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Conservative. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from a Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.


Ambrose Bierce

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Conservative. noun. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from a liberal, ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Conservative, n: A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal wh...
AMBROSE BIERCE A conservative is a liberal who just got mugged and a liberal is a conservative who just got arreste...
NOT SURE If a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, a liberal is a conservative who's been arr...
TOM WOLFE A liberal is a conservative who has been arrested.
THOMAS WOLFE A conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, and a libertarian is a conservative who's bee...
JACK ABRAMOFF There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy.” ~ Ambrose ...
J.J. MCAVOY A great statesman is he who knows when to depart from traditions, as well as when to adhere to them.
JOHN STUART MILL A conservative is a liberal who got mugged the night before
FRANK RIZZO A conservative is a liberal who got mugged the night before.
FRANK RIZZO It would be a serious mistake to replace a seasoned statesman with a tempermental tycoon who has ...
VICE PRESIDENT DAN QUAYLE [GIVING HIS OPINION ABOUT ROSS PEROT'S PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN] No formal course in fiction-writing can equal a close and observant perusal of the stories of Edgar ...
H. P. LOVECRAFT It is said that a neo-conservative is a liberal who has been mugged by reality.
STOCKWELL DAY The numerous evils to which individual persons are exposed are due to the defects existing in the pe...
MAIMONIDES Be careful of relying on the opinion of others, these are the same people that like liver.
NANETTE L. AVERY Be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others
JON POSTEL A liberal is a conservative who's been arrested. A conservative is a liberal who's been mugged.
WENDY KAMINER A liberal is a person who believes that water can be made to run uphill. A conservative is someone w...
THEODORE WHITE If a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, a liberal is a conservative who's been arrested
THOMAS WOLFE We must be both more conservative and more liberal than most students of Christian worship: conserva...
JOHN FRAME A man who has both feet planted firmly in the air can be safely called a liberal as opposed to the c...
JACQUES BARZUN A man who has both feet planted firmly in the air can be safely called a liberal as opposed to the c...
JACQUES BARZUN It is one of the truisms of politics that a conservative is often enough a former liberal who has be...
FRANK GAFFNEY The role of the Christian is to let other people know what Jesus has done, not to think of themselve...
LEWIS N. ROE Naturalistic atheism debunks itself. It has no power to explain even some of the most basic principl...
LEWIS N. ROE It's important to understand that if someone calls themselves a Christian, it does not automatically...
LEWIS N. ROE Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is no...
CATO (MARCUS PORCIUS CATO "THE ELDER") (A/K/A CATO THE CENSOR) Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is not...
WINSTON CHURCHILL As far back as history records people thinking, thinking people have been befuddled by the mysteries...
LEWIS N. ROE Any 20 year-old who isn't a liberal doesn't have a heart, and any 40 year-old who isn't a conservati...
SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL Any 20 year-old who isn't a liberal doesn't have a heart, and any 40 year-old who isn't a conservati...
MARGARET THATCHER Any 20 year-old who isn't a liberal doesn't have a heart, and any 40 year-old who isn't a conservati...
WINSTON CHURCHILL By the side of the everlasting Why there is a Yes--a transitory Yes if you like, but a Yes.
E.M. FORSTER A politician is a statesman who approaches every question with an open mouth.
ADLAI STEVENSON Most absurdly in the program, the Aidan Quinn character is portrayed as a courageous priest challeng...
MARK TOOLEY No matter what Sarah Palin and these geniuses she surrounds herself with try to tell you, climate ch...
JIMMY KIMMEL Any man who is under 30, and is not a liberal, has not heart; and any man who is over 30, and is not...
SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL MSNBC will never be as liberal as Fox is conservative.
DAVID SHUSTER God is not troubled by one who is conservative or liberal, and He certainly never inclines His ear t...
MAX LUCADO The atheist might have no proof for the supernatural, but they also have no proof against it. If we ...
LEWIS N. ROE All a man's affairs become diseased when he wishes to cure evils by evils.
