5. 1955 May 16, Evening Vanguard, Corrosive (Filler item), Quote Page 4, Column 1, Venice, California. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  6. 2012 (1993 First Printing), A Dictionary of Turkish Proverbs, Compiled by Metin Yurtbaşı, Topic: Anger, Quote Page 17, Published by Mehmet Başpehlivan, Excellence Publishing. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  7. 1878, Mille Et Un Proverbes Turcs: Recueillis, Traduits Et Mis En Ordre (A Thousand And One Turkish Proverbs: Collected, Translated and Arranged), Author: Jean Adolphe Decourdemanche, Topic: Modération, Proverb Number 563, Publisher Ernest Leroux, Paris, France. (Google Books Full View) link ↩︎
  8. 1913 August 4, The Cincinnati Post, Here’s the Truth about That Grouch You Carry by Albert Ford Ferguson, Quote Page 4, Column 5 and 6, Cincinnati, Ohio. (GenealogyBank) ↩︎
  9. 1955 August, Reader’s Digest, Volume 67, Number 400, (Filler item), Quote Page 120, The Reader’s Digest Association, Pleasantville, New York. (Verified on paper) ↩︎
  10. 1955 December 6, The El Paso Times, Everyday Events by W. J. Hooten, Quote Page 4, Column 2, El Paso, Texas. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  11. 1962 July 17, The Daily Progress, She’s Told to Forgive Father Because Hatred Will Do Harm by Ann Landers, Quote Page 7, Column 3, Charlottesville, Virginia. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  12. 1976 July 15, The Ouachita Citizen, (Untitled filler item with acknowledgement to the cook book “Assembled Recipes of God’s Cooks”), Quote Page 4-B, Column 8, West Monroe, Louisiana. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  13. 1977, Quote Unquote, Compiled by Lloyd Cory, Section: Anger, Quote Page 18, Published by Victor Books: A Division of SP Publications, Wheaton, Illinois. (Verified on paper) ↩︎
  14. 1981 January 15, The Windsor Beacon, Pass it on by Joan Moxon, Quote Page 9, Column 5, Windsor, Colorado. (Newspapers_com) ↩︎
  15. 1989, The Manager’s Book of Quotations by Lewis D. Eigen and Jonathan P. Siegel, Chapter 43: Stress & Stress Management, Quote Page 451, Column 2, AMACON: American Management Association, New York. (Verified with scans) ↩︎
  16. 2004 March 6, The Ledger, Section: Life, Article: VIEWS & REVIEWS, Quote Page D4, Location: Lakeland, Florida. (NewsBank Access World News) ↩︎
  17. 2004 June 21, Business Day, Section: Economy, Business & Finance, With no trust, communication becomes impossible by Stephen Covey, Johannesburg, South Africa. (NewsBank Access World News) ↩︎
  18. Google Groups discussion message, Timestamp: Jul 31, 2006, 12:23:37 AM, Group: Devine Group, From: Gayathri Elan, Subject: Thought for the Day. (Google Groups Search; Accessed July 9, 2023) link ↩︎
  19. 2007 September 29, The Phoenix, Article: The power of anger, Author: Dr. Don Meyer (President of Valley Forge Christian College, Phoenixville), Quote Page 4, Location: Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. (NewsBank Access World News) ↩︎