Ambrose Bierce Quotes, Life Quotes, Ambition Quotes

Ambition. An overmastering desire to be vilified by enemies while living and made ridiculous by friends when dead.

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Liar: A lawyer with a roving commission.

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A king's staff of office, the sign and symbol of his authority. It was originally a mace with which the sovereign admonished his jester and vetoed ministerial measures by breaking the bones of their proponents.

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RADIUM, n. A mineral that gives off heat and stimulates the organ that a scientist is a fool with.

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INJUSTICE, n. A burden which of all those that we load upon others and carry ourselves is lightest in the hands and heaviest upon the back.

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Consul - in American politics, a person who having failed to secure an office from the people is given one by the Administration on condition that he leave the country.

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EFFECT, n. The second of two phenomena which always occur together in the same order. The first, called a Cause, is said to generate the other-which is no more sensible than it would be for one who has never seen a dog except in pursuit of a rabbit to declare the rabbit the cause of the dog.

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LUMINARY, One who throws light upon a subject; as an editor by not writing about it.

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TRICHINOSIS, n. The pig's reply to proponents of porcophagy.

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According to the most trustworthy statistics the number of adult Dullards in the United States is but little short of thirty millions, including the statisticians.

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Compromise, n. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction of thinking he has got what he ought not to have, and is deprived of nothing except what was justly his due.

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GRAPESHOT, n. An argument which the future is preparing in answer to the demands of American Socialism.

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ZANY, n. A popular character in old Italian plays, who imitated with ludicrous incompetence the _buffone_, or clown, and was therefore the ape of an ape; for the clown himself imitated the serious characters of the play. The zany was progenitor to the specialist in humor, as we to-day have the unhappiness to know him. In the zany we see an example of creation; in the humorist, of transmission. Another excellent specimen of the modern zany is the curate, who apes the rector, who apes the bishop, who apes the archbishop, who apes the devil.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Character Quotes , Italian Quotes

Funeral: a pageant whereby we attest our respect for the dead by enriching the undertaker, and strengthen our grief by an expenditure that deepens our groans and doubles our tears.

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Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art.

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PHILISTINE, n. One whose mind is the creature of its environment, following the fashion in thought, feeling and sentiment. He is sometimes learned, frequently prosperous, commonly clean and always solemn.

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RUBBISH, n. Worthless matter, such as the religions, philosophies, literatures, arts and sciences of the tribes infesting the regions lying due south from Boreaplas.

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EVANGELIST, n. A bearer of good tidings, particularly (in a religious sense) such as assure us of our own salvation and the damnation of our neighbors.

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TRUCE, n. Friendship.

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REVOLUTION, n. A bursting of the boilers which usually takes place when the safety valve of public discussion is closed.

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