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An appellate court which reverses the judgment of a popular author's contemporaries, the appellant being his obscure competitor.

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
Popular
Reverses
Court
Contemporaries
Judgment
Competitor
Competitors
Popularity
Obscure
Reverse
Author
Appellate

More quotes by 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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He who thinks with difficulty believes with alacrity.
Ambrose Bierce
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CLOSE-FISTED, adj. Unduly desirous of keeping that which many meritorious persons wish to obtain.
Ambrose Bierce
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Inventor: A person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers and springs, and believes it civilization.
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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MALTHUSIAN, adj. Pertaining to Malthus and his doctrines, who believed in artificially limiting population, but found that it could not be done by talking. Herod of Judea, all the famous soldiers have been practical exponents of the Malthusian idea.
Ambrose Bierce
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Pantheism, n. The doctrine that everything is God, in contradistinction to the doctrine that God is everything.
Ambrose Bierce
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A cheap and easy cynicism rails at everything. The master of the art accomplishes the formidable task of discrimination.
Ambrose Bierce
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Friendless. Having no favors to bestow. Destitute of fortune. Addicted to utterance of truth and common sense.
Ambrose Bierce
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FREEBOOTER, n. A conqueror in a small way of business, whose annexations lack of the sanctifying merit of magnitude.
Ambrose Bierce
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CUI BONO? [Latin] What good would that do me?
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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SATIRE, n. An obsolete kind of literary composition in which the vices and follies of the author's enemies were expounded with imperfect tenderness.
Ambrose Bierce
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Appeal. In law, to put the dice into the box for another throw.
Ambrose Bierce
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REDEMPTION, n. Deliverance of sinners from the penalty of their sin, through their murder of the deity against whom they sinned . . . . whoso believeth in it shall not perish, but have everlasting life in which to try to understand it.
Ambrose Bierce
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POLITICIAN, n. An eel in the fundamental mud upon which the superstructure of organized society is reared. When he wriggles, he mistakes the agitation of his tail for the trembling of the edifice.
Ambrose Bierce
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Distress: A disease incurred by exposure to the prosperity of a friend.
Ambrose Bierce
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ZEUS /n./ The chief of Grecian gods, adored by the Romans as Jupiter and by the modern Americans as God, Gold, Mob and Dog.
Ambrose Bierce
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PALM, n. A species of tree . . . of which the familiar itching palm (Palma hominis) is most widely distributed . . . . This noble vegetable exudes a kind of invisible gum, which may be detected by applying to the bark a piece of gold or silver.
Ambrose Bierce
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MAMMALIA, n.pl. A family of vertebrate animals whose females in a state of nature suckle their young, but when civilized and enlightened put them out to nurse, or use the bottle.
Ambrose Bierce