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applause, n. The echo of a platitude.

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
Platitude
Platitudes
Echo
Applause
Echoes
Audience

More quotes by Ambrose Bierce

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PRESIDENCY, n. The greased pig in the field game of American politics.
Ambrose Bierce
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Turkey: A large bird whose flesh, when eaten on certain religious anniversaries has the peculiar property of attesting piety and gratitude.
Ambrose Bierce
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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
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DUEL, n. A formal ceremony preliminary to reconciliation of two enemies. Great skill is necessary to its satisfactory observance if awkwardly performed . . . deplorable consequences sometimes ensue. A long time ago a man lost his life.
Ambrose Bierce
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Year: A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments.
Ambrose Bierce
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Introduction - a social ceremony invented by the devil for the gratification of his servants and the plaguing of his enemies.
Ambrose Bierce
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OWE, v. To have (and to hold) a debt. The word formerly signified not indebtedness, but possession it meant own, and in the minds of debtors there is still a good deal of confusion between assets and liabilities.
Ambrose Bierce
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Happiness: an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another.
Ambrose Bierce
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HUMORIST, n. A plague that would have softened down the hoar austerity of Pharaoh's heart and persuaded him to dismiss Israel with his best wishes, cat-quick.
Ambrose Bierce
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INTENTION, n. The mind's sense of the prevalence of one set of influences over another set an effect whose cause is the imminence, immediate or remote, of the performance of an involuntary act.
Ambrose Bierce
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A man who piously shuts himself up to meditate upon the sin of wickedness and to keep it fresh in his mind joins a brotherhood of awful examples.
Ambrose Bierce
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VITUPERATION, n. Saite, as understood by dunces and all such as suffer from an impediment in their wit.
Ambrose Bierce
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There was never a genius who was not thought a fool until he disclosed himself whereas he is a fool then only.
Ambrose Bierce
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ANTIPATHY, n. The sentiment inspired by one's friend's friend.
Ambrose Bierce
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NOUMENON, n. That which exists, as distinguished from that which merely seems to exist, the latter being a phenomenon. The noumenon is a bit difficult to locate it can be apprehended only by a process of reasoning - which is a phenomenon.
Ambrose Bierce
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Appetite, n. An instinct thoughtfully implanted by Providence as a solution to the labor question.
Ambrose Bierce
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EXHORT, v.t. In religious affairs, to put the conscience of another upon the spit and roast it to a nut-brown discomfort.
Ambrose Bierce
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Magic: (n) The art of converting superstition into coin.
Ambrose Bierce
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Women of genius commonly have masculine faces, figures and manners. In transplanting brains to an alien soil God leaves a little of the original earth clinging to the roots.
Ambrose Bierce
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ULTIMATUM, n. In diplomacy, a last demand before resorting to concessions.
Ambrose Bierce