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Heaven lies about us in our infancy and the world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.


Ambrose Bierce

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Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close upon the growing boy.
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close upon the growing boy
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The soul that rises with us, our life's star, Hath had el...
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy.” ~ Ambrose ...
J.J. MCAVOY With a good friend it’s not always how long you knew them, but how well you did.
JANET GURTLER THE TRUTH ABOUT US If you love her. If you want her to stay. Fight for her.
JANET GURTLER THE TRUTH ABOUT US No formal course in fiction-writing can equal a close and observant perusal of the stories of Edgar ...
H. P. LOVECRAFT Half the lies our opponents tell about us are untrue.
BOYLE ROCHE Character building begins in our infancy, and continues until death.
ELEANOR ROOSEVELT Character building begins in our infancy and continues until death.
ELEANOR ROOSEVELT Fiction may be about lying – on the surface, anyway – but fiction is about hiding the truth behi...
STACIA KANE Knowledge is learning about the world outside us; wisdom is learning about the world within us.
JIM GENOVESE More people know about us all over the nation than in our own backyard which is pretty typical.
KATHLEEN MITCHELL I thought about it a lot (during Christmas break). Coach had us in the locker room for an hour after...
EBONIE HALLIBURTON Polite strangers often tell soothing lies about our physical appearance that prevent many of us from...
MARTHA BECK too many of us spend our time trying to chase happiness through wealth and status. however few of us...
DAROLL SAKAMOTO It was pretty good. They got our name out. Probably about 50 schools came and contacted us.
BRETT SMITH No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in today. No peace lies in the future which is ...
FRA GIOVANNI GIOCONDO just as soon as they send us the equipment — we're hoping in about a month.
JUDY DAVIS But as the Pope has a long arm, which might reach me in France, I have gone a little out of the way ...
EDMOND ABOUT It was in the Papal States that I studied the Roman Question. I traveled over every part of the coun...
EDMOND ABOUT I have been further enlightened by the conversation and correspondence of some illustrious Italians,...
EDMOND ABOUT I fight fairly, and in good faith.
EDMOND ABOUT Marriage, in life, is like a duel in the midst of a battle.
EDMOND ABOUT Could you please be as silent as the G in lasagna?
ABOUT LIFE Never under any circumstances take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night.
ABOUT LIFE I always dream of being a millionaire like my uncle!... He's dreaming too.
ABOUT LIFE I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their mo...
ABOUT LIFE At about six in the morning of July 3, 1860, while I was watering my petunias, and thinking of noth...
EDMOND ABOUT If we want to see real change in our world, it begins with us all on an individual basis.
DIONNA L. HAYDEN The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make. �...
VICE PRESIDENT DAN QUAYLE Heaven doesn't only teach humans about virtue and divinity.
It also shows us about politics and...
TOBA BETA To the world who watched us on July 4 and in the months afterward, we say thank you for all your ent...
JENNIFER HARRIS What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies with in us.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON The draft begins for us at about pick 22. Up until then, we'll be spectators, I think.
BILL POLIAN Self-improvement books, friends, and polite strangers often tell soothing lies about our physical ap...
MARTHA BECK Art shows us that human beings still matter in a world where money talks the loudest, where computer...
JOHN MAEDA Diversity is about all of us, and about us having to figure out how to walk through this world toget...
JACQUELINE WOODSON And now people all over the world know about us.
JACK KELLEY In the first movement, our infancy as a species, we felt no separation from the natural world around...
JOANNA MACY I offer my opponents a bargain: if they will stop telling lies about us, I will stop telling the tru...
ADLAI E. STEVENSON II It was pretty disappointing to get away from something that worked so well for us. After the game we...
AARON GAGNON Glorious indeed is the world of God around us, but more glorious the world of God within us. There...
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreason...
US CONSTITUTION No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor ...
US CONSTITUTION Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise...
US CONSTITUTION A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people t...
US CONSTITUTION Nothing is nearer to us than heaven. The earth is beneath our feet, and we tread upon it, but heaven...
NIKOS KAZANTZAKIS The truly scary thing about undiscovered lies is that they have a greater capacity to diminish us th...
CHERYL HUGHES So long as breath remains in our lungs, untapped potential lies inside us, waiting to be released. T...
WAYNE CORDEIRO The main thing was that he genuinely cared about us as people, ... And in pro football, that's prett...
