"We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created nice and equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, and the right to make that of another miserable by thrusting upon him an incalculable quantity of acquaintances; liberty, particularly the liberty to introduce persons to one another without first ascertaining if they are not already acquainted as enemies; and the pursuit of another's happiness with a running pack of strangers." INVENTOR, n. A person who makes an ingenious arrangement of wheels, levers, and springs, and believes it civilization. IRRELIGION, n. The principal one of the great faiths of the world. ITCH, n. The patriotism of a Scotchman. J J is a consonant in English, but some nations use it as a vowel--than which nothing could be more absurd. Its original form, which has been but slightly modified, was that of the tail of a subdued dog, and it was not a letter but a character, standing for the Latin verb jacere, "to throw," because when a stone is thrown at a dog the dog's tail assumes that shape. This is the origin of the letter, as expounded by the learned and renowned Dr. Jocolpus Burner, of the University of Belgrade, who established his conclusions on the subject in a work of three quarto volumes and committed suicide on being reminded that the j in the Roman alphabet had originally no curl. JEALOUS, adj. Unduly concerned about the preservation of that which can only be lost if not worth keeping. JESTER, n. An officer formerly attached to a king's household, whose business it was to amuse the court by ludicrous actions and utterances, the absurdity being attested by his motley costume. The king himself being attired with dignity, it took the world some centuries to discover that his own conduct and decrees were sufficiently ridiculous for the amusement not only of his court but of all mankind. The jester was commonly called a fool, but the poets and romancers have ever delighted to represent him as a singularly wise and witty person. In the circus clown of to-day the melancholy ghost of the court fool effects the dejection of humbler audiences with the same jests wherewith in life he gloomed the marble hall, panged the patrician sense of humor and tapped the tank of royal tears. The widow-queen of Portugal Had an audacious jester Who entered the confessional Disguised and there confessed her. "Father," she said, "thine ear bend down-- My sins are more than scarlet: I love my fool--blaspheming clown, And common, base-born varlet." "Daughter," the mimic priest replied, "That sin, indeed, is awful: The church's pardon is denied To love that is unlawful. "But since thy stubborn heart will be For him forever pleading, Thou 'dst better make him, by decree, A man of birth and breeding."