Take not God's name in vain; select a time when it will have effect.
Ambrose Bierce
Related
There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy.” ~ Ambrose ...
J.J. MCAVOY No formal course in fiction-writing can equal a close and observant perusal of the stories of Edgar ...
H. P. LOVECRAFT Against stupidity the very gods fight in vain.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER Against boredom the gods themselves fight in vain.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER With stupidity the gods themselves struggle in vain.
FRIEDRICH SCHILLER With stupidity the gods themselves struggle in vain.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER Against stupidity the very gods themselves contend in vain.
FRIEDRICH SCHILLER Against stupidity the very gods themselves contend in vain.
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER Against stupidity the very Gods themselves toil in vain
FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER The discussion about any one league will not go into our discussions when it comes time to select th...
CRAIG LITTLEPAGE The American people would not want to know of any misquotes that Dan Quayle may or may not make. �...
VICE PRESIDENT DAN QUAYLE It will take a long time for women's effect on politics to register so that we may properly appr...
FLORENCE ELLINWOOD ALLEN It is occasionally possible to charge Hell with a bucket of water, but against stupidity the gods th...
DORIS FLEESON When men destroy their old gods they will find new ones to take their place.
PEARL S. BUCK In the future we will have it. It's just a problem of time. It will take a long time.
ASHLEY WU Educate yourself, take the time to find out what is in a bill and how it will effect everything, and...
DAVID PRATT If your doing Gods will , you wont have time to do as you will
TIPSON N MOKGOPHA People who don't know me lower their eyes in embarrassment when the Lord's name is taken in vain in ...
SISTER PARISH I have been saddened a whole life time, it will not bother me any longer
BEN OAK They deserve attention from the world, so they will not have died in vain.
JOSEPH WONG I've always zoomed through life in a vain attempt to keep up with my sprinting brain. If I have ...
MEGAN MCCAFFERTY He did not waste time in a vain search for a place in history.
DEJAN STOJANOVIC Stop a minute, Ambrose!" interrupted Master Nathaniel. "I've got a sudden silly whim that we should ...
HOPE MIRRLEES Against stupidity the very gods
Themselves contend in vain.
[Ger., Mit der Dummheit kampfen Go...
JOHANN CHRISTOPH FRIEDRICH VON SCHILLER I do not believe it will have any effect at all.
BILL HUNT It will not have an immediate effect on the ground. We will continue fighting.
ERNEST WAMBA If it has an effect on political reform in China it will be a bad one. It can't have a good effect, ...
DAI QING We have a name for people who create universes - they're called gods. There is no greater hubris...
GREGORY BENFORD And they who do not bear witness to what is false, and when they pass by what is vain, they pass by ...
QURAN In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to te...
JANE AUSTEN It is in vain to chase two birds at the same time, even if you have a thousand legs.
MATSHONA DHLIWAYO [At the same time, the increase] does very little to really take the heat out of the market, ... I d...
JULIAN LEE How vain, without the merit, is the name.
HOMER Only the vain are concerned with their name.
RONALD FRANCIS GOGGIN How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.
HENRY DAVID THOREAU In vain have you acquired knowledge if you have not
imparted it to others.
DEUTERONOMY RABBAH God is the same, even though He has a thousand names; it is up to us to select a name for Him.
PAULO COELHO Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances: it was somebody's name, or he happened to be ...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON I am already kindly disposed towards you. My friendship it is not in my power to give: this is a gif...
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH Tragic heroes always moan when the gods take an interest in them, but it's the people the gods ignor...
TERRY PRATCHETT When the new home construction and everything does begin in New Orleans, it is going to be tight and...
ED MCMAHON It is not a mark of manhood to carelessly use the name of the Almighty or of His Beloved Son in a va...
GORDON B. HINCKLEY We haven't been listening to legal immigrants. We've been taking their name in vain.
SANDY CLOSE The discussion about any one league will not go into our discussions when it comes time to select th...
CRAIG LITTLEPAGE We have a plan for those in attendance to review, we will have some rudimentary costs of various par...
BRUCE SHULL Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances -- it was somebody's name, or he happened t...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON We know in the end this is not a good thing. Medicare Part D will have an effect on our sales and we...
DAVID MACKAY One cannot long remain so absorbed in contemplation of emptiness without being increasingly attracte...
EMILE DURKHEIM Gods? Don't let that impress you. Anyone can be a god if they have enough worshippers. You don't eve...
JOANNE HARRIS In the name of all that is holy, please consider the wages of a particular profession before you sel...
