WIST Quotations

Bierce, Ambrose -- “Foreign,” “Devil’s Dictionary” column, San Francisco Wasp (1884-12-13)

Dave — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 23:32:21 +0000

FOREIGN, adj. Belonging to another and inferior country.

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914?) American writer and journalist
“Foreign,” “Devil’s Dictionary” column, San Francisco Wasp (1884-12-13)

Not collected in later books.

Sterne, Laurence -- Tristam Shandy, Book 7, ch. 2 (1765)

Dave — Thu, 17 Mar 2016 14:19:52 +0000

A man should know something of his own country too, before he goes abroad.

Laurence Sterne (1713–1786) Anglo-Irish novelist, Anglican clergyman
Tristam Shandy, Book 7, ch. 2 (1765)

Stevenson, Robert Louis -- The Silverado Squatters, “With the Children of Israel,” sec. 3 (1883)

Dave — Wed, 02 Oct 2013 12:53:44 +0000

There is no foreign land; it is the traveller only that is foreign, and again, by a flash of recollection, lights up the contrasts of the earth.

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–1894) Scottish essayist, novelist, poet
The Silverado Squatters, “With the Children of Israel,” sec. 3 (1883)