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Behavior, n. Conduct, as determined, not by principle, but by breeding.

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
Behavior
Principles
Breeding
Conduct
Principle
Determined

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What this country needs what every country needs occasionally is a good hard bloody war to revive the vice of patriotism on which its existence as a nation depends.
Ambrose Bierce
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FOLLY, n. That gift and faculty divine whose creative and controlling energy inspires Man's mind, guides his actions and adorns his life.
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Incompatibility. In matrimony a similarity of tastes, particularly the taste for domination.
Ambrose Bierce
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There was never a genius who was not thought a fool until he disclosed himself whereas he is a fool then only.
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Slang is a foul pool at which every dunce fills his bucket, and then sets up as a fountain.
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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.
Ambrose Bierce
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TRICHINOSIS, n. The pig's reply to proponents of porcophagy.
Ambrose Bierce
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Human nature is pretty well balanced for every lacking virtue there is a rough substitute that will serve at a pinch--as cunning is the wisdom of the unwise, and ferocity the courage of the coward.
Ambrose Bierce
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alone, adj. In bad company.
Ambrose Bierce
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Censor, n. An officer of certain governments, employed to supress the works of genius. Among the Romans the censor was an inspector of public morals, but the public morals of modern nations will not bear inspection.
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A pessimist asked God for relief. Ah, you wish me to restore your hope and cheerfulness, said God. No, replied the petitioner, I wish you to create something that would justify them. The world is all created,said God, but you have overlooked something
Ambrose Bierce
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Alliance - in international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply inserted in each other's pockets that they cannot separately plunder a third.
Ambrose Bierce
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Hypocrisy: prejudice with a halo.
Ambrose Bierce
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Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
Ambrose Bierce
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Genius - to know without having learned to draw just conclusions from unknown premises to discern the soul of things.
Ambrose Bierce
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When publicly censured our first instinct is to make everybody a codefendant.
Ambrose Bierce
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Snow pursued by the wind is not wholly unlike a retreating army. In the open field it ranges itself in ranks and battalions where it can get a foothold it makes a stand where it can take cover it does so. You may see whole platoons of snow cowering behind a bit of broken wall.
Ambrose Bierce
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Brain: an apparatus with which we think that we think. Mind, n. A mysterious form of matter secreted by the brain.
Ambrose Bierce
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MOUSE, n. An animal which strews its path with fainting women.
Ambrose Bierce
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ILLUSTRIOUS, adj. Suitably placed for the shafts of malice, envy and detraction.
Ambrose Bierce