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“Prejudice, n. A vagrant opinion without visible means of support.”

Ambrose Bierce book The Devil's Dictionary

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)

Support

“Circus, n. A place where horses, ponies and elephants are permitted to see men, women and children acting the fool.”

Ambrose Bierce book The Devil's Dictionary

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)

Women , Men , Children , Fools

“Hidden in hollows and behind clumps of rank brambles were large tents, dimly lighted with candles, but looking comfortable. The kind of comfort they supplied was indicated by pairs of men entering and reappearing, bearing litters; by low moans from within and by long rows of dead with covered faces outside. These tents were constantly receiving the wounded, yet were never full; they were continually ejecting the dead, yet were never empty. It was as if the helpless had been carried in and murdered, that they might not hamper those whose business it was to fall to-morrow.”

Ambrose Bierce

Source: What I Saw At Shiloh (1881), V

Men , Business , Light , Dead

“Dawn: When men of reason go to bed.”

Ambrose Bierce
Men

“An army's bravest men are its cowards. The death which they would not meet at the hands of the enemy they will meet at the hands of their officers, with never a flinching.”

Ambrose Bierce

Source: What I Saw At Shiloh (1881), V

Death , Men

“Idiot, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant and controlling. The Idiot's activity is not confined to any special field of thought or action, but "pervades and regulates the whole." He has the last word in everything; his decision is unappealable. He sets the fashions and opinion of taste, dictates the limitations of speech and circumscribes conduct with a dead-line.”

Ambrose Bierce book The Devil's Dictionary

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)

Fashion , Decision , Dead

“Peyton Fahrquhar was dead; his body, with a broken neck, swung gently from side to side beneath the timbers of the Owl Creek bridge.”

Ambrose Bierce

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1891)

Dead

“Non-combatant, n. A dead Quaker.”

Ambrose Bierce book The Devil's Dictionary

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)

Dead

“Faith, n. Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Faith , Knowledge

“Love, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage or by removal of the patient from the influences under which he incurred the disorder. This disease is prevalent only among civilized races living under artificial conditions; barbarous nations breathing pure air and eating simple food enjoy immunity from its ravages. It is sometimes fatal, but more frequently to the physician than to the patient.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Love , Marriage , Disease , Food

“The covers of this book are too far apart.”

Ambrose Bierce
Books

“Quotation, n. The act of repeating erroneously the words of another. The words erroneously repeated.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

“One thing, however, I hope I may without offense affirm of these swamp-dwellers--they were pious. To what deity their veneration was given--whether, like the Egyptians, they worshiped the crocodile, or, like other Americans, adored themselves, I do not presume to guess.”

Ambrose Bierce

Source: What I Saw At Shiloh (1881), VI
Context: I suppose the country lying between Corinth and Pittsburg Landing could boast a few inhabitants other than alligators. What manner of people they were it is impossible to say, inasmuch as the fighting dispersed, or possibly exterminated them; perhaps in merely classing them as non-saurian I shall describe them with sufficient particularity and at the same time avert from myself the natural suspicion attaching to a writer who points out to persons who do not know him the peculiarities of persons whom he does not know. One thing, however, I hope I may without offense affirm of these swamp-dwellers--they were pious. To what deity their veneration was given--whether, like the Egyptians, they worshiped the crocodile, or, like other Americans, adored themselves, I do not presume to guess. But whoever, or whatever, may have been the divinity whose ends they shaped, unto Him, or It, they had builded a temple. This humble edifice, centrally situated in the heart of a solitude, and conveniently accessible to the supersylvan crow, had been christened Shiloh Chapel, whence the name of the battle.

Hope

“n. Garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.”

Ambrose Bierce

Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Mother's Day , For Mother , Feeling

“Egotist, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Personality

“Patience, n. A minor form of despair, disguised as a virtue.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Patience , Despair

“All are lunatics, but he who can analyze his delusion is called a philosopher.”

Ambrose Bierce

Source: Epigrams, p. 369
Source: The Collected Writings Of Ambrose Bierce

“Selfish, adj. Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Selfishness

“Pray, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.”

Ambrose Bierce

The Devil's Dictionary (1911)
Source: The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary

Law , Universe