DAMON HUARD How many languages are there in the world? How about 5 billion! Each of us talks, listens, and think...
SOURCE UNKNOWN What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us.
OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES We aren't telling ourselves lies; we're composing heroic narratives that tell us essential truths ab...
DAN MCADAMS Between us and heaven or hell there is only life, which is the frailest thing in the world.
BLAISE PASCAL While we do our good works let us not forget that the real solution lies in a world in which charity...
CHINUA ACHEBE The world is too much with us; late and soon, getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little ...
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH The modern museum has multiple purposes - to curate and preserve, to research, and to reach out to t...
KATE WILLIAMS I finally understand a little bit more of why Gods allows pain in this life. Maybe He tries to get u...
TOMMY POLO Our parents deserve our honor and respect for giving us life itself. Beyond this they almost always ...
EZRA TAFT BENSON What of us lies in the hearts of others is our truest and deepest self.
JOHANN GOTTFRIED VON HERDER I understand that it's a huge luxury for people to dwell on the problems in Washington. Things h...
DOUG LIMAN OUR history begins before we are born. We represent the hereditary influences of our race, and our a...
JAMES NASMYTH If life were measured by accomplishments, most of us would die in infancy.
A. P. GOUTHEY If life were measured by accomplishments, most of us would die in infancy.
A. P. GOUTHEY In its entirety, probably, it follows us at every instant; all that we have felt, thought and willed...
HENRI BERGSON In a way life begins to feel better once we realize that our sins do not own us and our fear can not...
BRIELL ADAMS Good religion teaches us about a good God and encourages us to be like Him to the people of the worl...
HAROLD J. DUARTE-BERNHARDT It's not just about the water for us - it's about our identity.
MARGARET MORA Our choice to become independent again was about our belief in the relationship between us and our f...
TAYLOR HANSON Laugh and cry and tell stories. Sad stories about bodies stolen, bodies no longer here. Enraging sto...
ELI CLARE Our conduct has a direct influence on how people think about the gospel. The world doesn't judge us ...
CAROLYN MAHANEY The world changes, we do not, therein lies the irony that kills us.
ANNE RICE Reality Check
His lying is not contigent on who you are or what you do. His lying is not your f...
SUSAN FORWARD A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking about real money.
EVERETT DIRKSEN I like to open for a band as it brings on sort of a challenge and it makes things more interesting. ...
KELLY JONES The good inside of all of us is wrapped in a layer of apathy, and we forget how much potential we ha...
SHARI ARISON Getting stuck in the past and whining about who had hurt us hampers our personal growth and submerge...
BALROOP SINGH The truly scary thing about undiscovered lies is that they have a greater capacity to diminish us th...
CHERYL HUGHES Maybe our favorite quotations say more about us than about the stories and people we're quoting.
JOHN GREEN Everything smaller than Heaven bores us because only Heaven is bigger than our hearts.
PETER KREEFT And of course, we know that opportunity lies outside the reach of some of our people. We don't n...
ARTUR DAVIS Heaven have mercy on us all - Presbyterians and Pagans alike - for we are all somehow dreadfully cra...
HERMAN MELVILLE Heaven have mercy on us all - Presbyterians and Pagans alike - for we are all somehow dreadfully cra...
HERMAN MELVILLE The Sunday School teacher talked too much in the way our grade school teacher used to when she told ...
FRANCES FARMER Elvis sells all over the world, and that's where the real opportunity for growth lies for us, to tak...
JACK SODEN Our psychological reality, which lies below the surface, frightens us because it endlessly surprises...
ANAIS NIN God has placed seed of greatness in each of us but the key lies in discovering our purpose and tilli...
SUNDAY ADELAJA It's proof that on this day we were the best team in the world. It's like the skydiving Olympics. We...
BEN MASSEY I keep thinking about blood, I dream about it. Wake up thinking about it. Pretty soon I'll be writin...
CASSANDRA CLARE In our quest to define and describe the world, we have crisscrossed the oceans and continents, compi...
ALAN HUFFMAN It wasn't about Indiana. It was just about us coming out and playing our game.
GLENN ROBINSON Heaven gives us hope and makes our present burdens easier to bear.
BILLY GRAHAM Coach told us about it right before the game. We were pretty focused on the game, but our hearts and...
AARON AFFLALO What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us.
HENRY DAVID THOREAU What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us.
ANON. Most of us lost everything, ... and if you do have something, you're not getting into New Orleans an...
ANTHONY CANNON

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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 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 Conservative. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from a Liberal, who wi...
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