Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Ambrose Gwinnett Biercewas an American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist. He wrote the short story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" and compiled a satirical lexicon, The Devil's Dictionary. His vehemence as a critic, his motto "Nothing matters", and the sardonic view of human nature that informed his work, all earned him the nickname "Bitter Bierce"...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth24 June 1842
CityMeighs County, OH
CountryUnited States of America
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.
Aristocrats: n. fellows that wear downy hats and clean shirts - guilty of education and suspected of bank accounts.
ACCUSE, v.t. To affirm another's guilt or unworth; most commonly as a justification of ourselves for having wronged him.
Sabbath - a weekly festival having its origin in the fact that God made the world in six days and was arrested on the seventh.
Friendless. Having no favors to bestow. Destitute of fortune. Addicted to utterance of truth and common sense.
An egotist is a person of low taste - more interested in himself than in me.
Doubt, indulged and cherished, is in danger of becoming denial; but if honest, and bent on thorough investigation, it may soon lead to full establishment of the truth.
Experience - the wisdom that enables us to recognise in an undesirable old acquaintance the folly that we have already embraced.
STORY, n. A narrative, commonly untrue. The truth of the stories here following has, however, not been successfully impeached.
REPORTER, n. A writer who guesses his way to the truth and dispels it with a tempest of words.
PLATITUDE, n. The fundamental element and special glory of popular literature. A thought that snores in words that smoke. All that is mortal of a departed truth. A jelly-fish withering on the shore of the sea of thought. A desiccated epigram.
OBSTINATE, adj. Inaccessible to the truth as it is manifest in the splendor and stress of our advocacy.
LIAR, n. One who tells an unpleasant truth.
RIMER, n. A poet regarded with indifference or disesteem.