GREAT, adj. I'm great, the Lion said --I reign The monarch of the wood and plain; The Elephant replied I'm great -- No quadruped can match my weight; I'm great --no animal has half So long a neck said the Giraffe. I'm great, the Kangaroo said --see My femoral muscularity; The 'Possum said I'm great --behold, My tail is lithe and bald and cold; An Oyster fried was understood To say I'm great because I'm good; Each reckons greatness to consist In that in which he heads the list, And Vierick thinks he tops his class Because he is the greatest ass. --Arion Spurl Doke.
More Quotes from Ambrose Gwinett Bierce:
Religions are conclusions for which the facts of nature supply no major premisesAmbrose Gwinett Bierce
HIBERNATE, v. i. To pass the winter season in domestic seclusion. There have been many singular popular notions about the hibernation of various animals. Many believe that the bear hibernates during the whole winter and subsists by mechanically sucking its paws. It is admitted that it comes out of its retirement in the spring so lean that it had to try twice before it can cast a shadow. Three or four centuries ago, in England, no fact was better attested than that swallows passed the winter months in the mud at the bottom of their brooks, clinging together in globular masses. They have apparently been compelled to give up the custom and account of the foulness of the brooks. Sotus Ecobius discovered in Central Asia a whole nation of people who hibernate. By some investigators, the fasting of Lent is supposed to have been originally a modified form of hibernation, to which the Church gave a religious significance but this view was strenuously opposed by that eminent authority, Bishop Kip, who did not wish any honors denied to the memory of the Founder of his family.
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce
TOMB, n. The House of Indifference. Tombs are now by common consent invested with a certain sanctity, but when they have been long tenanted it is considered no sin to break them open and rifle them, the famous Egyptologist, Dr. Huggyns, explaining that a tomb may be innocently glened as soon as its occupant is done smellynge, the soul being then all exhaled. This reasonable view is now generally accepted by archaeologists, whereby the noble science of Curiosity has been greatly dignified.
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce
FRANKALMOIGNE, n. The tenure by which a religious corporation holds lands on condition of praying for the soul of the donor. In mediaeval times many of the wealthiest fraternities obtained their estates in this simple and cheap manner, and once when Henry VIII of England sent an officer to confiscate certain vast possessions which a fraternity of monks held by frankalmoigne, What said the Prior, would you master stay our benefactor's soul in Purgatory Ay, said the officer, coldly, an ye will not pray him thence for naught he must e'en roast. But look you, my son, persisted the good man, this act hath rank as robbery of God Nay, nay, good father, my master the king doth but deliver him from the manifold temptations of too great wealth.
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce
SALAMANDER, n. Originally a reptile inhabiting fire later, an anthropomorphous immortal, but still a pyrophile. Salamanders are now believed to be extinct, the last one of which we have an account having been seen in Carcassonne by the Abbe Belloc, who exorcised it with a bucket of holy water.
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce
Age. That period of life in which we compound for the vices that remain by reviling those we have no longer the vigor to commit.
Ambrose Gwinett Bierce
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Based on Topics: Lions Quotes, Monarchy QuotesBased on Keywords: doke, giraffe, kangaroo, lithe, muscularity, possum, quadruped, reckons
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