Top 985 Quotes & Sayings by Ambrose Bierce - Page 2
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American journalist Ambrose Bierce.
Last updated on November 23, 2024.
Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited.
The slightest acquaintance with history shows that powerful republics are the most warlike and unscrupulous of nations.
Beauty, n: the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.
Rum, n. Generically, fiery liquors that produce madness in total abstainers.
Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.
Insurance - an ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfortable conviction that he is beating the man who keeps the table.
Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic.
Incompatibility. In matrimony a similarity of tastes, particularly the taste for domination.
Mad, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence.
Dog - a kind of additional or subsidiary Deity designed to catch the overflow and surplus of the world's worship.
Deliberation, n.: The act of examining one's bread to determine which side it is buttered on.
Cabbage: a familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head.
I believe we shall come to care about people less and less. The more people one knows the easier it becomes to replace them. It's one of the curses of London.
Irreligion - the principal one of the great faiths of the world.
An egotist is a person of low taste - more interested in himself than in me.
Consult: To seek approval for a course of action already decided upon.
In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office.
Jealous, adj. Unduly concerned about the preservation of that which can be lost only if not worth keeping.
Barometer, n.: An ingenious instrument which indicates what kind of weather we are having.
Belladonna, n.: In Italian a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the essential identity of the two tongues.
Heaven lies about us in our infancy and the world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.
Childhood: the period of human life intermediate between the idiocy of infancy and the folly of youth - two removes from the sin of manhood and three from the remorse of age.
Eulogy. Praise of a person who has either the advantages of wealth and power, or the consideration to be dead.
Prescription: A physician's guess at what will best prolong the situation with least harm to the patient.
Immortality: A toy which people cry for, And on their knees apply for, Dispute, contend and lie for, And if allowed Would be right proud Eternally to die for.
Revolution, n. In politics, an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment.
The best thing to do with the best things in life is to give them up.
Pray: To ask the laws of the universe to be annulled on behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.
Women in love are less ashamed than men. They have less to be ashamed of.
Wit - the salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out.
Witticism. A sharp and clever remark, usually quoted and seldom noted; what the Philistine is pleased to call a joke.
Historian - a broad-gauge gossip.
Learning, n. The kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious.
Egotist: a person more interested in himself than in me.
Genius - to know without having learned; to draw just conclusions from unknown premises; to discern the soul of things.
Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left.
Trial. A formal inquiry designed to prove and put upon record the blameless characters of judges, advocates and jurors.
Curiosity, n. An objectionable quality of the female mind. The desire to know whether or not a woman is cursed with curiosity is one of the most active and insatiable passions of the masculine soul.
Absence blots people out. We really have no absent friends.
A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention, and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.
Ability is commonly found to consist mainly in a high degree of solemnity.
Bacchus, n.: A convenient deity invented by the ancients as an excuse for getting drunk.
Famous, adj.: Conspicuously miserable.
Experience is a revelation in the light of which we renounce our errors of youth for those of age.
Doubt is the father of invention.
All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusions is called a philosopher.
Eloquence, n. The art of orally persuading fools that white is the color that it appears to be. It includes the gift of making any color appear white.
Impartial - unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from espousing either side of a controversy.
Acquaintance. A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to.
Litigant. A person about to give up his skin for the hope of retaining his bones.
Impiety. Your irreverence toward my deity.
Laziness. Unwarranted repose of manner in a person of low degree.
Ocean: A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man - who has no gills.
Suffrage, noun. Expression of opinion by means of a ballot. The right of suffrage (which is held to be both a privilege and a duty) means, as commonly interpreted, the right to vote for the man of another man's choice, and is highly prized.
Positive, adj.: Mistaken at the top of one's voice.
Friendless. Having no favors to bestow. Destitute of fortune. Addicted to utterance of truth and common sense.
Admiral. That part of a warship which does the talking while the figurehead does the thinking.
Clairvoyant, n.: A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron - namely, that he is a blockhead.
Happiness: an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another.
Alien - an American sovereign in his probationary state.
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