Quotations by Author

Ambrose Bierce

Conservative: A statesman who is enamored with the existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

Bore: A person who talks when you wish him to listen.

Painting: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.

Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.

History is an account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers, mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools.

An inventor is a person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers and springs, and believes it civilization.

Dawn, n. When men of reason go to bed.

The period of our lives when, according to Wordsworth, 'Heaven lies about us.' The world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.

Justice: A commodity which in a more or less adulterated condition the State sells to the citizen as a reward for his allegiance, taxes and personal service.

Logic, n. The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding.

Mad, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence; not conforming to standards of thought, speech, and action derived by the conformants [sic] from study of themselves; at odds with the majority; in short, unusual. It is noteworthy that persons are pronounced mad by officials destitute of evidence that they themselves are sane.

Politics, n. A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles. The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.

Religion, n. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.

Selfish, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others.

Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum. Translation: I think [that] I think, therefore, I think [that] I am.

I keep a conscience uncorrupted by religion, a judgment undimmed by politics and patriotism, a heart untainted by friendships and sentiments unsoured by animosities.

Religions are conclusions for which the facts of nature supply no major premises.

Faith; noun. Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." "Pray; verb. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy." Mythology: The body of a primitive people's beliefs concerning its origin, early history, heroes, deities and so forth, as distinguished from the true accounts which it invents later. Scriptures; noun. The sacred books of our holy religion, as distinguished from the false and profane writings on which all other faiths are based.

Fork: An instrument used chiefly for the purpose of putting dead animals into the mouth