ETHNOLOGY, n. The science that treats of the various tribes of Man, as robbers, thieves, swindlers, dunces, lunatics, idiots and ethnologists.

EXTINCTION, n. The raw material out of which theology created the future state.

Crowned with leaves of the laurel. In England the Poet Laureate is an officer of the sovereign's court, acting as dancing skeleton at every royal feast and singing-mute at every royal funeral.

Experience - the wisdom that enables us to recognise in an undesirable old acquaintance the folly that we have already embraced.

DECIDE, v.i. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.

Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.

A subsidiary Deity designed to catch the overflow and surplus of the world's worship . . . . [H]is master works for the means wherewith to purchase the idle wag of the Solomonic tail, seasoned with a look of tolerant recognition.