Admiration, n. — Ambrose Bierce Definition T-Shirt

Bierce wrote this for The Devil's Dictionary between 1881 and 1906. He defined admiration as a mirror. He wasn't wrong. Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary (1906) "ADMIRATION, n. Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves." Bierce compiled thirty years of newspaper-column entries into The Devil's Dictionary — a book he'd been writing, a definition at a time, since 1875. Each entry was a small trap: you walked in thinking it was about the word, and walked out realizing it was about you. The ADMIRATION entry is the trap at its best. You've done it — admired someone who thinks like you, reads what you read, agrees with what you already believe, and called it taste. The "polite" part is the kicker: Bierce isn't accusing you of anything crude. He's noting that self-admiration has very good manners. The Design The dictionary-entry format does what the definition does: it arrives as objective record and lands as personal verdict. ADMIRATION, n. at the top — formal, authoritative — and then the definition underneath delivers the ambush. The gold rule between definition and attribution is the pause where you realize you're in it. Also in the Devil's Dictionary set: Nowhere to Nothing, Bad Company, Top of One's Voice, and When You Wish Him to Listen. About This Tee 100% combed and ring-spun cotton Fabric weight: 4.2 oz/yd² (142 g/m²) Retail fit, true to size Side-seamed construction Machine washable, cold water Quoteiac logo on the left sleeve Who It's For The self-aware reader who finds Bierce funnier the more honest they're being Anyone who's described someone as brilliant right after they agreed with something you said The one who can laugh at the mirror — who's caught themselves praising themselves through someone else Wear the recognition. Ambrose Bierce, in Plain English Lived: 1842–1914(?), Ohio-born, San Francisco-made Fought in some of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War — Shiloh, Chickamauga — and never stopped writing about what he saw there Spent thirty years as a newspaper columnist in San Francisco, where he was known as "Bitter Bierce" and feared by politicians, frauds, and sentimentalists alike Disappeared into Mexico in 1913, age 71, and was never found — the most fittingly strange exit in American literary history The Devil's Dictionary was published in pieces over decades before it became a book in 1906 — each entry a surgical strike on self-deception Size Chart (Bella + Canvas) Size Width (in) Length (in) XS 16.5 26 S 18 28 M 20 29 L 22 30 XL 24 31 2XL 26 32