KnowYourQuotes
～(^з^)-☆ try DownloadStreamable.com download streamable videos

ROBBER, n. A candid man of affairs. It is related of Voltaire that one night he and some traveling companion lodged at a wayside inn. The surroundings were suggestive, and after supper they agreed to tell robber stories in turn. "Once there was a Farmer-General of the Revenues." Saying nothing more, he was encouraged to continue. "That," he said, "is the story."


Ambrose Bierce

  Email Quote to Friends   Link to Quote   Create Short URL  Publish Text About This Quote   Share on Facebook, Twitter, and more
  See Recommended Quotes For You

Related

Empathy is the new measurement of everything. It doesn't matter what religion you have, what God you...
C. JOYBELL C. You must save what you can of your life; you musn't lose it all simply because you've lost a part.
HENRY JAMES I believe that there is a Matrix and... to be more accurate I am in the Pornography Matrix.
DEYTH BANGER Farming is the oldest profession on earth
SOTONYE ANGA He that applauds him who does not deserve praise, is endeavoring to deceive the public; he that hiss...
SAMUEL JOHNSON He that applauds him who does not deserve praise, is endeavoring to deceive the public; he that hiss...
SAMUEL JOHNSON She was scarcely a year older than I was, dark-haired, slender, with a face that would break your he...
GEORGE R.R. MARTIN In the time of the robber barons, my great grandfather insisted on reinvesting and sharing profits w...
WILLIAM CLAY FORD, JR. I like to open for a band as it brings on sort of a challenge and it makes things more interesting. ...
KELLY JONES If you wanted to tell stories, he could tell them into the night. I used to kid that every story he ...
MARLIN FITZWATER I am often asked how it is that I am able to value people to such a deep degree. Apparently, I exhib...
C. JOYBELL C. It is a lie.
ARTHUR MILLER Within his stories there are textual references to blind storytellers, remember Homer (the Homers) m...
SUSAN BLOIR Who is the first farmer? The good book says: God planted a garden. So God is the first, then Adam, a...
SOTONYE ANGA We Are All Infinite
STEPHEN CHBOSKY You can't just sit there and put everyone's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You ...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY There's nothing like the deep breathes after laughing that hard. Nothing in the world like a sore st...
STHEPHEN CHBOSKY no more pencils, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks, when the teacher rings the bell, drop...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY So I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them.
STEPHEN CHBOSKY It was funny -- he looked like a composite sketch they show of a bank robber, with a baseball cap an...
ARCHIE STRUTHERS She wasn't bitter. She was sad, though. But it was a hopeful kind of sad. The kind of sad that just ...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY I saw other people there. Old men sitting alone. Young girls with blue eye shadow and awkward jaws. ...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY That one moment when you know you are not a sad story. You are ALIVE.
STEPHAN CHBOSKY Somos quienes somos por un montón de razones.Quizás nunca conozcamos la mayoría de ellas.Pero aun...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY I know these will all be stories some day, and our pictures will become old photographs. We all beco...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them. But even if...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY The President to-night has a dream: He was in a party of plain people, and, as it became known who h...
ABRAHAM LINCOLN I love my mom so much. I don't care if that's corny to say. I think on my next birthday, I'm going t...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY Ambos dijeron que tomara asiento y parecían hablar en serio, así que me senté.
STEPHEN CHBOSKY He had scarcely gone a short league, when Fortune, that was conducting his affairs from good to bet...
CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE CERVANTES SAAVEDRA) You release the pain of the past and press on. It's a new day, and God is doing a new thing. He want...
CRAIG GROESCHEL So, I guess we are who we are for alot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them. But even...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY So I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybewe'll never know most of them.
STEPHEN CHBOSKY (All the grief she had suffered over her lifetime had moulded her face into a mask of eternal sadnes...
JEAN SASSON I was very grateful to have heard it again. Because I guess we all forget sometimes. And I think eve...
STEPHEN CHBOSKY I don't know the significance of this, but I find it very interesting.
STEPHEN CHBOSKY Maybe it’s sad that these are now memories. And maybe it’s not sad.
STEPHEN CHBOSKY We die a day at a time
BANGAMBIKI HABYARIMANA The measure of a man is what he does with power.