SOPHOCLES Unsubscribe from should-a, would-a, could-a
MICHAEL H. DANSBURY Feast of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, Teacher, 397 To the good man to die is gain. The foolish fea...
ST. AMBROSE One who condones evils is just as guilty as the one who perpetrates it.
MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. One who condones evils is just as guilty as the one who perpetrates it.
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. A Radical is a man with both feet firmly planted--in the air. A Conservative is a man with two perfe...
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT In the real world, they told you who to be, not the other way around.
RHODA BELLEZA A liberal is a conservative whose conscience is on display
JEROME GIOIA A wise man who stands firm is a statesman, a foolish man who stands firm is a catastrophe.
ADLAI STEVENSON He who wishes to secure the good of others has already secured his own.
CONFUCIUS I have nothing against conservative people putting out conservative commentary or doing conservative...
BILL KELLER With this action, in one fell swoop, the president deprived himself and his supporters of the easies...
BILL KRISTOL With this action, in one fell swoop, the president deprived himself and his supporters of the easies...
BILL KRISTOL How lucky I am to have known somebody and something that saying goodbye to is so damned awful.
EVANS G. VALENS John Boehner was and is an unprincipled ward-heeler who simply couldn't weather the transition o...
ALEX PAREENE Whether you say that a god does exist, or that none do, it is a claim to know (or at least believe i...
LEWIS N. ROE There are an awful lot of cases in which O'Connor was the fifth justice in a liberal direction even ...
GEORGE WATSON The modern definition of 'racist' is someone who is winning an argument with a liberal.
PETER BRIMELOW The modern definition of "racist" is "someone who is winning an argument with a liberal
PETER BRIMELOW A liberal is a person who believes that water can be made to run uphill. A conservative is someone w...
THEODORE H. WHITE A politician is a man who understands government. A statesman is a politician who's been dead fo...
HARRY S TRUMAN Only fools wait, and only tools bait.
CRE There are approximately two trillion cells in the human body. You are never alone, there are always ...
DWIGHT W. HAYES During my first visit, I was really struck by how deeply religious many Oklahomans are. It is a very...
FAMKE JANSSEN There are very conservative libertarian Republicans who agree with liberal Democrats that you have t...
GLORIA BORGER This is very similar to the suggestion put forward by the Quirmian philosopher Ventre, who said, "Po...
TERRY PRATCHETT It really concerns me that we are losing a great statesman because the current leadership is so unwi...
CHUCK BOWEN I'm fucking the grave, I thought, I'm bringing the dead back to life...
CHARLES BUKOWSKI The conservative who resists change is as valuable as the radical who proposes it.
ARIEL DURANT Trump is more conservative on individual rights, domestic issues, economic issues and defense. On th...
FABRIZIO MOREIRA A liberal is a person who believes that water can be made to run uphill. A conservative is someone w...
THEODORE WHITE A statesman is he who thinks in the future generations, and a politician is he who thinks in the upc...
ABRAHAM LINCOLN Bigot-A person who wins an argument with a liberal
RUSH LIMBAUGH A compassionate conservative is someone who electrocutes juveniles but lets them have a last 'make a...
GARRISON KEILLOR One of the most important things I have found is that no one school of thought has all of the answer...
LEWIS N. ROE Life is a journey and it's about growing and changing and coming to terms with who and what you ...
KELLY MCGILLIS The fact is that the Democratic Party in modern times has always had a conservative wing, one freque...
RICK PERLSTEIN A man who is always satisfied with himself is seldom so with others, and others as little pleased wi...
FRANçOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD A Conservative is only a Tory who is ashamed of himself.
JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE Political tags - such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, an...
ROBERT A. HEINLEIN A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs, who has never learned to walk.
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT The aspirant would do well to avoid those ‘spiritual teachers’ who delight in pointing out the e...
PREM PRAKASH I don't think they will run. I think they'll find a conservative who is one of them... a George Alle...
