A Quote by Ambrose Bierce

optimism, n. The doctrine, or belief, that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly, everything good, especially the bad, and everything right that is wrong. It is held with greatest tenacity by those most accustomed to the mischance of falling into adversity, and is most acceptably expounded with disproof - an intellectual disorder, yielding to no treatment but death. It is hereditary, but fortunately not contagious.

Ambrose Bierce

Quote Topics

Accustomed Adversity Bad Beautiful Belief Contagious Death Disorder Doctrine Everything Falling Fortunately Good Greatest Held Hereditary Including Intellectual Mischance Most Optimism Right Tenacity Those Treatment Ugly Wrong

Quote Author

Ambrose Bierce
American - Journalist
June 24, 1842 - 1914

Optimism - the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.

Ambrose Bierce

'The Sleeping Beauty' is the greatest, most challenging and most vulnerable of classical ballets. Everything can go wrong with it, and all too often, everything does.

Robert Gottlieb

So everything we believe about happiness is wrong," I said. He nodded. Everything?" I asked, when what I meant was, Everything? Including you? Including me? And Marcus, being Marcus, knew what I really wanted to know, and answered my silent, more significant question. He held up his hand to shield the rays and looked me in the eyes. Almost.

Megan McCafferty

At times, when everything is good, you enjoy your peak, but you are sometimes not able to differentiate between right and wrong - everything seems to be good even if you know it's bad. So this is what I have learnt.

Mohammad Amir

Comfort is everything. You start doing something and you want it to be perfect right away, but most babies are born ugly and then they shake it out and you get beautiful toddlers.

John Mulaney

There can be no question of selecting in any direction, but of penetrating the whole cosmic law of rhythms, forces and material that are the real world, from the ugliest to the most beautiful, everything that has character and expression, from the crudest and most brutal to the gentlest and most delicate; everything that speaks to us in its capacity as life.

Asger Jorn

The popular tendency is to listen approvingly to the most extreme statements and claims of politicians and orators who seek popularity by declaring their own country right in everything and other countries wrong in everything.

Elihu Root

I have known good and evil, sin and virtue, right and wrong; I have judged and been judged; I have passed through birth and death, Joy and sorrow, heaven and hell; And in the end I realized that I AM in everything and everything is in me.

Hazrat Inayat Khan

Everything was a constant battle. My first film was beautiful. I got an amazing cast. That worked out great. Everything else was like murphy's law. Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong.

Katie Aselton

Retrench in everything that is bad and worthless, and improve in everything that is good and beautiful.

Susa Young Gates

Those of you who have been there [Haiti] know it is one of the most beautiful countries in the world. It has everything. It has everything above the ground, and everything under the ground.... It is an amazing place. I strongly recommend that whenever you get a chance, if you haven't been there, that you go to Haiti. I think it was a certain Queen of England who said that after her death "Calais" would be found written on her heart. When I die, I think that "Haiti" is going to be written on my heart.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

There is a connection between heaven and earth. Finding that connection gives meaning to everything, including death. Missing it makes everything meaningless, including life.

John H. Groberg

I think I am in my last days, but it doesn't really matter because I have had such a beautiful life. I have lived through many wars and have lost everything many times - including my husband, my mother and my beloved son. Yet, life is beautiful, and I have so much to learn and enjoy. I have no space nor time for pessimism and hate. Life is beautiful, love is beautiful, nature and music are beautiful. Everything we experience is a gift, a present we should cherish and pass on to those we love.

Alice Herz-Sommer

Everything ends, and Everything matters. Everything matters not in spite of the end of you and all that you love, but because of it. Everything is all you’ve got…and after Everything is nothing. So you were wise to welcome Everything, the good and the bad alike, and cling to it all. Gather it in. Seek the meaning in sorrow and don’t ever turn away, not once, from here until the end. Because it is all the same, it is all unfathomable, and it is all infinitely preferable to the one dreadful alternative.