PLATO Mother Superior jump the gun...
-The Beatles, Happiness is a Warm Gun
LAUREN MYRACLE His life seemed like a deck of cards, and in the midst of all those two’s and three’s someone ha...
TEKOA MANNING Someone asked me...how it felt and I was reminded of a story that a fellow townsman of ours used to ...
ADLAI E. STEVENSON II A man of guilt acknowledges and changes himself immediately on being hinted slightly about his fault...
ANUJ SOMANY I'm not saying that I'm better than anyone... I'm just saying that I'm one-of-a-kind.
C LIONG I'm not saying that I'm better than anyone... I'm just saying that I'm one-of-a-kind.
C LIONG It's a director's job to tell a story and he's very well versed in telling stories with ...
CUBA GOODING, JR. You deserve to be with somebody, who knows you're the one, from that very first moment he lays eyes ...
C. JOYBELL C. I asked him if he was going to do the bidding of the mayor and I was pretty satisfied with his answe...
DAVID BLOOM 35. God is entitled to a portion of our income—not because He needs it but because we need to give...
JAMES C. DOBSON S., a clever and truthful man, once told me the story of how he ceased to believe. On a hunting expe...
LEO TOLSTOY Saddam Hussein can't dictate who the inspectors are. It's like the bank robber saying he gets to cho...
SANDY BERGER A great future starts with what you can see
SOTONYE ANGA It is said of a lonely man that he does not appreciate the life of society. This is like saying he h...
SEBASTIAN ROCH NICOLAS CHAMFORT The Doktor was an old man. When he was a kid, his Dad bought him a chemistry set. He never played wi...
CHRISTINA ENGELA (On WWI:)

A man of importance had been shot at a place I could not pronounce in Swahili o...
BERYL MARKHAM He was a great young man. A lot of times people just say that after someone's gone, but he was the t...
JACK BURTON There was a man here, lashed himself to a spar as his ship went down, and for seven days and seven n...
JEANETTE WINTERSON If a writer is to tell his own story - tell it slowly, and as if it were a story about other people ...
ORHAN PAMUK Once upon a time," he said out loud to the darkness. He said these words because they were the best,...
KATE DICAMILLO As an example of just how useless these philosophers are for any practice in life there is Socrates ...
DESIDERIUS ERASMUS It was just a job. It wasn't any special interest in consumer affairs. I needed a paycheck and the A...
DAN QUAYLE Life is not a game. Still, in this life, we choose the games we live to play.
J.R. RIM What is the Other?" they ask.
The Other is the one who taught me whatI should be like, but not ...
PAULO COELHO No formal course in fiction-writing can equal a close and observant perusal of the stories of Edgar ...
H. P. LOVECRAFT A voice said, "Climb." And he said, "How shall I climb?the mountains are so steep that I cannot clim...
AMY CARMICHAEL Then the Jews sought him at the feast, and said, Where is he? / And there was much murmuring among t...
BIBLE He wept because he was afraid now that he could not save Gabriel. He no longer cared about himself
LOIS LOWRY My father was a tomato farmer. There is the phrase that says he or she worked their fingers to the b...
SIDNEY POITIER I'm fucking the grave, I thought, I'm bringing the dead back to life...
CHARLES BUKOWSKI As Caesar was at supper the discourse was of death - which sort was the best, "That," said he, "whic...
PLUTARCH He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied ...
OSCAR WILDE [Karpinski tried to get information, but] nobody knew anything, nobody - at least, that's what they ...
JANIS KARPINSKI He was a hero to his valet, who bullied him, and a terror to most of his relations, whom he bullied ...
OSCAR WILDE Socrates liked to tease his interlocutors by saying that the only thing he knew was that he knew not...
A. C. (ANTHONY CLIFFORD) GRAYLING Plunging in “truths” about God is like walking on the bottom of a sea that is not there, searchi...
MARIANA FULGER Plunging in “truths” about God is like walking on the bottom of a sea that is not there, searchi...
MARIANA FULGER I am broken and healing, but every piece of my heart belong to you.
SARAH J. MAAS You do what you love, what you need
SARAH J. MAAS You are the blood of the dragon. You can make a hat.
GEORGE R.R. MARTIN He had let me know time after time that he was a thinking man, a man of intellect and wit. Yet one u...
