Ambrose Bierce Quotes

Hurry n: The dispatch of bunglers.

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Coward: One who, in a perilous emergency, thinks with his legs.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Sarcastic Quotes , Courage Quotes

EXECUTIVE, n. An officer of the Government, whose duty it is to enforce the wishes of the legislative power until such time as the judicial department shall be pleased to pronounce them invalid and of no effect.

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

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Hail, high Excess especially in wine, To thee in worship do I bend the knee Who preach abstemiousness unto me My skull thy pulpit, as my paunch thy shrine. Precept on precept, aye, and line on line, Could ne'er persuade so sweetly to agree With reason as thy touch, exact and free, Upon my forehead and along my spine. At thy command eschewing pleasure's cup, With the hot grape I warm no more my wit; When on thy stool of penitence I sit I'm quite converted, for I can't get up. Ungrateful he who afterward would falter To make new sacrifices at thine altar!

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Nature's fortuitous manifestation of her purposeless objectionableness.

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Potable, n. Suitable for drinking. Water is said to be potable; indeed, some declare it our natural beverage, although even they find it palatable only when suffering from the recurrent disorder known as thirst, for which it is a medicine.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Drinking Quotes , Medicine Quotes

JESTER, n. An officer attached to the king's household to amuse the court by ludicrous actions and utterances . . . the king's own conduct and decrees [being] sufficiently ridiculous for the amusement not only of his court but of all mankind.

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

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I think I think, therefore I think I am.

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ANTIPATHY, n. The sentiment inspired by one's friend's friend.

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A wedding is a ceremony at which two persons undertake to become one, one undertakes to become nothing, and nothing undertakes to become supportable.

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The fact that boys are allowed to exist at all is evidence of remarkable Christian forbearance among men - were it not for a mawkish humanitarianism, coupled with imperfect digestive powers, we should devour our young, as Nature intended.

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True, man does not know woman. But neither does woman.

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OBSOLETE, adj. No longer used by the timid. Said chiefly of words. A word which some lexicographer has marked obsolete is ever thereafter an object of dread and loathing to the fool writer . . .

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Lexicographer Quotes , Fool Quotes

EXISTENCE, n. A transient, horrible, fantastic dream,/ Wherein is nothing yet all things do seem:/ From which we're wakened by a friendly nudge/ Of our bedfellow Death, and cry: "O fudge!"

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Infidel, n. In New York, one who does not believe in the Christian religion; in Constantinople, one who does.

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When publicly censured our first instinct is to make everybody a codefendant.

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The sum of religion, says Pythagoras, is to be like him thou worshipest. Had Pythagoras lived in our day he would have seen his mistake. The sum of modern religion is to make him thou worshipest like unto thyself.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Mistake Quotes , Modern Quotes