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Botany, n. The science of vegetables - those that are not good to eat, as well as those that are. It deals largely with their flowers, which are commonly badly designed, inartistic in color, and ill-smelling.

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
Science
Vegetables
Wells
Badly
Well
Designed
Good
Ill
Flowers
Botany
Flower
Smelling
Color
Commonly
Deals
Largely

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Advice: The suggestions you give someone else which you hope will work for your benefit.
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DAY, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent. This period is divided into two parts, the day proper and the night, or day improper - the former devoted to sins of business, the latter consecrated to the other sort.
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Advice, the smallest current coin.
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REPUBLIC, n. A nation in which, the thing governing and the thing governed being the same, there is only a permitted authority to enforce an optional obedience.
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Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.
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ROSTRUM, n. In Latin, the beak of a bird or the prow of a ship. In America, a place from which a candidate for office energetically expounds the wisdom, virtue and power of the rabble.
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CRAYFISH, n. A small crustacean very much resembling the lobster, but less indigestible.
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THEOSOPHY, n. An ancient faith having all the certitude of religion and all the mystery of science.
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Sweater, n.: garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly.
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REASON, v.i. To weight probabilities in the scales of desire.
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Cribbage, n. A substitute for conversation among those to whom nature has denied ideas.
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PILGRIM, n. A traveler that is taken seriously. A Pilgrim Father was one who [was] not permitted to sing psalms through his nose [in Europe], followed it to Massachusetts, where he could personate God according to the dictates of his conscience.
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LEXICOGRAPHER, n. A pestilent fellow who, under the pretense of recording some particular stage in the development of a language, does what he can to arrest its growth, stiffen its flexibility and mechanize its methods.
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J, n. A consonant in English, but some nations use it as a vowel . . . from a Latin verb, jacere, to throw, because when a stone is thrown at a dog the dog's tail assumes that shape.
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Condole - to show that bereavement is a smaller evil than sympathy.
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The game of discontent has its rules, and he who disregards them cheats. It is not permitted to you to wish to add another's advantages or possessions to your own you are permitted only to wish to be another.
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PLEONASM, n. An army of words escorting a corporal of thought.
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REPENTANCE, n. The faithful attendant and follower of Punishment. It is usually manifest in a degree of reformation that is not inconsistent with continuity of sin.
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RACK, n. An argumentative implement formerly much used in persuading devotees of a false faith to embrace the living truth. As a call to the unconverted the rack never had any particular efficacy, and is now held in light popular esteem.
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AFFLICTION, n. An acclimatizing process preparing the soul for another and bitter world.
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