COCO J. GINGER He was nothing but a conduit, after all, and there isn't a culvert in the world that remembers the w...
STEPHEN KING He thinks he'll be remembered as the villain in the story. But I forgot to tell him that the villain...
SARAH J. MAAS Marc is an expert at scoring racks on the hoof. We were passing up bucks that he scored at 155, 160 ...
JAY FRANCIS There are some men who are counted great because they represent the actuality of their own age, and ...
THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY The issue isn't whether he loved you, it's how much. Too much. Love can be poison
SARAH J. MAAS I turned.
Rhysand leaned against the archway into the sitting room, arms crossed, wings nowhere...
SARAH J. MAAS Hodor," said Hodor.
GEORGE R.R. MARTIN She made a fence of phrases, which seemed a treachery to herself.
ELIZABETH TAYLOR Night gathers, and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold ...
GEORGE R.R. MARTIN Now they came back to him, on this night he was seventeen years old. All the years and places of his...
URSULA K. LE GUIN A teacher of meditation once told the story of a man who wanted nothing to do with the stress of lif...
ELAINE N. ARON In the morning of the world," he said, "when the dew still lay upon the Garden, man was created so t...
ROBERT NATHAN Never give up on you. In order to make a difference you would have to somehow be different.
JOHNNIE DENT JR. I asked him if it were a mirage, and he said yes. I said it was a dream, and he agreed, But said it ...
NEIL GAIMAN I just want silence... nothing less... nothing more.
DEYTH BANGER The robber shot and wounded one of security guards who was arresting him.
BRENDA KGAFELA Each man lives in his own universe and when he dies the world is over
BANGAMBIKI HABYARIMANA I think you always have to be aware of where he (Young) is and not turn your back on him. Some teams...
A.J. HAWK It is universally agreed that Jean Renoir was one of the greatest of all directors, and he was also ...
ROGER EBERT I think you always have to be aware of where he (Young) is and not turn your back on him. Some teams...
A.J. HAWK

More Ambrose Bierce

WRATH, n. Anger of a superior quality and degree, appropriate to exalted characters and momentous oc...
AMBROSE BIERCE Fidelity - a virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
AMBROSE BIERCE RECREATION, n. A particular kind of dejection to relieve a general fatigue.
AMBROSE BIERCE FUNERAL, n. A pageant whereby we attest our respect for the dead by enriching the undertaker, and s...
AMBROSE BIERCE ... the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his coun...
AMBROSE BIERCE Bride: A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
AMBROSE BIERCE Insurance - an ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfort...
AMBROSE BIERCE The small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify we give the name of knowledge.
AMBROSE BIERCE Famous, adj.: Conspicuously miserable.
AMBROSE BIERCE Perseverance - a lowly virtue whereby mediocrity achieves an inglorious success.
AMBROSE BIERCE The best thing to do with the best things in life is to give them up.
AMBROSE BIERCE Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.
AMBROSE BIERCE Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Cabbage: a familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head.
AMBROSE BIERCE Nominee. A modest gentleman shrinking from the distinction of private life and diligently seeking th...
AMBROSE BIERCE The world has suffered more from the ravages of ill-advised marriages than from virginity.
AMBROSE BIERCE Heaven lies about us in our infancy and the world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.
AMBROSE BIERCE Acquaintance: a degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor or obscure, and intimate ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Pray: To ask the laws of the universe to be annulled on behalf of a single petitioner confessedly un...
AMBROSE BIERCE To bother about the best method of accomplishing an accidental result.
AMBROSE BIERCE A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man, who has no gills.
AMBROSE BIERCE Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue.
AMBROSE BIERCE Politeness -- The most acceptable hypocrisy.
AMBROSE BIERCE Laughter -- An interior convulsion, producing a distortion of the features and accompanied by inarti...
AMBROSE BIERCE Alien. An American sovereign in his probationary state.
AMBROSE BIERCE An account, mostly false, of events, mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly k...
AMBROSE BIERCE Historian. A broad -- gauge gossip.
AMBROSE BIERCE Miss: A title with which we brand unmarried women to indicate that they are in the market. Miss, Mis...
AMBROSE BIERCE A funeral is a pageant whereby we attest our respect for the dead by enriching the undertaker.
