Quotes About Bierce

Remember Ambrose Bierce's witty definition of the verb 'to pray': 'to ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner, confessedly unworthy'.

Wine, madam, is God's next best gift to man.

Cat: a soft indestructible automaton provided by nature to be kicked when things go wrong in the domestic circle.

CANNON, n. An instrument employed in the rectification of national boundaries.

Clairvoyant, n.: A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron - namely, that he is a blockhead.

SPOOKER, n. A writer whose imagination concerns itself with supernatural phenomena, especially in the doings of spooks.

You frighten me, Mr. Reed," Bierce said. "Why is that?" "Because according to your creed, you'd be willing to tear up the Constitution of the United States." "It's a piece of paper," Reed said. "A good one, mind you," he added. "But a piece of paper nonetheless. Times

Labor, n. One of the processes by which A acquires property for B. —Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

DIPLOMACY, n. Lying in state, or the patriotic art of lying for one's country.

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

Calamity, n. A more than commonly plain and unmistakable reminder that the affairs of this life are not of our own ordering.

ARSENIC, n. A kind of cosmetic greatly affected by the ladies, whom it greatly affects in turn.

CARNIVOROUS, adj. Addicted to the cruelty of devouring the timorous vegetarian, his heirs and assigns.

CLERGYMAN, n. A man who undertakes the management of our spiritual affairs as a method of better his temporal ones.

Bigamy, n. A mistake in taste for which the wisdom of the future will adjudge a punishment called trigamy.

CLAIRVOYANT, n. A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron, namely, that he is a blockhead.

ABRUPT, adj. Sudden, without ceremony, like the arrival of a cannon- shot and the departure of the soldier whose interests are most affected by it. Dr. Samuel Johnson beautifully said of another author's ideas that they were concatenated without abruption.

reverent title had previously been forced upon him by the religious scruples of the last newspaper in which a part of the work had appeared, with the natural

Mesmerism, n. Hypnotism before it wore good clothes, kept a carriage and asked Incredulity to dinner.

In Bacon we see the culminating prime Of British intellect and British crime.

BANG, n. The cry of a gun. That arrangement of a woman's hair which suggests the thought of shooting her; hence the name.

EMOTION, n. A prostrating disease caused by a determination of the heart to the head. It is sometimes accompanied by a copious discharge of hydrated chloride of sodium from the eyes.

CARNIVOROUS, adj. Addicted to the cruelty of devouring the timorous vegetarian, his heirs and assigns.

If every hypocrite in the United States were to break his leg to-day the country could be successfully invaded to-morrow by the warlike hypocrites of Canada.