Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art. – Ambrose Bierce
Brandy, n. A cordial composed of one part thunder-and-lightning, one part remorse, two parts bloody murder, one part death-hell-and-the-grave and four parts clarified Satan. – Ambrose Bierce
Patriotism. Combustible rubbish ready to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name. – Ambrose Bierce
Inventor: A person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers and springs, and believes it civilization. – Ambrose Bierce
Do behold the king in his glory, King Sequoia. Behold! Behold! seems all I can say…. Well may I fast, not from bread but from business, bookmaking, duty doing & other trifles…. I’m in the woods woods woods, & they are in mee-ee-ee…. I wish I were wilder & so bless Sequoia I will be. – John Muir, from a letter to Jeanne C. Carr, circa autumn 1870, ©1984 Muir-H