AMBROSE BIERCE An egotist is a person interested in himself than in me!
AMBROSE BIERCE Abscond. To move in a mysterious way, commonly with the property of another.
AMBROSE BIERCE Creditor. One of a tribe of savages dwelling beyond the Financial Straits and dreaded for their deso...
AMBROSE BIERCE A cynic is a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, and not as they ought to be.
AMBROSE BIERCE Alliance. In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply inserte...
AMBROSE BIERCE A coward is one who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
AMBROSE BIERCE Compromise. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction o...
AMBROSE BIERCE A bride is a woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
AMBROSE BIERCE Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
AMBROSE BIERCE ALLIANCE, n. In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply in...
AMBROSE BIERCE Hypocrisy: prejudice with a halo
AMBROSE BIERCE Forgetfulness. A gift of God bestowed upon debtors in compensation for their destitution of conscie...
AMBROSE BIERCE One who is in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
AMBROSE BIERCE ZENITH, n. The point in the heavens directly overhead to a man standing or a growing cabbage. A m...
AMBROSE BIERCE Dawn: When men of reason go to bed.
AMBROSE BIERCE Painting: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.
AMBROSE BIERCE Cabbage: A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man's head.
AMBROSE BIERCE Admiration, n.: Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
AMBROSE BIERCE Acquaintance, n.: A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to.
AMBROSE BIERCE BOUNDARY, n. In political geography, an imaginary line between two nations, separating the imaginar...
AMBROSE BIERCE Faith, noun. Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Education, n. That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understa...
AMBROSE BIERCE Happiness, noun. An agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another.
AMBROSE BIERCE History, n. An account mostly false, of events unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly...
AMBROSE BIERCE Dentist, n.: A Prestidigitator who, putting metal in one's mouth, pulls coins out of one's pockets.
AMBROSE BIERCE Cynic, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.
AMBROSE BIERCE Income is the natural and rational gauge and measure of respectability.
AMBROSE BIERCE Optimism, n. The doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.
AMBROSE BIERCE Mad, adj: Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence.
AMBROSE BIERCE INTIMACY, n. A relation into which fools are providentially drawn for their mutual destruction.
AMBROSE BIERCE Litigant: a person about to give up his skin for the hope of retaining his bone.
AMBROSE BIERCE ZEAL, n. A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and inexperienced. A passion that goeth b...
AMBROSE BIERCE TELEPHONE n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeab...
AMBROSE BIERCE Telephone, n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreea...
AMBROSE BIERCE I believe we shall come to care about people less and less. The more people one knows the easier it ...
AMBROSE BIERCE PREDICAMENT, n. The wage of consistency.
AMBROSE BIERCE ULTIMATUM, n. In diplomacy, a last demand before resorting to concessions. Having received an ultima...
AMBROSE BIERCE DIPLOMACY, n. The patriotic art of lying for one's country.
AMBROSE BIERCE PORTUGUESE, n.pl. A species of geese indigenous to Portugal. They are mostly without feathers and im...
AMBROSE BIERCE Christians and camels receive their burdens kneeling
AMBROSE BIERCE Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum - I think that I think, therefore I think that I am.
AMBROSE BIERCE CREMONA, n. A high-priced violin made in Connecticut.
AMBROSE BIERCE PROVIDENTIAL, adj. Unexpectedly and conspicuously beneficial to the person so describing it.
AMBROSE BIERCE BABE or BABY, n. A misshapen creature of no particular age, sex, or condition, chiefly remarkable fo...
AMBROSE BIERCE A wedding is a ceremony at which two persons undertake to become one, one undertakes to become nothi...
AMBROSE BIERCE PROJECTILE, n. The final arbiter in international disputes. Formerly these disputes were settled by ...
AMBROSE BIERCE BAAL, n. An old deity formerly much worshiped under various names. As Baal he was popular with the P...
AMBROSE BIERCE CARTESIAN, adj. Relating to Descartes, a famous philosopher, author of the celebrated dictum, _Cogit...
AMBROSE BIERCE MEEKNESS, n. Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while.

M is for Moses,...
AMBROSE BIERCE TEETOTALER, n. One who abstains from strong drink, sometimes totally, sometimes tolerably totally.
