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POSITIVISM- A philosophy that denies our knowledge of the Real and affirms our ignorance of the Apparent. Its longest exponent is Comte, its broadest Mill and its thickest Spencer.

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
Real
Denies
Exponent
Mills
Thickest
Longest
Positivism
Apparent
Exponents
Deny
Spencer
Ignorance
Broadest
Philosophy
Affirms
Knowledge
Mill

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If you would be accounted great by your contemporaries, be not too much greater than they.
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TRUCE, n. Friendship.
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COMPULSION, n. The eloquence of power.
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KILT, n. A costume sometimes worn by Scotchmen in America and Americans in Scotland.
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BRANDY, n. A cordial composed on one part thunder-and-lightning, one part remorse, two parts bloody murder, one part death-hell-and-the-grave and four parts clarified Satan.
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adherent, n. A follower who has not yet obtained all that he expects to get.
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ANTIPATHY, n. The sentiment inspired by one's friend's friend.
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ASS, n. A public singer with a good voice but no ear.
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OUTCOME, n. A particular type of disappointment . . . . judged by the outcome, the result. This is immortal nonsense the wisdom of an act is to be juded by the light that the doer had when he performed it.
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SARCOPHAGUS, n. Among the Greeks a coffin which being made of a certain kind of carnivorous stone, had the peculiar property of devouring the body placed in it.
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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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diplomacy, n.: The patriotic art of lying for one's country.
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A man who piously shuts himself up to meditate upon the sin of wickedness and to keep it fresh in his mind joins a brotherhood of awful examples.
Ambrose Bierce
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Good-bye -- if you hear of my being stood up against a stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease or falling down the cellar stairs.
Ambrose Bierce
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Molecule, n.: The ultimate, indivisible unit of matter. It is distinguished from the corpuscle, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of matter, by a closer resemblance to the atom, also the ultimate, indivisible unit of matter ... The ion differs from the molecule, the corpuscle and the atom in that it is an ion.
Ambrose Bierce
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Anoint, v.: To grease a king or other great functionary already sufficiently slippery.
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Adolescence: A stage between infancy and adultery.
Ambrose Bierce
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An army's bravest men are its cowards. The death which they would not meet at the hands of the enemy they will meet at the hands of their officers, with never a flinching.
Ambrose Bierce
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Fidelity - a virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
Ambrose Bierce
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Philanthropist, n.: A rich (and usually bald) old gentleman who has trained himself to grin while his conscience is picking his pocket.
Ambrose Bierce