The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce (best english books to read TXT) 📖

to proponents of porcophagy.

Moses Mendlessohn having fallen ill sent for a Christian

physician, who at once diagnosed the philosopher’s disorder as

trichinosis, but tactfully gave it another name. “You need and

immediate change of diet,” he said; “you must eat six ounces of pork

every other day.”

“Pork?” shrieked the patient — “pork? Nothing shall induce me to

touch it!”

“Do you mean that?” the doctor gravely asked.

“I swear it!”

“Good! — then I will undertake to cure you.”

 

TRINITY, n. In the multiplex theism of certain Christian churches,

three entirely distinct deities consistent with only one. Subordinate

deities of the polytheistic faith, such as devils and angels, are not

dowered with the power of combination, and must urge individually

their claims to adoration and propitiation. The Trinity is one of the

most sublime mysteries of our holy religion. In rejecting it because

it is incomprehensible, Unitarians betray their inadequate sense of

theological fundamentals. In religion we believe only what we do not

understand, except in the instance of an intelligible doctrine that

contradicts an incomprehensible one. In that case we believe the

former as a part of the latter.

 

TROGLODYTE, n. Specifically, a cave-dweller of the paleolithic

period, after the Tree and before the Flat. A famous community of

troglodytes dwelt with David in the Cave of Adullam. The colony

consisted of “every one that was in distress, and every one that was

in debt, and every one that was discontented” — in brief, all the

Socialists of Judah.

 

TRUCE, n. Friendship.

 

TRUTH, n. An ingenious compound of desirability and appearance.

Discovery of truth is the sole purpose of philosophy, which is the

most ancient occupation of the human mind and has a fair prospect of

existing with increasing activity to the end of time.

 

TRUTHFUL, adj. Dumb and illiterate.

 

TRUST, n. In American politics, a large corporation composed in

greater part of thrifty working men, widows of small means, orphans in

the care of guardians and the courts, with many similar malefactors

and public enemies.

 

TURKEY, n. A large bird whose flesh when eaten on certain religious

anniversaries has the peculiar property of attesting piety and

gratitude. Incidentally, it is pretty good eating.

 

TWICE, adv. Once too often.

 

TYPE, n. Pestilent bits of metal suspected of destroying

civilization and enlightenment, despite their obvious agency in this

incomparable dictionary.

 

TZETZE (or TSETSE) FLY, n. An African insect (_Glossina morsitans_)

whose bite is commonly regarded as nature’s most efficacious remedy

for insomnia, though some patients prefer that of the American

novelist (_Mendax interminabilis_).

U

UBIQUITY, n. The gift or power of being in all places at one time,

but not in all places at all times, which is omnipresence, an

attribute of God and the luminiferous ether only. This important

distinction between ubiquity and omnipresence was not clear to the

mediaeval Church and there was much bloodshed about it. Certain

Lutherans, who affirmed the presence everywhere of Christ’s body were

known as Ubiquitarians. For this error they were doubtless damned,

for Christ’s body is present only in the eucharist, though that

sacrament may be performed in more than one place simultaneously. In

recent times ubiquity has not always been understood — not even by

Sir Boyle Roche, for example, who held that a man cannot be in two

places at once unless he is a bird.

 

UGLINESS, n. A gift of the gods to certain women, entailing virtue

without humility.

 

ULTIMATUM, n. In diplomacy, a last demand before resorting to

concessions.

Having received an ultimatum from Austria, the Turkish Ministry

met to consider it.

“O servant of the Prophet,” said the Sheik of the Imperial Chibouk

to the Mamoosh of the Invincible Army, “how many unconquerable

soldiers have we in arms?”

“Upholder of the Faith,” that dignitary replied after examining

his memoranda, “they are in numbers as the leaves of the forest!”

“And how many impenetrable battleships strike terror to the hearts

of all Christian swine?” he asked the Imaum of the Ever Victorious

Navy.

“Uncle of the Full Moon,” was the reply, “deign to know that they

are as the waves of the ocean, the sands of the desert and the stars

of Heaven!”

For eight hours the broad brow of the Sheik of the Imperial

Chibouk was corrugated with evidences of deep thought: he was

calculating the chances of war. Then, “Sons of angels,” he said, “the

die is cast! I shall suggest to the Ulema of the Imperial Ear that he

advise inaction. In the name of Allah, the council is adjourned.”

 

UN-AMERICAN, adj. Wicked, intolerable, heathenish.

 

UNCTION, n. An oiling, or greasing. The rite of extreme unction

consists in touching with oil consecrated by a bishop several parts of

the body of one engaged in dying. Marbury relates that after the rite

had been administered to a certain wicked English nobleman it was

discovered that the oil had not been properly consecrated and no other

could be obtained. When informed of this the sick man said in anger:

“Then I’ll be damned if I die!”

“My son,” said the priest, “this is what we fear.”

 

UNDERSTANDING, n. A cerebral secretion that enables one having it to

know a house from a horse by the roof on the house. Its nature and

laws have been exhaustively expounded by Locke, who rode a house, and

Kant, who lived in a horse.

 

His understanding was so keen

That all things which he’d felt, heard, seen,

He could interpret without fail

If he was in or out of jail.