CHRIS MATTHEWS a distinguished leader who championed the rights of all Americans.
ELIJAH CUMMINGS Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live, it is asking others to live as one wishes to live.
OSCAR WILDE Most people I think feel exterior-wise Churches, unless we yell like 'horton hears a who' that all u...
CHUCK BRIDGES Most people who ask for advice from others have already resolved to act as it pleases them.
KHALIL GIBRAN Most people who ask for advice from others have already resolved to act as it pleases them.
KNEGGE Most people who ask for advice from others have already resolved to act as it pleases them.
KAHLIL GIBRAN The true statesman is the one who is willing to take risks.
CHARLES DE GAULLE Having been shown the possibility that God exists, the atheist has chosen not to accept it. They hav...
LEWIS N. ROE The scientific method gives us information by testing and repeating observable things so that we can...
LEWIS N. ROE The claim to know that no god exists is just irrational. The non-existence of any god has no evidenc...
LEWIS N. ROE The only thing worse than a knee-jerk liberal is a knee-pad conservative.
The only thing worse than a knee-jerk liberal is a knee-pad conservative.
EDWARD ABBEY When people find a man of the most distinguished abilities as a writer their inferior while he is ...
SAMUEL JOHNSON It is as hard to satirize well a man of distinguished vices, as to praise well a man of distinguishe...
JONATHAN SWIFT We always maintain a list of existing growers who want to add to their broiler houses as well as peo...
BOB BILLINGSLEY He never sought to stem the current. [Of a statesman who accommodates his views to public opinion....
UNKNOWN A politician is a man who understands government. A statesman is a politician who's been dead for 15...
HARRY S TRUMAN

More Ambrose Bierce

Destiny: A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure.
AMBROSE BIERCE Belladonna, n.: In Italian a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the e...
AMBROSE BIERCE Divorce: a resumption of diplomatic relations and rectification of boundaries.
AMBROSE BIERCE Death is not the end. There remains the litigation over the estate.
AMBROSE BIERCE Immortality: A toy which people cry for, And on their knees apply for, Dispute, contend and lie for,...
AMBROSE BIERCE Litigation: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of as a sausage.
AMBROSE BIERCE Suffrage, noun. Expression of opinion by means of a ballot. The right of suffrage (which is held to ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Laziness. Unwarranted repose of manner in a person of low degree.
AMBROSE BIERCE Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.
AMBROSE BIERCE Doubt is the father of invention.
AMBROSE BIERCE Life - a spiritual pickle preserving the body from decay.
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 Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art.
AMBROSE BIERCE Cynic, n: a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.
AMBROSE BIERCE Deliberation, n.: The act of examining one's bread to determine which side it is buttered on.
AMBROSE BIERCE Clairvoyant, n.: A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Liberty:one of imaginations most precious possessions.
AMBROSE BIERCE Quoting: the act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
AMBROSE BIERCE Day, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent.
AMBROSE BIERCE Success is the one unpardonable sin against our fellows.
AMBROSE BIERCE Optimist: a proponent of the doctrine that black is white.
AMBROSE BIERCE Litigant: a person about to give up his skin for the hope of retaining his bone.
AMBROSE BIERCE Ocean: A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man - who has no gills.
AMBROSE BIERCE Beauty, n: the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.
AMBROSE BIERCE OCEAN, n. A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man -- who has no gills.
AMBROSE BIERCE ZEAL, n. A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and inexperienced. A passion that goeth b...
AMBROSE BIERCE For every man there is something in the vocabulary that would stick to him like a second skin. His e...
AMBROSE BIERCE Education, n.: That which discloses the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understand...
AMBROSE BIERCE Love, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage.
AMBROSE BIERCE Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
AMBROSE BIERCE Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.
AMBROSE BIERCE You don't have to be stupid to be a Christian, ... but it probably helps.
AMBROSE BIERCE Ocean, n. A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man — who has no g...
