Quotes from Ambrose Bierce


    Sorted by Popularity


    We submit to the majority because we have to. But we are not compelled to call our attitude of subjection a posture of respect.

    Respect | Attitude | Majority


    Absence blots people out. We really have no absent friends.

    Absence | Absent


    The hardest tumble a man can make is to fall over his own bluff.

    Fall | Hardest | Bluff


    Optimism - the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.

    Beautiful | Optimism | Ugly


    Creditor. One of a tribe of savages dwelling beyond the Financial Straits and dreaded for their desolating incursions.

    Financial | Beyond | Tribe


    Erudition - dust shaken out of a book into an empty skull.

    Skull | Empty | Dust


    To apologize is to lay the foundation for a future offense.

    Future | Foundation | Lay


    Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue.

    Patience | Virtue | Form


    Duty - that which sternly impels us in the direction of profit, along the line of desire.

    Direction | Desire | Duty


    Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket or a left.

    Skill | Equal | Left


    Compromise, n. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction of thinking he has got what he ought not to have, and is deprived of nothing except what was justly his due.

    Thinking | Compromise


    The covers of this book are too far apart.

    Far | Apart | Covers


    A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention, and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.

    Others | Abstain | Affairs


    Abscond - to move in a mysterious way, commonly with the property of another.

    Property | Mysterious | Move


    Alien - an American sovereign in his probationary state.

    Alien | Sovereign | State


    Famous, adj.: Conspicuously miserable.

    Famous | Miserable | Adjective


    Impiety. Your irreverence toward my deity.

    Deity | Toward


    Eloquence, n. The art of orally persuading fools that white is the color that it appears to be. It includes the gift of making any color appear white.

    Art | Color | Gift


    Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.

    Temptation | Pleasure | Weak


    Admiral. That part of a warship which does the talking while the figurehead does the thinking.

    Thinking | Talking | Admiral


       

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