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COMMERCE, n. A kind of transaction in which A plunders from B the goods of C, and for compensation B picks the pocket of D of money belonging to E.

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
Belonging
Commerce
Pockets
Plunders
Goods
Transaction
Picks
Plunder
Money
Transactions
Kind
Compensation
Pocket

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LEGACY, n. A gift from one who is legging it out of this vale of tears.
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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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Erudition - dust shaken out of a book into an empty skull.
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JESTER, n. An officer attached to the king's household to amuse the court by ludicrous actions and utterances . . . the king's own conduct and decrees [being] sufficiently ridiculous for the amusement not only of his court but of all mankind.
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There are two instruments worse than a clarinet - two clarinets.
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A statesman who shakes the fruit trees of his neighbors - to dislodge the worms.
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NOUMENON, n. That which exists, as distinguished from that which merely seems to exist, the latter being a phenomenon. The noumenon is a bit difficult to locate it can be apprehended only by a process of reasoning - which is a phenomenon.
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Academe, n.: An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. Academy, n.: A modern school where football is taught.
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Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country.
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FICKLENESS, n. The iterated satiety of an enterprising affection.
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TRICHINOSIS, n. The pig's reply to proponents of porcophagy.
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April fool, n. The March fool with another month added to his folly.
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INTIMACY, n. A relation into which fools are providentially drawn for their mutual destruction.
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WALL STREET, n. A symbol for sin for every devil to rebuke. That Wall Street is a den of thieves is a belief that serves every unsuccessful thief in place of a hope in Heaven.
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Custard: A detestable substance produced by a malevolent conspiracy of the hen, the cow, and the cook.
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APHORISM, n. Predigested wisdom. The flabby wine-skin of his brain Yields to some pathologic strain, And voids from its unstored abysm The driblet of an aphorism. The Mad Philosopher, 1697
Ambrose Bierce
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REPRESENTATIVE, n. In national politics, a member of the Lower House in this world, and without discernible hope of promotion in the next.
Ambrose Bierce
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You are not permitted to kill a woman who has wronged you, but nothing forbids you to reflect that she is growing older every minute.
Ambrose Bierce
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REDEMPTION, n. Deliverance of sinners from the penalty of their sin, through their murder of the deity against whom they sinned . . . . whoso believeth in it shall not perish, but have everlasting life in which to try to understand it.
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Labor is one of the processes by which A acquires property for B.
Ambrose Bierce