Quote

FIB, n. A lie that has not cut its teeth. An habitual liar's nearest approach to truth: the perigee of his eccentric orbit.

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
Lying
Orbit
Truth
Habitual
Eccentric
Liar
Liars
Teeth
Approach
Cutting
Nearest

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

Image
Intolerance is natural and logical, for in every dissenting opinion lies an assumption of superior wisdom.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
The money-getter who pleads his love of work has a lame defense, for love of work at money-getting is a lower taste than love of money.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Clairvoyant, n.: A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron - namely, that he is a blockhead.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PREDESTINATION, n. The doctrine that all things occur according to programme. . . . not be confused with that of foreordination. The difference is great enough to have deluged Christendom with ink, to say nothing of the gore.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Coronation: The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and visible signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite bomb.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
ACCOUNTABILITY, n. The mother of caution.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Before undergoing a surgical operation, arrange your temporal affairs. You may live.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Optimism - the doctrine or belief that everything is beautiful, including what is ugly.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Democracy is four wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
OYSTER, n. A slimy, gobby shellfish which civilization gives men the hardihood to eat without removing its entrails! The shells are sometimes given to the poor.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
CANNON, n. An instrument employed in the rectification of national boundaries.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
NOBLEMAN, n. Nature's provision for wealthy American minds ambitious to incur social distinction and suffer high life.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
The speech of one who utters with his tongue what he thinks with his ear, and feels the pride of a creator in accomplishing the feat of a parrot. A means (under Providence) of setting up as a wit without a capital of sense.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
picture, n. A representation in two dimensions of something wearisome in three.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
MIND, n. A mysterious form of matter secreted by the brain. Its chief activity consists in the endeavour to ascertain its own nature, the futility of the attempt being due to the fact that it has nothing but itself to know itself with.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
NEWTONIAN, Pertaining to a philosophy of the universe invented by Newton, who discovered that an apple will fall to the ground, but was unable to say why. His successors and disciples have advanced so far as to be able to say when.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
NEPOTISM, n. Appointing your grandmother to office for the good of the party.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Nominee. A modest gentleman shrinking from the distinction of private life and diligently seeking the honorable obscurity of public office.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Marriage, n: the state or condition of a community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves, making in all, two.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PAST, n. That part of Eternity with some small fraction of which we have a slight and regrettable acquaintance... The Past is the Future of yesterday, the Future is the Past of to-morrow. They are one - the knowledge and the dream.
Ambrose Bierce