Ambrose Bierce

Positive, adj. Mistaken at the top of one's voice.

Opportunity, n. A favorable occasion for grasping a disappointment.

This is a simple story of a battle; such a tale as may be told by a soldier who is no writer to a reader who is no soldier.

Wisdom is known only by contrasting it with folly; by shadow only we perceive that all visible objects are not flat. Yet Philanthropos would abolish evil!

Congratulation, n. The civility of envy.

Erudition, n. Dust shaken out of a book into an empty skull.

Conservative, n. A statesman enamored of existing evils, as opposed to a Liberal, who wants to replace them with others.

Infancy, n. The period of our lives when, according to Wordsworth, 'Heaven lies about us.' The world begins lying about us pretty soon afterward.

Absent, adj. Peculiarly exposed to the tooth of detraction; vilifed; hopelessly in the wrong; superseded in the consideration and affection of another.

Admiration, n. Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.

Year, n. A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments.

Slang is a foul pool at which every dunce fills his bucket, and then sets up as a fountain.

Road, n. A strip of land along which one may pass from where it is too tiresome to be to where it is futile to go.

Genealogy, n. An account of one's descent from an ancestor who did not particularly care to trace his own.

Opposition, n. In politics the party that prevents the Government from running amok by hamstringing it.

O proud philanthropist, your hope is vain
To get by giving what you lost by gain.

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.

Acquaintance, n. A person whom we know well enough to borrow from, but not well enough to lend to. A degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor or obscure, and intimate when he is rich or famous

Barometer, n. An ingenious instrument which indicates what kind of weather we are having.

The game of discontent has its rules, and he who disregards them cheats. It is not permitted to you to wish to add another's advantages or possessions to your own; you are permitted only to wish to be another.