Quote

Justice is 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.

Ambrose Bierce

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Taxes
Allegiance
Citizens
Commodity
Conditions
Citizen
Personal
Reward
Justice
Sells
State
Condition
Less
Rewards
States
Service
Adulterated

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

Image
A man is known by the company he organizes.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Age is provident because the less future we have the more we fear it.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
MUGWUMP, n. In politics one afflicted with self-respect and addicted to the vice of independence. A term of contempt.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
The furrier gets the skins of more foxes than asses.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
The natural equipment to accomplish some small part of the meaner ambitions distinguishing able men from dead ones. In the last analysis ability is commonly found to consist mainly in a high degree of solemnity.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Edible, adj.: Good to eat, and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pig, a pig to a man, and a man to a worm.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PICKANINNY, n. The young of the Procyanthropos, or Americanus dominans. It is small, black and charged with political fatalities.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Potable, n. Suitable for drinking. Water is said to be potable indeed, some declare it our natural beverage, although even they find it palatable only when suffering from the recurrent disorder known as thirst, for which it is a medicine.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Absence blots people out. We really have no absent friends.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
To apologize is to lay the foundation for a future offense.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
EMOTION, n. A prostrating disease caused by a determination of the heart to the head. It is sometimes accompanied by a copious discharge of hydrated chloride of sodium from the eyes.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
MISCREANT, n. A person of the highest degree of unworth. Etymologically, the word means unbeliever, and its present signification may be regarded as theology's noblest contribution to the development of our language.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
RICE-WATER, n. A mystic beverage secretly used by our most popular novelists and poets to regulate the imagination and narcotize the conscience.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PIRACY, n. Commerce without its folly-swaddles, just as God made it.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
COMMERCE, n. A kind of transaction in which A plunders from B the goods of C, and for compensation B picks the pocket of D of money belonging to E.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
moral, adj. Conforming to a local and mutable standard of right. Having the quality of general expediency.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Democracy is defended in 3 stages. Ballot Box, Jury Box, Cartridge Box.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
GUNPOWDER, n. An agency employed by civilized nations for the settlement of disputes which might become troublesome if left unadjusted.
Ambrose Bierce