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Ambrose Bierce Quotes about War

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Men who expect universal peace through invention of destructive weapons of war are no wiser than one who, noting the improvement of agricultural implements, should prophesy an end to the tilling of the soil.

Men who expect universal peace through invention of destructive weapons of war are no wiser than one who, noting the improvement of agricultural implements, should prophesy an end to the tilling of the soil.

Ambrose Bierce
War, Men, Weapons
Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Illustrated)”, p.2696, Delphi Classics

At war with savages and idiots. To be a Frenchman abroad is to be miserable; to be an American abroad is to make others miserable.

Ambrose Bierce
War, Savages, Idiot
Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.9, University of Georgia Press

Riot – A popular entertainment given to the military by innocent bystanders.

Ambrose Bierce
Peace, War, Military
Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.202, University of Georgia Press

WAR, n. A by-product of the arts of peace. The most menacing political condition is a period of international amity.

Ambrose Bierce
Art, Peace, War
Ambrose Bierce (2013). “The Devil's Dictionary (or The Cynic's Wordbook: Unabridged with all the Definitions)”, p.217, e-artnow

What this country needs what every country needs occasionally is a good hard bloody war to revive the vice of patriotism on which its existence as a nation depends.

Ambrose Bierce
Country, War, Patriotism
Ambrose Bierce, S. T. Joshi, Tryambak Sunand Joshi, David E. Schultz (2003). “A Much Misunderstood Man: Selected Letters of Ambrose Bierce”, p.208, Ohio State University Press

Admiral. That part of a warship which does the talking while the figurehead does the thinking.

Ambrose Bierce
War, Army, Thinking
Ambrose Bierce (2011). “Ambrose Bierce: The Devil's Dictionary, Tales, and Memoirs: The Devil's Dictionary, Tales, and Memoirs”, p.568, Library of America

No country is so wild and difficult but men will make it a theater of war.

Ambrose Bierce
Country, War, Men
Ambrose Bierce (2016). “A Son of the Gods and Horseman in the Sky”, p.17, Read Books Ltd

One of the greatest of poets, Coleridge was one of the wisest of men, and it was not for nothing that he read us this parable. Let us have a little less of "hands across the sea," and a little more of that elemental distrust that is the security of nations. War loves to come like a thief in the night; professions of eternal amity provide the night.

Ambrose Bierce
War, Night, Men
Ambrose Bierce (2016). “The Devil's Dictionary: The Devil World”, p.232, 谷月社

Every patriot believes his country better than any other country . . . In its active manifestation-it is fond of killing-patriotism would be well enough if it were simply defensive, but it is also aggressive . . . Patriotism deliberately and with folly aforethought subordinates the interests of a whole to the interests of a part . . . Patriotism is fierce as a fever, pitiless as the grave and blind as a stone.

Ambrose Bierce
Country, War, Believe

War: A by-product of the arts of peace.

Ambrose Bierce
Art, War, Products
Ambrose Bierce (2012). “The Devil's Dictionary”, p.134, Courier Corporation

The slightest acquaintance with history shows that powerful republics are the most warlike and unscrupulous of nations.

Ambrose Bierce
Peace, Powerful, War
Ambrose Bierce (1912). “The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce ...: Antepenultimata”

REPARTEE, n. Prudent insult in retort. Practiced by gentlemen with a constitutional aversion to violence, but a strong disposition to offend. In a war of words, the tactics of the North American Indian.

Ambrose Bierce
Strong, War, Gentleman
Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.197, University of Georgia Press

CANNON, n. An instrument employed in the rectification of national boundaries.

Ambrose Bierce
Peace, War, Boundaries
"The Devil's Dictionary". Book by Ambrose Bierce, 1906.

LOGOMACHY, n. A war in which the weapons are words and the wounds punctures in the swim-bladder of self-esteem - a kind of contest in which, the vanquished being unconscious of defeat, the victor is denied the reward of success.

Ambrose Bierce
War, Self Esteem, Swim
Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.153, University of Georgia Press

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