AMBROSE BIERCE Fidelity. A virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
AMBROSE BIERCE Incompatibility. In matrimony a similarity of tastes, particularly the taste for domination.
AMBROSE BIERCE The world has suffered more from the ravages of ill-advised marriages than from virginity.
AMBROSE BIERCE Marriage. The state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress and two slaves, m...
AMBROSE BIERCE Bride. A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
AMBROSE BIERCE What is a democrat? One who believes that the republicans have ruined the country. What is a republi...
AMBROSE BIERCE Nominee. A modest gentleman shrinking from the distinction of private life and diligently seeking th...
AMBROSE BIERCE Learning. The kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious.
AMBROSE BIERCE Consult. To seek another's approval of a course already decided on.
AMBROSE BIERCE Happiness is an agreeable sensation, arising from contemplating the misery of others.
AMBROSE BIERCE Life. A spiritual pickle preserving the body from decay.
AMBROSE BIERCE Acquaintance: a degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor or obscure, and intimate ...
AMBROSE BIERCE An acquaintance is someone we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to.
AMBROSE BIERCE A temporary insanity curable by marriage.
AMBROSE BIERCE Beauty. The power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.
AMBROSE BIERCE Let me tell you what a writer is. A writer takes comprehensive views, holds large convictions, makes...
AMBROSE BIERCE Corporation. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.
AMBROSE BIERCE Don't steal; thou it never thus compete successfully in business. Cheat.
AMBROSE BIERCE Philanthropist. A rich (and usually bald) old gentleman who has trained himself to grin while his co...
AMBROSE BIERCE Age. That period of life in which we compound for the vices that remain by reviling those we have no...
AMBROSE BIERCE Success is the one unpardonable sin against one's fellows.
AMBROSE BIERCE Education is that which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understan...
AMBROSE BIERCE Destiny. A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure.
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 Knowledge is the small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify.
AMBROSE BIERCE Erudition. Dust shaken out of a book into an empty skull.
AMBROSE BIERCE Saint. A dead sinner revised and edited.
AMBROSE BIERCE Insurrection. An unsuccessful revolution; disaffection's failure to substitute misrule for bad gover...
AMBROSE BIERCE Revolution is an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment.
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 Take not God's name in vain; select a time when it will have effect.
AMBROSE BIERCE A prejudice is a vagrant opinion without visible means of support.
AMBROSE BIERCE Bigot, one who is obstinately and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not entertain.
AMBROSE BIERCE Pray: To ask the laws of the universe to be annulled on behalf of a single petitioner confessedly un...
AMBROSE BIERCE Eulogy. Praise of a person who has either the advantages of wealth and power, or the consideration t...
AMBROSE BIERCE Admiration; is our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
AMBROSE BIERCE To bother about the best method of accomplishing an accidental result.
AMBROSE BIERCE A route of many roads leading from nowhere to nothing.
AMBROSE BIERCE All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a philosopher.
AMBROSE BIERCE A lowly virtue whereby mediocrity achieves a glorious success.
AMBROSE BIERCE Peace, in international affairs, is a period of cheating between two periods of fighting.
AMBROSE BIERCE Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue.
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 They say that hens do cackle loudest when there is nothing vital in the eggs they have laid.
AMBROSE BIERCE Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
AMBROSE BIERCE Heaven lies about us in our infancy and the world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.
AMBROSE BIERCE As records of courts and justice are admissible, it can easily be proved that powerful and malevolen...
AMBROSE BIERCE Before undergoing a surgical operation, arrange your temporal affairs. You may live.
AMBROSE BIERCE Politeness -- The most acceptable hypocrisy.
AMBROSE BIERCE A man is known by the company he organizes.
AMBROSE BIERCE Logic, n. The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapaciti...
AMBROSE BIERCE Enthusiasm. A distemper of youth, curable by small doses of repentance in connection with outward ap...
AMBROSE BIERCE Egotist. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than me.
AMBROSE BIERCE An egotist is a person interested in himself than in me!
