Ambrose Bierce Quotes, Art Quotes, Tasks Quotes

A cheap and easy cynicism rails at everything. The master of the art accomplishes the formidable task of discrimination.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Art Quotes , Tasks Quotes

TEDIUM, n. Ennui, the state or condition of one that is bored. Many fanciful derivations of the word have been affirmed, but so high an authority as Father Jape says that it comes from a very obvious source --the first words of the ancient Latin hymn _Te Deum Laudamus_. In this apparently natural derivation there is something that saddens.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Father Quotes , Latin Quotes

KISS, n. A word invented by the poets as a rhyme for "bliss." It is supposed to signify, in a general way, some kind of rite or ceremony appertaining to a good understanding; but the manner of its performance is unknown to this lexicographer.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Kissing Quotes , Understanding Quotes

POVERTY, n. A file provided for the teeth of the rats of reform. Its victims are distinguished by possession of all the virtues and by their faith in leaders seeking to conduct them into a prosperity where they believe these to be unknown.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Believe Quotes , Leader Quotes

PRE-ADAMITE, n. One of an experimental and apparently unsatisfactory race of antedated Creation. . . . Little its known of them beyond the fact that they supplied Cain with a wife and theologians with a controversy.

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No country is so wild and difficult but men will make it a theater of war.

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He who thinks with difficulty believes with alacrity.

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PITY, n. A failing sense of exemption, inspired by contrast.

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ENOUGH, pro. All there is in the world if you like it.

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HATRED, n. A sentiment appropriate to the occasion of another's superiority.

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DISABUSE, v.t. To present your neighbor with another and better error than the one which he has deemed advantageous to embrace.

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PERFECTION, n. An imaginary state of quality distinguished from the actual by an element known as excellence; an attribute of the critic.

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Wisdom is known only by contrasting it with folly; by shadow only we perceive that all visible objects are not flat. Yet Philanthropos would abolish evil!

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Evil Quotes , Shadow Quotes

REFUSAL, n. Denial of something desired; Refusals are graded in a descending scale of finality thus: the refusal absolute, the refusal condition, the refusal tentative and the refusal feminine. The last is called by some casuists the refusal assentive.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Desire Quotes , Denial Quotes

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.

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Confidante: One entrusted by A with the secrets of B confided to herself by C.

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Hypocrisy: prejudice with a halo.

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History is an account, mostly false, of events, mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Lying Quotes , History Quotes

REASON, n. Propensitate of prejudice.

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ROMANCE, n. Fiction that owes no allegiance to the God of Things as They Are. In the novel the writer's thought is tethered to probability, but in romance it ranges at will over the entire region of the imagination . . .

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Tags : Ambrose Bierce Quotes , Imagination Quotes , Romance Quotes