MILES ANTHONY SMITH We are not going to see a significant effect overnight as a result of an OPEC agreement. I don't see...
CALVIN SCHNURE If it takes a year, it will take a year. Time is not an issue.
DAN GOLDIN If you're not really having a good time, it's not worth it.
KYLE CHANDLER If ever a time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in Government...
SAMUEL ADAMS It will take a lot of time. It will take a lot of effort.
HENRY BUNSOW A magician must always value his magic effects more than himself, because after few years audience m...
AMIT KALANTRI One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have ...
KURT VONNEGUT JR. One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have ...
KURT VONNEGUT Do not take liberties with the gods, or weary them
CONFUCIUS Your greatest regrets in life will not come from your past failures; they would come from rememberin...
BAMIGBOYE OLUROTIMI You have to spend a lot of time at church prior to playing in the Spectrum. There's a lot of praying...
LEONARD PERRY I'm fighting for the heart and soul of the Republican Party and I think if I win this campaign t...
DOUG HOFFMAN Husbands and wives generally understand when opposition will be vain.
JANE AUSTEN I'm not a vain person at all.
KRISTEN CRUZ I'm not so young as you are vain!
VERONICA FRANCO Use not vain repetitions
BIBLE Our specific concern
is that it will have a ripple effect.
LAURIE PETERSON When you have times of uncertainty, it's a time to take less risk, not more.
KAREN ALTFEST Corrections won't happen that quick, it will take a time. The public will have to want to make a cha...
BOBBY BOWERS It will be hard for our management team to select a starting eleven,
MIKE LAWSON We know all their gods; they ignore ours. What they call our sins are our gods, and what they call t...
NATALIE CLIFFORD BARNEY Well, Valek, any new promotions?” the Commander asked
“No. But Maren shows promise. Unfortu...
MARIA V. SNYDER Most of us will die twice; Once when we take our last breath, and again when the world forgets your ...
T. ARCHMAN When people are not skillful with time, when they have not learnt to manage and use time, and when t...
SUNDAY ADELAJA DECALOGUE, n. A series of commandments, ten in number --just enough to permit an intelligent selecti...
AMBROSE BIERCE When you meet someone for the first time,you will be judged in less than 5 minutes, always make sure...
MOE GHALAYINI Select cartoons will be reproduced in a catalog and the works will go on public display.
DAVOOD KAZEMI If we publish it maybe they will see it or somebody they know will see their name in it and take car...
JANET TAYLOR Life's irony;Life needs us to constantly hope in it,for it to effect changes in our lives or else it...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN) If a man's esteem and gratitude are ever worth the winning, you have won mine today. If ever the fut...
BRAM STOKER He who is false to the present duty breaks a thread in the loom, and you will see the effect when th...
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING He who is false to the present duty breaks a thread in the loom, and you will see the effect when th...
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING We are not leaving Brussels without a result, and I will let it take the time it needs...If not, we ...
ANDERS RASMUSSEN We are not leaving Brussels without a result, and I will let it take the time it needs...If not, we ...
ANDERS FOGH RASMUSSEN Supply in this quarter will be bigger than usual, so it will have a bad effect on the market. It's d...
HIROYUKI YAMADA Dave will return to Fairmont in a few weeks and we will select performers for next season.
HELEN GOULD It will take a lot of officers' time to go out when a dog's squatting on someone else's property. Th...
DAVID ADAMSON It is scheduled to take effect.
ARLENE MURRAY Remember to act always as if you were at a symposium. When the food or drink comes around, reach out...
EPICTETUS Identify the action you will take to achieve your goal, not the action you're 'supposed' to take. Ta...
KATRINA BEE In some ways, this makes our objectives more difficult. It will take more time, it will take more cr...
JAMES MCLEOD I don't miss him anymore. Most of the time, anyway. I want to. I wish I could but unfortunately, it'...
CHARLES YU My main concern is the negative effect this will have on students who take part in college courses. ...
BOB JENKINS It is vain to say human beings might be satisfied with tranquillity; they must have action, and they...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE The tree of life in the new year will bare the fruits of time for all to collect, but destiny will d...
DR.MOHAMMED FAIG ABAD ALRAZAK To say that a man is vain means merely that he is pleased with the effect he produces on other peo...
MAX BEERBOHM To say that a man is vain means merely that he is pleased with the effect he produces on other peopl...
MAX BEERBOHM Every time someone ends a prayer in the Western world they say Amen - that is the name of an Egyptia...
WHITLEY STRIEBER
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 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 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