AMBROSE BIERCE Duty. That which sternly impels us in the direction of profit, along the line of desire.
AMBROSE BIERCE Opiate. An unlocked door in the prison of Identity. It leads into the jail yard.
AMBROSE BIERCE Insurance: An ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comforta...
AMBROSE BIERCE Backbite. To speak of a man as you find him when he can't find you.
AMBROSE BIERCE Alien. An American sovereign in his probationary state.
AMBROSE BIERCE Miss: A title with which we brand unmarried women to indicate that they are in the market. Miss, Mis...
AMBROSE BIERCE Witticism. A sharp and clever remark, usually quoted and seldom noted; what the Philistine is please...
AMBROSE BIERCE Wit. The salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out.
AMBROSE BIERCE A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man, who has no gills.
AMBROSE BIERCE Impartial. Unable to perceive any promise of personal advantage from espousing either side of a cont...
AMBROSE BIERCE Dog. A kind of additional or subsidiary Deity designed to catch the overflow and surplus of the worl...
AMBROSE BIERCE Physician -- One upon whom we set our hopes when ill and our dogs when well.
AMBROSE BIERCE Divorce. A resumption of diplomatic relations and rectification of boundaries.
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 A cynic is a blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, and not as they ought to be.
AMBROSE BIERCE Confidante. One entrusted by A with the secrets of B confided to herself by C.
AMBROSE BIERCE The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling.
AMBROSE BIERCE Future. That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is ...
AMBROSE BIERCE A funeral is a pageant whereby we attest our respect for the dead by enriching the undertaker.
AMBROSE BIERCE An accident is an inevitable occurrence due to the actions of immutable natural laws.
AMBROSE BIERCE To apologize is to lay the foundation for a future offense.
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 Habit is a shackle for the free.
AMBROSE BIERCE Laughter -- An interior convulsion, producing a distortion of the features and accompanied by inarti...
AMBROSE BIERCE Litigant. A person about to give up his skin for the hope of retaining his bones.
AMBROSE BIERCE Appeal. In law, to put the dice into the box for another throw.
AMBROSE BIERCE Trial. A formal inquiry designed to prove and put upon record the blameless characters of judges, ad...
AMBROSE BIERCE Experience is a revelation in the light of which we renounce our errors of youth for those of age.
AMBROSE BIERCE Experience. The wisdom that enables us to recognize in an undesirable old acquaintance the folly tha...
AMBROSE BIERCE The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
AMBROSE BIERCE PROPHECY, n. The art and practice of selling one's credibility for future delivery.
AMBROSE BIERCE When in Rome, do as Rome does.
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 Bore -- a person who talks when you wish him to listen.
AMBROSE BIERCE Ambition. An overmastering desire to be vilified by enemies while living and made ridiculous by frie...
AMBROSE BIERCE Irreligion. The principal one of the great faiths of the world.
AMBROSE BIERCE Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things withou...
AMBROSE BIERCE Architect. One who drafts a plan of your house, and plans a draft of your money.
AMBROSE BIERCE Genealogy. An account of one's descent from an ancestor who did not particularly care to trace his o...
AMBROSE BIERCE Absurdity. A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion.
AMBROSE BIERCE Abstainer. A weak man who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.
AMBROSE BIERCE Woman absent is woman dead.
AMBROSE BIERCE The covers of this book are too far apart.
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 coward is one who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.
AMBROSE BIERCE The Senate is a body of old men charged with high duties and misdemeanors.
AMBROSE BIERCE Compromise. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction of ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Alliance. In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply inserte...
AMBROSE BIERCE ALLIANCE, n. In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply in...
AMBROSE BIERCE Acquaintance is a degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor and obscure, and intima...
AMBROSE BIERCE ARSENIC, n. A kind of cosmetic greatly affected by the ladies, whom it greatly affects in turn."Eat ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Compromise. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction o...
