Ambrose Bierce

Acquaintance: a degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor or obscure, and intimate when he is rich read more

Acquaintance: a degree of friendship called slight when its object is poor or obscure, and intimate when he is rich or famous.

Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his read more

Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country.

OBSESSED, p.p. Vexed by an evil spirit, like the Gadarene swine and other critics. Obsession was once more common than read more

OBSESSED, p.p. Vexed by an evil spirit, like the Gadarene swine and other critics. Obsession was once more common than it is now. Arasthus tells of a peasant who was occupied by a different devil for every day in the week, and on Sundays by two. They were frequently seen, always walking in his shadow, when he had one, but were finally driven away by the village notary, a holy man; but they took the peasant with them, for he vanished utterly. A devil thrown out of a woman by the Archbishop of Rheims ran through the trees, pursued by a hundred persons, until the open country was reached, where by a leap higher than a church spire he escaped into a bird. A chaplain in Cromwell's army exorcised a soldier's obsessing devil by throwing the soldier into the water, when the devil came to the surface. The soldier, unfortunately, did not.

Advice: the smallest current coin.

Advice: the smallest current coin.

Optimist: a proponent of the doctrine that black is white.

Optimist: a proponent of the doctrine that black is white.