Bride: A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.
Interpretation
This quote humorously suggests that a bride's future happiness is often linked to her past experiences rather than her current situation.
Ambrose Bierce's quote plays on the idea that a bride enters marriage with hope for a joyful future, yet the term 'happiness behind her' implies that the real joys may have occurred in her past. This irony highlights the complexities of marital expectations and the humor in the pursuit of personal happiness.
In practice
Sharing this quote during a wedding toast to highlight the humorous expectations of marriage.
PALM, n. A species of tree . . . of which the familiar "itching palm" ("Palma hominis") is most widely distributed . . . . This noble vegetable exudes a kind of invisible gum, which may be detected by applying to the bark a piece of gold or silver.
Human nature is pretty well balanced; for every lacking virtue there is a rough substitute that will serve at a pinch--as cunning is the wisdom of the unwise, and ferocity the courage of the coward.
Indigestion: A disease which the patient and his friends frequently mistake for deep religious conviction and concern for the salvation of mankind. As the simple Red Man of the Western Wild put it, with, it must be confessed, a certain force: 'Plenty well, no pray; big belly ache, heap God.'
Disobey n:To celebrate with an appropriate ceremony the maturity of a command
NOUMENON, n. That which exists, as distinguished from that which merely seems to exist, the latter being a phenomenon. The noumenon is a bit difficult to locate; it can be apprehended only by a process of reasoning - which is a phenomenon.
PARDON, v. To remit a penalty and restore to the life of crime. To add to the lure of crime the temptation of ingratitude.
Not following her is the hardest thing I've ever done.
I was late to understand that chaos and intensity are no subsitute for lasting love, nor are they necessarily an improvement on real life. Normal people are not always boring. On the contrary. Volatility and passion, although often more romantic and enticing, are not intrinsically preferable to a steadiness of experience and feeling about another person.
Young love needs dangers and barriers to nourish it.
Nothing can be accomplished without love.
I was always hungry for love. Just once, I wanted to know what it was like to get my fill of it -- to be fed so much love I couldn't take any more. Just once.
When you reduce a woman to writing, she makes you think of a thousand other women
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.