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"Monarchies, aristocracies, and religions are all based upon that large defect in your race -- the individual's distrust of his neighbor, and his desire, for safety's or comfort's sake, to stand well in his neighbor's eye. These institutions will always remain, and always flourish, and always oppress you, affront you, and degrade you, because you will always be and remain slaves of minorities. There was never a country where the majority of people were in their secret hearts loyal to any of these institutions." -- Mark Twain, _The Mysterious Stranger_
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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>an interesting definition of droll
you pays your money and you takes your choice:
1. Intentionally facetious, amusing, comical, funny. 2. Unintentionally amusing; queer, quaint, odd, strange, ‘funny’.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear tsuwm: I don't see anything droll in that quote. It seems to be an unpleasant fact of life that the elite are always in the minority, and use religion and other institutions out of fear, to control the mob which is the majority.
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Carpal Tunnel
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dear bill, you're right. the only thing funny is that Mark Twain said it.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear tsuwm: But the fact that a humorist said it need not mean he believed it. Perhaps Twain was putting the words into a character's mouth. I can't remember reading that book.
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stranger
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stranger
Joined: Nov 2001
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dear bill, you're right. the only thing funny is that Mark Twain said it.
Another example of Mark Twain drollness: "I bear him no malice. In fact, I'd send him a fan if I could."
Used as an example in an exercise to demonstrate the power of the unsaid word.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear Drow: I'm not sure I get it, unless the proposed recipient of the fan is in Purgatory. But in that case, I don't see how malice would be possible.
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