(n.) A comprehensive maxim or principle expressed in a few words; a sharply defined sentence relating to abstract truth rather than to practical matters.
Example Sentences:
(1) For the man who created the " specialist in failure " aphorism to disparage a fellow manager, it is obvious how much that would hurt.
(2) His most celebrated aphorism was his response to a journalist who wondered whether Christian Democrats would ever be weary of wielding power: "Political power wears out only those who haven't got it."
(3) She is thinking about a book of aphorisms, for which Spark characters such as Mrs Hawkins and Miss Jean Brodie are famous.
(4) His aphorisms include the following: "may your food be your medicine".
(5) When we sit down for a more formal interview in his Manhattan hotel room a few hours later, Ross's earlier gregarious anecdotes are replaced by aphorisms that could come straight off one of those inspirational posters you see in recruitment consultant offices.
(6) I just thought up a nonsensical Confucian-sounding aphorism and said it in a grossly exaggerated version of my dad's voice.
(7) Greg Dyke must put plug in Qatar talk if Fifa revamp is to unite the world | Barney Ronay Read more Like Blatter, Dyke can lapse into mystifyingly abstract aphorisms.
(8) One cheering side-effect of economic depression, is that it provides occasion to recall Keynes's sideline in Wildean aphorisms.
(9) Vidal's critics disparaged his tendency to formulate an aphorism rather than to argue, finding in his work an underlying note of contempt for those who did not agree with him.
(10) It's an aphorism the ex-head of the civil service proved wrong.
(11) Much of that is down to Dupuis who, in a genre where bland aphorisms are often the norm, actually has something to say.
(12) Twain was always a barometric writer, with a knack for registering contemporary social pressures in sharp-eyed aphorisms that weren't merely quotable, but often well ahead of their time.
(13) The old aphorism is still valid: When in doubt, take it out.
(14) Which in turn helps partially to explain the significance of the aphorism: 'An Argentine is an Italian who speaks Spanish and thinks he is an Englishman.'
(15) Now they are the stalest of cliches, but when, in the first 1998 episode, in the midst of all that big hair and weird brown lipstick, you hear Carrie first describe the allure and disappointment of "toxic bachelors", when Samantha first says frankly that she likes to have sex without emotion, to "fuck like a man", it was bitingly fresh for women to speak these aphorisms out loud, in public, and in fabulous heels.
(16) Elizabeth is prone to blurting out aphorisms, such as "it's easier to give a blow job than make coffee" and "you should be just as happy with the breasts you have as you are with the futility of existence".
(17) In its submission to the special session, Colombia quotes Albert Einstein’s aphorism that the definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result”.
(18) Aphorisms often appear too trite to tell us anything meaningful, yet this is not the case with the assertion attributed to Mahatma Gandhi that "the true measure of any society can be found in how it treats its most vulnerable members".
(19) The files disclose that Thatcher's first months in power reveal a torrent of pungent political aphorisms that were to sustain her in power for the next 13 years.
(20) It was a favourite Reagan aphorism, sometimes half-true, sometimes a disastrous basis for policy in a globally connected, ever more sophisticated world.
Aphorist
Definition:
(n.) A writer or utterer of aphorisms.
Example Sentences:
(1) More than 2,000 years ago aphorist Publilius Syrus expressed precisely the same idea: "Debt is the slavery of the free", as did the Bible: "The rich rules over the poor and the borrower is the slave of the lender".
(2) Martin Amis, who has little time for Vidal the novelist, recognised the glory of the witty, learned, aphoristic essays.
(3) But that fine aphorist of late capitalism missed an efficiency saving.
(4) He writes in terse numbered paragraphs, following Nietzsche's aphoristic style.
(5) Is there anything else I can do to piss you off?” A picture of Obama with “Does this ass make my car look big?” The Republican style for 2016 is angry aphoristic humor.