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Cribbage, n. A substitute for conversation among those to whom nature has denied ideas.

Ambrose Bierce

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Ambrose Bierce
Born: 1842
Born: June 24
Aphorist
Journalist
Poet
Science Fiction Writer
Writer
Meigs County
Ohio
Dod Grile
William Herman
Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce
Ambrose Bierce
Conversation
Among
Nature
Ideas
Substitute
Substitutes
Denied

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The gambling known as business looks with austere disfavor upon the business known as gambling.
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FOLLY, n. That gift and faculty divine whose creative and controlling energy inspires Man's mind, guides his actions and adorns his life.
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PASTIME, n. A device for promoting dejection. Gentle exercise for intellectual debility.
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Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel.
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Wisdom is known only by contrasting it with folly by shadow only we perceive that all visible objects are not flat. Yet Philanthropos would abolish evil!
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PIANO, n. A parlor utensil for subduing the impenitent visitor. It is operated by depressing the keys of the machine and the spirits of the audience.
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When God makes a beautiful woman, the devil opens a new register.
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Responsibility, n. A detachable burden easily shifted to the shoulders of God, Fate, Fortune, Luck or one's neighbor. In the days of astrology it was customary to unload it upon a star.
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HARMONISTS, n. A sect of Protestants, now extinct, who came from Europe in the beginning of the last century and were distinguished for the bitterness of their internal controversies and dissensions.
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MAGIC, n. An art of converting superstition into coin. There are other arts serving the same high purpose, but the discreet lexicographer does not name them.
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Admiration, n. Our polite recognition of another's resemblance to ourselves.
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critic, n. A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries to please him.
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A bird in the hand is worth what it will bring.
Ambrose Bierce
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Abstainer: a weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure.
Ambrose Bierce
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RIMER, n. A poet regarded with indifference or disesteem.
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An egotist is a person of low taste - more interested in himself than in me.
Ambrose Bierce
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MAGNETISM, n. Something acting upon a magnet. The two definitions immediately foregoing are condensed from the works of one thousand eminent scientists, who have illuminated the subject with a great white light, to the inexpressible advancement of human knowledge.
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ACCOUNTABILITY, n. The mother of caution.
Ambrose Bierce
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Income is the natural and rational gauge and measure of respectability.
Ambrose Bierce
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PREDESTINATION, n. The doctrine that all things occur according to programme. . . . not be confused with that of foreordination. The difference is great enough to have deluged Christendom with ink, to say nothing of the gore.
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