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A single swallow, it is said, devours ten millions of insects every year. The supplying of these insects I take to be a signal instance of the Creator's bounty in providing for the lives of His creatures.

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
Creatures
Swallow
Single
Insects
Millions
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Providing
Lives
Instance
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Take
Creator
Supplying
Every
Ten
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Years
God
Signal

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

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PERIPATETIC, adj. Walking about. Relating to the philosophy of Aristotle, who, while expounding it, moved from place to place in order to avoid his pupil's objections. A needless precaution - they knew no more of the matter than he.
Ambrose Bierce
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MUMMY, n. - an ancient Egyptian handy, too, in museums in gratifying the vulgar curiosity that serves to distinguish man from the lower animals.
Ambrose Bierce
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An egotist is a person of low taste - more interested in himself than in me.
Ambrose Bierce
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BAIT, n. A preparation that renders the hook more palatable. The best kind is beauty.
Ambrose Bierce
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critic, n. A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries to please him.
Ambrose Bierce
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POCKET, n. The cradle of motive and the grave of conscience. In woman this organ is lacking so she acts without motive, and her conscience, denied burial, remains ever alive, confessing the sins of others.
Ambrose Bierce
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Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
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
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Destiny: A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure.
Ambrose Bierce
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DIAPHRAGM, n. A muscular partition separating disorders of the chest from disorders of the bowels.
Ambrose Bierce
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The most intolerant advocate is he who is trying to convince himself.
Ambrose Bierce
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MAN, n. An animal so lost in rapturous contemplation of what he thinks he is as to overlook what he indubitably ought to be. His chief occupation is extermination of other animals and his own species, which, however, multiplies with such insistent rapidity as to infest the whole habitable earth and Canada.
Ambrose Bierce
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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.
Ambrose Bierce
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Brain: an apparatus with which we think we think.
Ambrose Bierce
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ELEGY, n. A composition in verse, in which, without employing any of the methods of humor, the writer aims to produce in the reader's mind the dampest kind of dejection.
Ambrose Bierce
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A bad marriage is like an electrical thrilling machine: it makes you dance, but you can't let go.
Ambrose Bierce
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OBSTINATE, adj. Inaccessible to the truth as it is manifest in the splendor and stress of our advocacy.
Ambrose Bierce
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WASHINGTONIAN, n. A Potomac tribesman who exchanged the privilege of governing himself for the advantage of good government. In justice to him it should be said that he did not want to.
Ambrose Bierce
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Heathen, n. A benighted creature who has the folly to worship something that he can see and feel.
Ambrose Bierce
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PROPERTY, n. Any material thing, having no particular value, that may be held by A against the cupidity of B. Whatever gratifies the passion for possession in one and disappoints it in all others. The object of man's brief rapacity and long indifference.
Ambrose Bierce