Quote

SARCOPHAGUS, n. Among the Greeks a coffin which being made of a certain kind of carnivorous stone, had the peculiar property of devouring the body placed in it.

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
Stones
Coffin
Kindness
Devouring
Property
Coffins
Among
Greeks
Certain
Placed
Body
Peculiar
Made
Greek
Kind
Stone
Carnivorous

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

Image
LIAR, n. One who tells an unpleasant truth.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
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
Image
The best kind of onion soup is the simplest kind.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
HOMŒOPATHIST, n. The humorist of the medical profession.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
PLEONASM, n. An army of words escorting a corporal of thought.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Eloquence, n. The art of orally persuading fools that white is the color that it appears to be. It includes the gift of making any color appear white.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Litigant. A person about to give up his skin for the hope of retaining his bones.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
self-esteem, n. An erroneous appraisal.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
mine, adj. Belonging to me if I can hold or seize it.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
REPARATION, n. Satisfaction that is made for a wrong and deducted from the satisfaction felt in committing it.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
RUIN, v. To destroy. Specifically, to destroy a maid's belief in the virtue of maids.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
HASH: There is no definition for this word - nobody knows what hash is.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
One engaged in a commercial pursuit. A commercial pursuit is one in which the thing pursued is a dollar.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
You are not permitted to kill a woman who has wronged you, but nothing forbids you to reflect that she is growing older every minute.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
Monsieur Franqulin, inventor of electricity. This illustrious savant, after having made several voyages around the world, died on the Sandwich Islands and was devoured by savages, of whom not a single fragment was ever recovered.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
ILLUSTRIOUS, adj. Suitably placed for the shafts of malice, envy and detraction.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
A short story padded. A species of composition bearing the same relation to literature that the panorama bears to art. As it is too long to be read at a sitting the impressions made by its successive parts are successively effaced, as in the pa
Ambrose Bierce
Image
REPENTANCE, n. The faithful attendant and follower of Punishment. It is usually manifest in a degree of reformation that is not inconsistent with continuity of sin.
Ambrose Bierce
Image
K, n. A consonant originally precisely that of our H, but altered to its present shape to commemorate the destruction of [one of two lofty columns in] the great temple of Jarute.
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