Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Gwinnett Biercewas an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist. He wrote the short story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" and compiled a satirical lexicon, The Devil's Dictionary. His vehemence as a critic, his motto "Nothing matters", and the sardonic view of human nature that informed his work, all earned him the nickname "Bitter Bierce"...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth24 June 1842
CityMeighs County, OH
CountryUnited States of America
REALITY, n. The dream of a mad philosopher. That which would remain in the cupel if one should assay a phantom. The nucleus of a vacuum.
OATH, n. In law, a solemn appeal to the Deity, made binding upon the conscience by a penalty for perjury.
REPARATION, n. Satisfaction that is made for a wrong and deducted from the satisfaction felt in committing it.
When you have made a catalogue of your friend's faults it is only fair to supply him with a duplicate, so that he may know yours.
PIRACY, n. Commerce without its folly-swaddles, just as God made it.
APHORISM, n. Predigested wisdom. The flabby wine-skin of his brain Yields to some pathologic strain, And voids from its unstored abysm The driblet of an aphorism. "The Mad Philosopher," 1697
Mad; adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence; not conforming to standards of thought, speech, and action derived by the conformants 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.
Rum, n. Generically, fiery liquors that produce madness in total abstainers.
To seek a justification for a decision already made.
Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum -- "I think that I think, therefore I think that I am;" as close an approach to certainty as any philosopher has yet made.
Mad, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence.
The small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify we give the name of knowledge.
Lawsuit: A machine which you go into as a pig and come out of as a sausage.
Egotist: a person more interested in himself than in me.