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MUMMY, n. - an ancient Egyptian handy, too, in museums in gratifying the vulgar curiosity that serves to distinguish man from the lower animals.

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
Animal
Distinguish
Men
Serves
Vulgar
Museums
Lower
Mummy
Curiosity
Gratifying
Ancient
Egyptian
Animals
Handy

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PARDON, v. To remit a penalty and restore to the life of crime. To add to the lure of crime the temptation of ingratitude.
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Clarinet n. An instrument of torture operated by a person with cotton in his ears. There are two instruments worse than a clarinet – two clarinets.
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Justice is a commodity which in a more or less adulterated condition the State sells to the citizen as a reward for his allegiance, taxes and personal service.
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IGNORAMUS, n. A person unacquainted with certain kinds of knowledge familiar to yourself, and having certain other kinds that you know nothing about.
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Painting, n.: The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather, and exposing them to the critic.
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MAN, n. An animal so lost in rapturous contemplation of what he thinks he is as to overlook what he indubitably ought to be.
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Respectability, n. The offspring of a liaison between a bald head and a bank account.
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MOUSE, n. An animal which strews its path with fainting women.
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Nothing is more logical than persecution. Religious tolerance is a kind of infidelity.
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Spring beckons! All things to the call respond the trees are leaving and cashiers abscond.
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PLATONIC, adj. Pertaining to the philosophy of Socrates. Platonic Love is a fool's name for the affection between a disability and a frost.
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UXORIOUSNESS, n. A perverted affection that has strayed to one's own wife.
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self-esteem, n. An erroneous appraisal.
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BAIT, n. A preparation that renders the hook more palatable. The best kind is beauty.
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NOMINATE, v. To designate for the heaviest political assessment. To put forward a suitable person to incur the mudgobbling and deadcatting of the opposition.
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GRAPESHOT, n. An argument which the future is preparing in answer to the demands of American Socialism.
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The most affectionate creature in the world is a wet dog.
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INCOMPATIBILITY, n. In matrimony a similarity of tastes, particularly the taste for domination. Incompatibility may, however, consist of a meek-eyed matron living just around the corner. It has even been known to wear a moustache.
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REFUSAL, n. Denial of something desired Refusals are graded in a descending scale of finality thus: the refusal absolute, the refusal condition, the refusal tentative and the refusal feminine. The last is called by some casuists the refusal assentive.
Ambrose Bierce
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ARTLESSNESS, n. A certain engaging quality to which women attain by long study and severe practice upon the admiring male, who is pleased to fancy it resembles the candid simplicity of his young.
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