AMBROSE BIERCE TEDIUM, n. Ennui, the state or condition of one that is bored. Many fanciful derivations of the word...
AMBROSE BIERCE MOLECULE, n. The ultimate, indivisible unit of matter. It is distinguished from the corpuscle, also ...
AMBROSE BIERCE FEAST, n. A festival. A religious celebration usually signalized by gluttony and drunkenness, freque...
AMBROSE BIERCE Vote: The instrument and symbol of a free man's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his c...
AMBROSE BIERCE LOQUACITY, n. A disorder which renders the sufferer unable to curb his tongue when you wish to talk.
AMBROSE BIERCE In each human heart are a tiger, a pig, an ass and a nightingale. Diversity of character is due to t...
AMBROSE BIERCE Advice is the smallest current coin.
AMBROSE BIERCE SOPHISTRY, n. The controversial method of an opponent, distinguished from one's own by superior insi...
AMBROSE BIERCE ALDERMAN, n. An ingenious criminal who covers his secret thieving with a pretence of open marauding.
AMBROSE BIERCE Pray, v.: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled on behalf of a single petitioner confesse...
AMBROSE BIERCE WEATHER, n. The climate of the hour. A permanent topic of conversation among persons whom it does no...
AMBROSE BIERCE INDECISION, n. The chief element of success; "for whereas," saith Sir Thomas Brewbold, "there is but...
AMBROSE BIERCE LEONINE, adj. Unlike a menagerie lion. Leonine verses are those in which a word in the middle of a l...
AMBROSE BIERCE PILLORY, n. A mechanical device for inflicting personal distinction --prototype of the modern newspa...
AMBROSE BIERCE APPLAUSE, n. The echo of a platitude.
AMBROSE BIERCE WORSHIP, n. Homo Creator's testimony to the sound construction and fine finish of Deus Creatus. A po...
AMBROSE BIERCE MISERICORDE, n. A dagger which in mediaeval warfare was used by the foot soldier to remind an unhors...
AMBROSE BIERCE ELECTOR, n. One who enjoys the sacred privilege of voting for the man of another man's choice.
AMBROSE BIERCE ORPHAN, n. A living person whom death has deprived of the power of filial ingratitude . . .
AMBROSE BIERCE ENCOMIAST, n. A special (but not particular) kind of liar.
AMBROSE BIERCE TEDIUM, n. Ennui, the state or condition of one that is bored. Many fanciful derivations of the word...
AMBROSE BIERCE DEGENERATE, adj. Less conspicuously admirable than one's ancestors. The contemporaries of Homer were...
AMBROSE BIERCE ALIEN, n. An American sovereign in his probationary state.
AMBROSE BIERCE ASS, n. A public singer with a good voice but no ear. In Virginia City, Nevada, he is called the Was...
AMBROSE BIERCE PAST, n. That part of Eternity with some small fraction of which we have a slight and regrettable ac...
AMBROSE BIERCE APPETITE, n. An instinct thoughtfully implanted by Providence as a solution to the labor question.
AMBROSE BIERCE CAABA, n. A large stone presented by the archangel Gabriel to the patriarch Abraham, and preserved a...
AMBROSE BIERCE ADOLESCENCE The stage between puberty and adultery.
AMBROSE BIERCE CREMONA, n. A high-priced violin made in Connecticut.
AMBROSE BIERCE ROPE, n. An obsolescent appliance for reminding assassins that they too are mortal. It is put about ...
AMBROSE BIERCE REALISM, n. The art of depicting nature as it is seem by toads. The charm suffusing a landscape pain...
AMBROSE BIERCE BAAL, n. An old deity formerly much worshiped under various names. As Baal he was popular with the P...
AMBROSE BIERCE HYDRA, n. A kind of animal that the ancients catalogued under many heads.
AMBROSE BIERCE FREEDOM, n. Exemption from the stress of authority in a beggarly half dozen of restraint's infinite ...
AMBROSE BIERCE MEEKNESS, n. Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while.M is for Moses, Who slew th...
AMBROSE BIERCE WIDOW, n. A pathetic figure that the Christian world has agreed to take humorously, although Christ'...
AMBROSE BIERCE FRIENDLESS, adj. Having no favors to bestow. Destitute of fortune. Addicted to utterance of truth an...
