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Quotes from The Cynic's Dictionary — Ambrose Bierce

1842–1910 United States

← All quotes by Ambrose Bierce

104 quotes

LAZINESS, n. Unwarranted repose of manner in a person of low degree.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

APPEAL, v.t. In law, to put the dice into the box for another throw.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

COWARD, n. One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

BEGGAR, n. One who has relied on the assistance of his friends.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

INJUSTICE, n. A burden which of all those that we load upon others and carry ourselves is lightest in the hands and heaviest upon the back.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

DISCUSSION, n. A method of confirming others in their errors.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

INJURY, n. An offense next in degree of enormity to a slight.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

APOLOGIZE, v.i. To lay the foundation for a future offence.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

BENEFACTOR, n. One who makes heavy purchases of ingratitude, without, however, materially affecting the price, which is still within the means of all.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

LIAR, n. A lawyer with a roving commission.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

ACCOUNTABILITY, n. The mother of caution.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

CONVERSATION, n. A fair to the display of the minor mental commodities, each exhibitor being too intent upon the arrangement of his own wares to observe those of his neighbor.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

HEMP, n. A plant from whose fibrous bark is made an article of neckwear which is frequently put on after public speaking in the open air and prevents the wearer from taking cold.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

APOSTATE, n. A leech who, having penetrated the shell of a turtle only to find that the creature has long been dead, deems it expedient to form a new attachment to a fresh turtle.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

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.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

ENTERTAINMENT, n. Any kind of amusement whose inroads stop short of death by injection.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

FIB, n. A lie that has not cut its teeth. An habitual liar's nearest approach to truth: the perigee of his eccentric orbit.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

ARMOR, n. The kind of clothing worn by a man whose tailor is a blacksmith.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

EMOTION, n. A prostrating disease caused by a determination of the heart to the head. It is sometimes accompanied by a copious discharge of hydrated chloride of sodium from the eyes.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

AGE, n. That period of life in which we compound for the vices that we still cherish by reviling those that we have no longer the enterprise to commit.

The Cynic's Dictionary (1906)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Ambrose Bierce (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.