Halpin was pretty generally deprecated as an intellectual black sheep who was likely at any moment to disgrace the flock by bleating in metre. The Tennessee Fraysers were a practical folk – not practical in the popular sense of devotion to sordid pursuits, but having a robust contempt for any qualities unfitting a man for the wholesome vocation of politics.

— Ambrose Bierce

Ambrose Bierce Quotes

Halpin was pretty generally deprecated as an intellectual black sheep who was likely at any moment to disgrace the flock by bleating in metre. The Tennessee Fraysers were a practical folk – not practical in the popular sense of devotion to sordid pursuits, but having a robust contempt for any qualities unfitting a man for the wholesome vocation of politics.

— Ambrose Bierce

I will not submit unheard. There may be powers that are not malignant travelling this accursed road. I shall leave them a record and an appeal.

— Ambrose Bierce

Patriotism deliberately and with folly aforethought subordinates the interests of a whole to the interests of a part.

— Ambrose Bierce

The tendency to lie is one thing; lying is another.

— Ambrose Bierce

ALLEGORY, n. A metaphor in three volumes and a tiger.

— Ambrose Bierce

ARMY, n. A class of non-producers who defend the nation by devouring everything likely to tempt an enemy to invade.

— Ambrose Bierce

BLACKGUARD, n. A man whose qualities, prepared for display like a box of berries in a market – the fine ones on top – have been opened on the wrong side. An inverted gentleman.

— Ambrose Bierce

ABSENCE, n. That which “makes the heart grow fonder” – of absence. Absence of mind is the cerebral condition essential to success in popular preaching. It is sometimes termed lack of sense.

— Ambrose Bierce

He dug his fingers into the sand, threw it over himself in handfuls and audibly blessed it. It looked like diamonds, rubies, emeralds; he could not think of nothing beautiful which it did not resemble.

— Ambrose Bierce

Good stranger,” I continued, “I am ill and lost. Direct me, I beseech you, to Carcosa.

— Ambrose Bierce

When the man was dead an examination disclosed the unmistakable marks of an animal’s fangs deeply sunken into the jugular vein. But there was no animal.

— Ambrose Bierce

AUTHENTIC, adj. Indubitably true – in somebody’s opinion.

— Ambrose Bierce

Patriotism is fierce as a fever, pitiless as the grave and blind as a stone.

— Ambrose Bierce

At about this time something occurred which caused my cup of joy, already full, to overflow on all sides, a circular cataract of bliss.

— Ambrose Bierce

Some deep disappointment in early life had soured its disposition, and it had declared war upon the whole world.

— Ambrose Bierce

This irrascible and implacable brute – this incarnate thunderbolt – this monster of the upper deep, I had seen reposing in the shade of an adjacent tree, dreaming dreams of conquest and glory.

— Ambrose Bierce

Like a plant that has struck its root into some poisonous mineral, my poor uncle was dying slowly upward.

— Ambrose Bierce

The fever of battle burned hot in its heart; its brain was intoxicated with the wine of strife.

— Ambrose Bierce

When Death comes cloaked in mystery, he is terrible indeed.

— Ambrose Bierce

It fought, like the angels and devils, in mid-air, cleaving the atmosphere like a bird, describing a parabolic curve and descending upon its victim at just the exact angle of incidence to make the most of its velocity and weight.

— Ambrose Bierce
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