AMBROSE BIERCE CONSULT, v.i. To seek another's disapproval of a course already decided on.
AMBROSE BIERCE PREDICAMENT, n. The wage of consistency.
AMBROSE BIERCE BASILISK, n. The cockatrice. A sort of serpent hatched form the egg of a cock. The basilisk had a ba...
AMBROSE BIERCE Strike while your employer has a big contract.
AMBROSE BIERCE EDITOR, n. A person who combines the judicial functions of Minos, Rhadamanthus and Aeacus, but is pl...
AMBROSE BIERCE COMMONWEALTH, n. An administrative entity operated by an incalculable multitude of political parasit...
AMBROSE BIERCE ERUDITION, n. Dust shaken out of a book into an empty skull.So wide his erudition's mighty span, He ...
AMBROSE BIERCE PORTUGUESE, n.pl. A species of geese indigenous to Portugal. They are mostly without feathers and im...
AMBROSE BIERCE POSTERITY, n. An appellate court which reverses the judgment of a popular author's contemporaries, t...
AMBROSE BIERCE ICONOCLAST, n. A breaker of idols, the worshipers whereof are imperfectly gratified by the performan...
AMBROSE BIERCE FELON, n. A person of greater enterprise than discretion, who in embracing an opportunity has formed...
AMBROSE BIERCE IMPOSTOR n. A rival aspirant to public honors.
AMBROSE BIERCE DECIDE, v.i. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.A leaf was ri...
AMBROSE BIERCE DIGESTION, n. The conversion of victuals into virtues. When the process is imperfect, vices are evol...
AMBROSE BIERCE CONVERSATION, n. A fair to the display of the minor mental commodities, each exhibitor being too int...
AMBROSE BIERCE Egotism, n: Doing the New York Times crossword puzzle with a pen.
AMBROSE BIERCE PRIMATE, n. The head of a church, especially a State church supported by involuntary contributions. ...
AMBROSE BIERCE ARCHBISHOP, n. An ecclesiastical dignitary one point holier than a bishop.If I were a jolly archbish...
AMBROSE BIERCE SCEPTER, n. A king's staff of office, the sign and symbol of his authority. It was originally a mace...
AMBROSE BIERCE BLANK-VERSE, n. Unrhymed iambic pentameters --the most difficult kind of English verse to write acce...
AMBROSE BIERCE Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility.
AMBROSE BIERCE DISCRIMINATE, v.i. To note the particulars in which one person or thing is, if possible, more object...
AMBROSE BIERCE NOTORIETY, n. The fame of one's competitor for public honors. The kind of renown most accessible and...
AMBROSE BIERCE USAGE, n. The First Person of the literary Trinity, the Second and Third being Custom and Convention...
AMBROSE BIERCE SENATE, n. A body of elderly gentlemen charged with high duties and misdemeanors.
AMBROSE BIERCE RICE-WATER, n. A mystic beverage secretly used by our most popular novelists and poets to regulate t...
AMBROSE BIERCE HUMANITY, n. The human race, collectively, exclusive of the anthropoid poets.
AMBROSE BIERCE There are four kinds of Homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy.
AMBROSE BIERCE MILLENNIUM, n. The period of a thousand years when the lid is to be screwed down, with all reformers...
AMBROSE BIERCE Christian: one who believes that the New Testament is a divinely inspired book admirably suited to t...
AMBROSE BIERCE OPTIMIST, n. A proponent of the doctrine that black is white. A pessimist applied to God for relief....
AMBROSE BIERCE OPTIMIST, n. A proponent of the doctrine that black is white. A pessimist applied to God for relief.
AMBROSE BIERCE Infidel, n. In New York, one who does not believe in the Christian religion; in Constantinople, one ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Pray, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner, c...
AMBROSE BIERCE In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary, patriotism is defined as the last refuge of a scoundrel. With a...
AMBROSE BIERCE LAZINESS, n. Unwarranted repose of manner in a person of low degree.
AMBROSE BIERCE PEDIGREE, n. The known part of the route from an arboreal ancestor with a swim bladder to an urban d...
AMBROSE BIERCE ACCUSE, v.t. To affirm another's guilt or unworth; most commonly as a justification of ourselves for...
