"Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic."
Ambrose BierceTiny Panda Quotes
Quotes by Ambrose Bierce
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"Logic: The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding."
Ambrose Bierce"Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art."
Ambrose Bierce"Beauty, n: the power by which a woman charms a lover and terrifies a husband."
Ambrose Bierce"Corporation: An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility."
Ambrose Bierce"The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling."
Ambrose Bierce"Insurance - an ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfortable conviction that he is beating the man who keeps the table."
Ambrose Bierce"Death is not the end. There remains the litigation over the estate."
Ambrose Bierce"Experience - the wisdom that enables us to recognise in an undesirable old acquaintance the folly that we have already embraced."
Ambrose Bierce"Destiny: A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure."
Ambrose Bierce"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel."
Ambrose Bierce"Religion. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable."
Ambrose Bierce"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography."
Ambrose Bierce"In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office."
Ambrose Bierce"Happiness: an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another."
Ambrose Bierce"Bride: A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her."
Ambrose Bierce"Future. That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends are true and our happiness is assured."
Ambrose Bierce"Wit - the salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out."
Ambrose Bierce"Doubt is the father of invention."
Ambrose Bierce"Liberty: One of Imagination's most precious possessions."
Ambrose Bierce"Mad, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence."
Ambrose Bierce"Jealous, adj. Unduly concerned about the preservation of that which can be lost only if not worth keeping."
Ambrose Bierce"The small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify we give the name of knowledge."
Ambrose Bierce"Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage."
Ambrose Bierce"Marriage, n: the state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves, making in all, two."
Ambrose Bierce"Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly."
Ambrose Bierce"Patience, n. A minor form of dispair, disguised as a virtue."
Ambrose Bierce"Meekness: Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while."
Ambrose Bierce"Patriotism. Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name."
Ambrose Bierce"What this country needs what every country needs occasionally is a good hard bloody war to revive the vice of patriotism on which its existence as a nation depends."
Ambrose Bierce"Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage."
Ambrose Bierce"Conservative, n: A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal who wishes to replace them with others."
Ambrose Bierce"Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country."
Ambrose Bierce"Success is the one unpardonable sin against our fellows."
Ambrose Bierce"Telephone, n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeable person keep his distance."
Ambrose Bierce"Inventor: A person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers and springs, and believes it civilization."
Ambrose Bierce"Day, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent."
Ambrose Bierce"Who never doubted, never half believed. Where doubt is, there truth is - it is her shadow."
Ambrose Bierce"When you doubt, abstain."
Ambrose Bierce"Women in love are less ashamed than men. They have less to be ashamed of."
Ambrose Bierce"Education, n.: That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding."
Ambrose Bierce"Learning, n. The kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious."
Ambrose Bierce"Lawsuit: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of as a sausage."
Ambrose Bierce"Prescription: A physician's guess at what will best prolong the situation with least harm to the patient."
Ambrose Bierce"Ocean: A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man - who has no gills."
Ambrose Bierce"Spring beckons! All things to the call respond; the trees are leaving and cashiers abscond."
Ambrose Bierce"Academe, n.: An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. Academy, n.: A modern school where football is taught."
Ambrose Bierce