Ambrose Gwinett Bierce Known Quotations
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce Quotes about:
Known Quotes from:
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Alive Quotes
KING, n. A male person commonly known in America as a ""crowned head,"" although he never wears a crown and has usually no head to speak of.A king, in times long, long gone by, Said to his lazy jester:""If I were you and you were I My moments merrily would fly -- Nor care nor grief to pester.""""The reason, Sire, that you would thrive,"" The fool said --""if you'll hear it -- Is that of all the fools alive Who own you for their sovereign, I've The most forgiving spirit."" --Oogum Bem
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Bishop Quotes
OLEAGINOUS, adj. Oily, smooth, sleek. Disraeli once described the manner of Bishop Wilberforce as "unctuous, oleaginous, saponaceous." And the good prelate was ever afterward known as Soapy Sam. For every man there is something in the vocabulary that would stick to him like a second skin. His enemies have only to find it.
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Anybody Quotes
HANGMAN, n. An officer of the law charged with duties of the highest dignity and utmost gravity, and held in hereditary disesteem by a populace having a criminal ancestry. In some of the American States his functions are now performed by an electrician, as in New Jersey, where executions by electricity have recently been ordered --the first instance known to this lexicographer of anybody questioning the expediency of hanging Jerseymen.
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Acute Quotes
IN'ARDS, n. The stomach, heart, soul and other bowels. Many eminent investigators do not class the soul as an in'ard, but that acute observer and renowned authority, Dr. Gunsaulus, is persuaded that the mysterious organ known as the spleen is nothing less than our important part. To the contrary, Professor Garrett P. Servis holds that man's soul is that prolongation of his spinal marrow which forms the pith of his no tail; and for demonstration of his faith points confidently to the fact that no tailed animals have no souls. Concerning these two theories, it is best to suspend judgment by believing both.
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Architects Quotes
RAMSHACKLE, adj. Pertaining to a certain order of architecture, otherwise known as the Normal American. Most of the public buildings of the United States are of the Ramshackle order, though some of our earlier architects preferred the Ironic. Recent additions to the White House in Washington are Theo-Doric, the ecclesiastic order of the Dorians. They are exceedingly fine and cost one hundred dollars a brick.
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Cheat Quotes
SAINT, n. A dead sinner revised and edited. The Duchess of Orleans relates that the irreverent old calumniator, Marshal Villeroi, who in his youth had known St. Francis de Sales, said, on hearing him called saint: "I am delighted to hear that Monsieur de Sales is a saint. He was fond of saying indelicate things, and used to cheat at cards. In other respects he was a perfect gentleman, though a fool.
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Citizen Quotes
RESPLENDENT, adj. Like a simple American citizen beduking himself in his lodge, or affirming his consequence in the Scheme of Things as an elemental unit of a parade.The Knights of Dominion were so resplendent in their velvet- and-gold that their masters would hardly have known them. --"Chronicles of the Classes