AMBROSE BIERCE EMBALM, v.i. To cheat vegetation by locking up the gases upon which it feeds. By embalming their dea...
AMBROSE BIERCE SERIAL, n. A literary work, usually a story that is not true, creeping through several issues of a n...
AMBROSE BIERCE ACQUAINTANCE, n. A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to. A...
AMBROSE BIERCE PANTALOONS, n. A nether habiliment of the adult civilized male. The garment is tubular and unprovide...
AMBROSE BIERCE BOUNTY, n. The liberality of one who has much, in permitting one who has nothing to get all that he ...
AMBROSE BIERCE EXTINCTION, n. The raw material out of which theology created the future state.
AMBROSE BIERCE Absurdity, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
AMBROSE BIERCE LUNARIAN, n. An inhabitant of the moon, as distinguished from Lunatic, one whom the moon inhabits. T...
AMBROSE BIERCE WINE, n. Fermented grape-juice known to the Women's Christian Union as "liquor," sometimes as "rum."...
AMBROSE BIERCE QUORUM, n. A sufficient number of members of a deliberative body to have their own way and their own...
AMBROSE BIERCE Land: A part of the earth's surface, considered as property. The theory that land is property su...
AMBROSE BIERCE ARRAYED, pp. Drawn up and given an orderly disposition, as a rioter hanged to a lamppost.
AMBROSE BIERCE PREDILECTION, n. The preparatory stage of disillusion.
AMBROSE BIERCE Pitted against hard drinking Christians the abstemious Mahometans go down like grass before the scyt...
AMBROSE BIERCE Coward: One who, in a perilous emergency, thinks with his legs.
AMBROSE BIERCE Opportunity is a favorable occasion for grasping a disappointment.
AMBROSE BIERCE UGLINESS, n. A gift of the gods to certain women, entailing virtue without humility.
AMBROSE BIERCE From the vast, invisible ocean of moonlight overhead fell, here and here, a slender, broken stream t...
AMBROSE BIERCE He who thinks with difficulty believes with alacrity.
AMBROSE BIERCE You don't have to be stupid to be a Christian, ... but it probably helps.
AMBROSE BIERCE Edible. Good to eat and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pi...
AMBROSE BIERCE Consult. To seek another's approval of a course already decided on.
AMBROSE BIERCE They say that hens do cackle loudest when there is nothing vital in the eggs they have laid.
AMBROSE BIERCE Impiety. Your irreverence toward my deity.
AMBROSE BIERCE Deliberation. The act of examining one's bread to determine which side it is buttered on.
AMBROSE BIERCE PROPHECY, n. The art and practice of selling one's credibility for future delivery.
AMBROSE BIERCE Admiration; is our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
AMBROSE BIERCE Optimism. The doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.
AMBROSE BIERCE An optimist is a proponent of the doctrine that black is white.
AMBROSE BIERCE Appeal. In law, to put the dice into the box for another throw.
AMBROSE BIERCE Wit. The salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out.
AMBROSE BIERCE To apologize is to lay the foundation for a future offense.
AMBROSE BIERCE The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling.
AMBROSE BIERCE Consul. In American politics, a person who having failed to secure an office from the people is give...
AMBROSE BIERCE Forgetfulness. A gift of God bestowed upon debtors in compensation for their destitution of conscien...
AMBROSE BIERCE The covers of this book are too far apart.
AMBROSE BIERCE The Senate is a body of old men charged with high duties and misdemeanors.
AMBROSE BIERCE To be positive: to be mistaken at the top of one's voice.
AMBROSE BIERCE Censor, n. An officer of certain governments, employed to supress the works of genius. Among the Rom...
AMBROSE BIERCE Genealogy. An account of one's descent from an ancestor who did not particularly care to trace his o...
AMBROSE BIERCE Woman absent is woman dead.
AMBROSE BIERCE DIPLOMACY, n. Lying in state, or the patriotic art of lying for one's country.
AMBROSE BIERCE Calamities are of two kinds. Misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
AMBROSE BIERCE YANKEE, n. In Europe, an American. In the Northern States of our Union, a New Englander. In the So...
AMBROSE BIERCE Politeness, n. The most acceptable hypocrisy.
AMBROSE BIERCE Calamities are of two kinds: misfortunes to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
AMBROSE BIERCE