A short, witty, instructivesaying; an aphorism or maxim. (noun)
Examples of word apothegm
The whole “pass now, fix later” apothegm is naive.
Wolpert says he's surprised to discover he's 82, and quotes Oscar Wilde's apothegm "The tragedy of old age is not that one is old, but that one is young."
We'll let Indian and Northern Affairs Minister Chuck Strahl complete that apothegm in the time-honoured way.
The Burkean apothegm mentioned earlier in the article is very fitting here.
In practical terms, it becomes akin to the line about owing a bank a billion dollars, though recent events may have given the lie to that apothegm.
But this isn't some random apothegm; it is a dramatic thought, provoked by the life situation of the main character and attributed to him; it certainly is not an Olympian idea delivered from on high.
Favorite apothegm by Perry Logan on Saturday, Mar 7, 2009 at 6: 09: 52 AM
He concludes with an apothegm for the president -- "When you're cooking up a more perfect Union, sometimes you've got to break some eggs" -- apparently innocent of the provenance of this saying in apologetics for Stalin's mass killings of Russian peasants and political enemies: "You can't make an omelet without breaking eggs."
Bill Vallicella, the Maverick Philosopher, offers a witty apothegm from the book: “Persistently obscure writers will usually be found to be defective human beings.”
Just remember the apothegm that a government that is big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take it all away.