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Thomas Mifflin
Thomas Mifflin 1744-1800, American Revolutionary general and political leader, b. Philadelphia. Turning from business to public affairs, he was a member of the Pennsylvania provincial assembly and of the First Continental Congress. He joined the army early in the American Revolution and rose to the...
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cult
cult ritual observances involved in worship of, or communication with, the supernatural or its symbolic representations. A cult includes the totality of ideas, activities, and practices associated with a given divinity or social group. It includes not only ritual activities but also the beliefs and...
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Open Door
Open Door maintenance in a certain territory of equal commercial and industrial rights for the nationals of all countries. As a specific policy, it was first advanced by the United States, but it was rooted in the typical most-favored-nation clause of the treaties concluded with China after the ...
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belief
belief in philosophy, commitment to something, involving intellectual assent. Philosophers have disagreed as to whether belief is active or passive; René Descartes held that it is a matter of will, while David Hume thought that it was an emotional commitment, and C. S. Peirce considered it a...
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conservation of natural resources
conservation of natural resources the wise use of the earth's resources by humanity. The term conservation came into use in the late 19th cent. and referred to the management, mainly for economic reasons, of such valuable natural resources as timber, fish, game, topsoil, pastureland, and minerals...
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Marcus Gabius Apicius
Marcus Gabius Apicius , 1st cent., Roman gourmet. He squandered most of his large fortune on feasts and then, anticipating a need to economize, committed suicide. The cookbook called Apicius probably dates from a century later.
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asp
asp popular name for several species of viper , one of which, the European asp ( Vipera aspis ), is native to S Europe. It is also a name for the Egyptian cobra ( Naja haja ). It is believed that the asp Cleopatra used to commit suicide was either that cobra or the horned viper ( Cerastes cornut...
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Balaam
Balaam , the central character in an amalgam of Israelite traditions found in the Book of Numbers. Hired by Balak, king of Moab, to curse the Hebrews encamped in the Jordan valley, Balaam could only bless them. Later, Balaam seduced the Israelites to commit evil, an act for which he was killed.
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perjury
perjury , in criminal law, the act of willfully and knowingly stating a falsehood under oath or under affirmation in judicial or administrative proceedings. If the person accused of perjury had any probable cause for his belief that the statement he made was true, then he is not guilty of perjury. I...
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Triple Alliance and Triple Entente
Triple Alliance and Triple Entente , two international combinations of states that dominated the diplomatic history of Western Europe from 1882 until they came into armed conflict in World War I.
Formation of the Triple Alliance
In 1871 two new major states of Europe had been formed—...
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