Quote

Human nature is pretty well balanced for every lacking virtue there is a rough substitute that will serve at a pinch--as cunning is the wisdom of the unwise, and ferocity the courage of the coward.

Ambrose Bierce

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Ambrose Bierce
Born: 1842
Born: June 24
Aphorist
Journalist
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Meigs County
Ohio
Dod Grile
William Herman
Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Wisdom
Lacking
Nature
Coward
Wells
Balanced
Ferocity
Human
Rough
Pinch
Humans
Serve
Unwise
Well
Courage
Cunning
Every
Pretty
Substitute
Virtue
Substitutes

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

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repose, v.i. To cease from troubling.
Ambrose Bierce
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Absence blots people out. We really have no absent friends.
Ambrose Bierce
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moral, adj. Conforming to a local and mutable standard of right. Having the quality of general expediency.
Ambrose Bierce
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Epitaph: An inscription on a tomb showing that virtues acquired by death have a retroactive effect.
Ambrose Bierce
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Jealous, adj. Unduly concerned about the preservation of that which can be lost only if not worth keeping.
Ambrose Bierce
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KILT, n. A costume sometimes worn by Scotchmen in America and Americans in Scotland.
Ambrose Bierce
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VANITY, n. The tribute of a fool to the worth of the nearest ass.
Ambrose Bierce
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Duty - that which sternly impels us in the direction of profit, along the line of desire.
Ambrose Bierce
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Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math.
Ambrose Bierce
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RATTLESNAKE, n. Our prostrate brother, Homo ventrambulans.
Ambrose Bierce
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I think love is the most unbelievable, and critical, thing in civilization. Everything else is very mechanical and predictable, but love, you can't catch it.
Ambrose Bierce
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A violin is the revenge exacted by the intestines of a dead cat.
Ambrose Bierce
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PRESIDENCY, n. The greased pig in the field game of American politics.
Ambrose Bierce
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GUILLOTINE, n. A machine which makes a Frenchman shrug his shoulders with good reason.
Ambrose Bierce
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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.
Ambrose Bierce
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Mausoleum, n: the final and funniest folly of the rich.
Ambrose Bierce
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INFALAPSARIAN, n. One who ventures to believe that Adam need not have sinned unless he had a mind to - in opposition to the Supralapsarians, who hold that that luckless person's fall was decreed from the beginning.
Ambrose Bierce
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SEINE, n. A kind of net for effecting an involuntary change of environment. For fish it is made strong and coarse, but women are more easily taken with a singularly delicate fabric weighted with small, cut stones.
Ambrose Bierce
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RASCALITY, n. Stupidity militant. The activity of a clouded intellect.
Ambrose Bierce
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GUNPOWDER, n. An agency employed by civilized nations for the settlement of disputes which might become troublesome if left unadjusted.
Ambrose Bierce