Ambrose Bierce Quotes About Wit

• Pun: A form of wit, to which wise men stoop and fools aspire

  Ambrose Bierce

  Wise, Men, Fool

• Hail, high Excess especially in wine,
  To thee in worship do I bend the knee
  Who preach abstemiousness unto me
  My skull thy pulpit, as my paunch thy shrine.
  Precept on precept, aye, and line on line,
  Could ne'er persuade so sweetly to agree
  With reason as thy touch, exact and free,
  Upon my forehead and along my spine.
  At thy command eschewing pleasure's cup,
  With the hot grape I warm no more my wit;
  When on thy stool of penitence I sit
  I'm quite converted, for I can't get up.
  Ungrateful he who afterward would falter
  To make new sacrifices at thine altar!

  Ambrose Bierce

  Wine, Sacrifice, Skulls

  Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Illustrated)”, p.2393, Delphi Classics

• Wit - the salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Native American, Humor, Leaving

  Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.238, University of Georgia Press

• VITUPERATION, n. Saite, as understood by dunces and all such as suffer from an impediment in their wit.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Understanding, Suffering, Dunces

  Ambrose Bierce (2009). “The Devil's Dictionary: Easyread Super Large 20pt Edition”, p.462, ReadHowYouWant.com

• To be comic is merely to be playful, but wit is a serious matter. To laugh at it is to confess that you do not understand.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Laughing, Matter, Serious

  Ambrose Bierce (2015). “A Cynic Looks at Life”, p.38, Sheba Blake Publishing

• The speech of one who utters with his tongue what he thinks with his ear, and feels the pride of a creator in accomplishing the feat of a parrot. A means (under Providence) of setting up as a wit without a capital of sense.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Mean, Pride, Thinking

  Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.215, University of Georgia Press

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