Ambrose Bierce Quotes, Hurt Quotes, Believe Quotes

Be as decent as you can. Don't believe without evidence. Treat things divine with marked respect — don't have anything to do with them. Do not trust humanity without collateral security; it will play you some scurvy trick. Remember that it hurts no one to be treated as an enemy entitled to respect until he shall prove himself a friend worthy of affection. Cultivate a taste for distasteful truths. And, finally, most important of all, endeavor to see things as they are, not as they ought to be.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Hurt Quotes , Believe Quotes

MINISTER, n. An agent of a higher power with a lower responsibility. In diplomacy, an officer sent into a foreign country as the visible embodiment of his sovereign's hostility.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Country Quotes , Responsibility Quotes

REALITY, n. The dream of a mad philosopher. That which would remain in the cupel if one should assay a phantom. The nucleus of a vacuum.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Dream Quotes , Philosophy Quotes

A leech who, having penetrated the shell of a turtle only to find that the creature has long been dead, deems it expedient to form a new attachment to a fresh turtle.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Turtles Quotes , Attachment Quotes

LEAD, n. A heavy blue-gray metal much used in giving stability to light lovers - particularly to those who love not wisely but other men's wives.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Love Quotes , Men Quotes

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.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Character Quotes , Italian Quotes

Work: a dangerous disorder affecting high public functionaries who want to go fishing.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Lakes Quotes , Sea Quotes

Impartial - unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from espousing either side of a controversy.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Promise Quotes , Literature Quotes

MANNA, n. A food miraculously given to the Israelites in the wilderness. When it was no longer supplied to them they settled down and tilled the soil, fertilizing it, as a rule, with the bodies of the original occupants.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Food Quotes , Cooking Quotes

Absurdity, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Belief Quotes , Opinion Quotes

PALM, n. A species of tree . . . of which the familiar "itching palm" ("Palma hominis") is most widely distributed . . . . This noble vegetable exudes a kind of invisible gum, which may be detected by applying to the bark a piece of gold or silver.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Vegetables Quotes , Tree Quotes

CALAMITY, n. A more than commonly plain and unmistakable reminder that the affairs of this life are not of our own ordering. Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Life Quotes , Two Quotes

DIAPHRAGM, n. A muscular partition separating disorders of the chest from disorders of the bowels.

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prospect, n. An outlook, usually forbidding. An expectation, usually forbidden.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Expectations Quotes , Outlook Quotes

Homicide, /n./ The slaying of one human by another. There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy, but it makes no great difference to the person slain whether he died by one kind or another - the classification is for the advantage of the lawyers.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Death Quotes , Suicide Quotes

REPARATION, n. Satisfaction that is made for a wrong and deducted from the satisfaction felt in committing it.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Satisfaction Quotes , Made Quotes