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MUGWUMP, n. In politics one afflicted with self-respect and addicted to the vice of independence. A term of contempt.

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
Independence
Respect
Politics
Term
Afflicted
Self
Addicted
Contempt
Vice
Vices

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Before undergoing a surgical operation, arrange your temporal affairs. You may live.
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LAST, n. A shoemaker's implement, named by a frowning Providence as opportunity to the maker of puns.
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QUEEN, n. A woman by whom the realm is ruled when there is a king, and through whom it is ruled when there is not.
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LEAD, n. A heavy blue-gray metal much used in giving stability to light lovers - particularly to those who love not wisely but other men's wives.
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CEMETERY, n. An isolated suburban spot where mourners match lies, poets write at a target and stone-cutters spell for a wager.
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PRESIDE, v. To guide the action of a deliberative body to a desirable result. In Journalese, to perform upon a musical instrument as, He presided at the piccolo.
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Knowledge is the small part of ignorance that we arrange and classify.
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Coronation: The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and visible signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite bomb.
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MEDICINE, n. A stone flung down the Bowery to kill a dog in Broadway.
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Optimist – A proponent of the doctrine that black is white.
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MISDEMEANOR, n. An infraction of the law having less dignity than a felony and constituting no claim to admittance into the best criminal society.
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A popular character in old Italian plays, who imitated with ludicrous incompetence the buffone, or clown, and was therefore the ape of an ape for the clown himself imitated the serious characters of the play.
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He laughs best who laughs least.
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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.
Ambrose Bierce
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REASON, n. Propensitate of prejudice.
Ambrose Bierce
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Indigestion: A disease which the patient and his friends frequently mistake for deep religious conviction and concern for the salvation of mankind. As the simple Red Man of the Western Wild put it, with, it must be confessed, a certain force: 'Plenty well, no pray big belly ache, heap God.'
Ambrose Bierce
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PANDEMONIUM, n. Literally, the Place of All the Demons. Most of them have escaped into politics and finance, and the place is now used as a lecture hall by the Audible Reformer.
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Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage.
Ambrose Bierce
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In this world one must have a name it prevents confusion, even when it does not establish identity. Some, though, are known by numbers, which also seem inadequate distinctions.
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SCRAP-BOOK, n. A book that is commonly edited by a fool. Many persons of some small distinction compile scrap-books containing whatever they happen to read about themselves or employ others to collect.
Ambrose Bierce