AMBROSE BIERCE Convent. A place of retirement for women who wish for leisure to meditate upon the sin of idleness.
AMBROSE BIERCE Religion. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.
AMBROSE BIERCE International arbitration may be defined as the substitution of many burning questions for a smoulde...
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 Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
AMBROSE BIERCE A bride is a woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
AMBROSE BIERCE Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic.
AMBROSE BIERCE There are 4 kinds of Homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy.
AMBROSE BIERCE FIDELITY, n. A virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
AMBROSE BIERCE ZOOLOGY, n. The science and history of the animal kingdom, including its king, the House Fly ("Mus...
AMBROSE BIERCE HIPPOGRIFF, n. An animal (now extinct) which was half horse and half griffin. The griffin was a com...
AMBROSE BIERCE ZENITH, n. The point in the heavens directly overhead to a man standing or a growing cabbage. A m...
AMBROSE BIERCE YANKEE, n. In Europe, an American. In the Northern States of our Union, a New Englander. In the So...
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 OBSESSED, p.p. Vexed by an evil spirit, like the Gadarene swine and other critics. Obsession was onc...
AMBROSE BIERCE Optimism. The doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.
AMBROSE BIERCE Women and foxes, being weak, are distinguished by superior tact.
AMBROSE BIERCE Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited.
AMBROSE BIERCE QUEEN, n. A woman by whom the realm is ruled when there is a king, and through whom it is ruled wh...
AMBROSE BIERCE When you are ill make haste to forgive your enemies, for you may recover.
AMBROSE BIERCE Electricity seems destined to play a most important part in the arts and industries. The question of...
AMBROSE BIERCE Electricity is the power that causes all natural phenomena not known to be caused by something else.
AMBROSE BIERCE ECCENTRICITY, n. A method of distinction so cheap that fools employ it to accentuate their incapaci...
AMBROSE BIERCE LAND, n. A part of the earth's surface, considered as property. The theory that land is property s...
AMBROSE BIERCE The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling.
AMBROSE BIERCE Birth: The first and direst of all disasters.
AMBROSE BIERCE Dawn: When men of reason go to bed.
AMBROSE BIERCE Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affai...
AMBROSE BIERCE Amnesty, n. The state's magnanimity to those offenders whom it would be too expensive to punish.
AMBROSE BIERCE Patriotism. Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name.
AMBROSE BIERCE Admiral. That part of a warship which does the talking while the figurehead does the thinking.
AMBROSE BIERCE Famous, adj.: Conspicuously miserable.
AMBROSE BIERCE Positive, adj.: Mistaken at the top of one's voice.
AMBROSE BIERCE Mad, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence.
AMBROSE BIERCE Edible, adj.: Good to eat, and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Jealous, adj. Unduly concerned about the preservation of that which can be lost only if not worth ke...
AMBROSE BIERCE Dog - a kind of additional or subsidiary Deity designed to catch the overflow and surplus of the wor...
AMBROSE BIERCE Acquaintance. A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to.
AMBROSE BIERCE Perseverance - a lowly virtue whereby mediocrity achieves an inglorious success.
AMBROSE BIERCE Logic: The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities ...
AMBROSE BIERCE Prescription: A physician's guess at what will best prolong the situation with least harm to the...
AMBROSE BIERCE Lawsuit: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of as a sausage.
AMBROSE BIERCE Compromise, n. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction ...
AMBROSE BIERCE The best thing to do with the best things in life is to give them up.
AMBROSE BIERCE TELEPHONE n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeab...
AMBROSE BIERCE Egotist, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.
AMBROSE BIERCE Positive, adj.: Mistaken at the top of one's voice.
AMBROSE BIERCE Beauty, n: the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband.
AMBROSE BIERCE Sweater, n. Garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.
AMBROSE BIERCE Sabbath - a weekly festival having its origin in the fact that God made the world in six days and wa...
AMBROSE BIERCE The small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify we give the name of knowledge.
AMBROSE BIERCE