Quote

An election is nothing more than the advanced auction of stolen goods.

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
Nothing
Auction
Auctions
Advanced
Stolen
Deception
Goods
Election

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

Image
CEMETERY, n. An isolated suburban spot where mourners match lies, poets write at a target and stone-cutters spell for a wager.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
To seek a justification for a decision already made.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
DECIDE, v.i. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
AFFLICTION, n. An acclimatizing process preparing the soul for another and bitter world.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PRIMATE, n. The head of a church, especially a State church supported by involuntary contributions. The Primate of England is the Archbishop of Canterbury, an amiable old gentleman, who occupies Lambeth Palace when living and Westminster Abbey when dead. He is commonly dead.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PERORATION, n. The explosion of an oratorical rocket. It dazzles, but to an observer having the wrong kind of nose its most conspicuous peculiarity is the smell of the several kinds of powder used in preparing it.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
IMPOSTOR n. A rival aspirant to public honors.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
A malefactor who atones for making your writing nonsense by permitting the compositor to make it unintelligible.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Laughter, n. An interior convulsion, producing a distortion of the features and accompanied by inarticulate noises. It is infectious and, though intermittent, incurable.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Doubt begins only at the last frontiers of what is possible.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Woman absent is woman dead.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
When publicly censured our first instinct is to make everybody a codefendant.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Dawn: When men of reason go to bed.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
VIRTUES, n.pl. Certain abstentions.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Boundary, n. In political geography, an imaginary line between two nations, separating the imaginary rights of one from the imaginary rights of another.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
CALAMITY, n. A more than commonly plain and unmistakable reminder that the affairs of this life are not of our own ordering. Calamities are of two kinds: misfortune to ourselves, and good fortune to others.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
To renounce an honor for an advantage. To renounce an advantage for a greater advantage.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
International arbitration may be defined as the substitution of many burning questions for a smoldering one
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Conservative, n: A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal who wishes to replace them with others.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
IDLENESS, n. A model farm where the devil experiments with seeds of new sins and promotes the growth of staple vices.
Ambrose Bierce