He wrote at Inspiration’s call

Deep disquisitions on them all,

Then, pent at last in an asylum,

Performed the service to compile ‘em.

So great a writer, all men swore,

They never had not read before.

 

Jorrock Wormley

 

UNITARIAN, n. One who denies the divinity of a Trinitarian.

 

UNIVERSALIST, n. One who forgoes the advantage of a Hell for persons

of another faith.

 

URBANITY, n. The kind of civility that urban observers ascribe to

dwellers in all cities but New York. Its commonest expression is

heard in the words, “I beg your pardon,” and it is not consistent with

disregard of the rights of others.

 

The owner of a powder mill

Was musing on a distant hill —

Something his mind foreboded —

When from the cloudless sky there fell

A deviled human kidney! Well,

The man’s mill had exploded.

His hat he lifted from his head;

“I beg your pardon, sir,” he said;

“I didn’t know ‘twas loaded.”

 

Swatkin

 

USAGE, n. The First Person of the literary Trinity, the Second and

Third being Custom and Conventionality. Imbued with a decent

reverence for this Holy Triad an industrious writer may hope to

produce books that will live as long as the fashion.

 

UXORIOUSNESS, n. A perverted affection that has strayed to one’s own

wife.

V

VALOR, n. A soldierly compound of vanity, duty and the gambler’s

hope.

“Why have you halted?” roared the commander of a division and

Chickamauga, who had ordered a charge; “move forward, sir, at once.”

“General,” said the commander of the delinquent brigade, “I am

persuaded that any further display of valor by my troops will bring

them into collision with the enemy.”

 

VANITY, n. The tribute of a fool to the worth of the nearest ass.

 

They say that hens do cackle loudest when

There’s nothing vital in the eggs they’ve laid;

And there are hens, professing to have made

A study of mankind, who say that men

Whose business ‘tis to drive the tongue or pen

Make the most clamorous fanfaronade

O’er their most worthless work; and I’m afraid

They’re not entirely different from the hen.

Lo! the drum-major in his coat of gold,

His blazing breeches and high-towering cap —

Imperiously pompous, grandly bold,

Grim, resolute, an awe-inspiring chap!

Who’d think this gorgeous creature’s only virtue

Is that in battle he will never hurt you?

 

Hannibal Hunsiker

 

VIRTUES, n.pl. Certain abstentions.

 

VITUPERATION, n. Saite, as understood by dunces and all such as

suffer from an impediment in their wit.

 

VOTE, n. The instrument and symbol of a freeman’s power to make a

fool of himself and a wreck of his country.

W

W (double U) has, of all the letters in our alphabet, the only

cumbrous name, the names of the others being monosyllabic. This

advantage of the Roman alphabet over the Grecian is the more valued

after audibly spelling out some simple Greek word, like

epixoriambikos. Still, it is now thought by the learned that other

agencies than the difference of the two alphabets may have been

concerned in the decline of “the glory that was Greece” and the rise

of “the grandeur that was Rome.” There can be no doubt, however, that

by simplifying the name of W (calling it “wow,” for example) our

civilization could be, if not promoted, at least better endured.

 

WALL STREET, n. A symbol for sin for every devil to rebuke. That

Wall Street is a den of thieves is a belief that serves every

unsuccessful thief in place of a hope in Heaven. Even the great and

good Andrew Carnegie has made his profession of faith in the matter.

 

Carnegie the dauntless has uttered his call

To battle: “The brokers are parasites all!”

Carnegie, Carnegie, you’ll never prevail;

Keep the wind of your slogan to belly your sail,

Go back to your isle of perpetual brume,

Silence your pibroch, doff tartan and plume:

Ben Lomond is calling his son from the fray —

Fly, fly from the region of Wall Street away!

While still you’re possessed of a single baubee

(I wish it were pledged to endowment of me)

‘Twere wise to retreat from the wars of finance

Lest its value decline ere your credit advance.

For a man ‘twixt a king of finance and the sea,

Carnegie, Carnegie, your tongue is too free!

 

Anonymus Bink

 

WAR, n. A by-product of the arts of peace. The most menacing

political condition is a period of international amity. The student

of history who has not been taught to expect the unexpected may justly

boast himself inaccessible to the light. “In time of peace prepare

for war” has a deeper meaning than is commonly discerned; it means,

not merely that all things earthly have an end — that change is the

one immutable and eternal law — but that the soil of peace is thickly

sown with the seeds of war and singularly suited to their germination

and growth. It was when Kubla Khan had decreed his “stately pleasure

dome” — when, that is to say, there were peace and fat feasting in

Xanadu — that he

 

heard from afar

Ancestral voices prophesying war.

 

One of the greatest of poets, Coleridge was one of the wisest of

men, and it was not for nothing that he read us this parable. Let us

have a little less of “hands across the sea,” and a little more of

that elemental distrust that is the security of nations. War loves to

come like a thief in the night; professions of eternal amity provide

the night.

 

WASHINGTONIAN, n. A Potomac tribesman who exchanged the privilege of

governing himself for the advantage of good government. In justice to

him it should be said that he did not want to.

 

They took away his vote and gave instead

The right, when he had earned, to eat his bread.

In vain — he clamors for his “boss,” pour soul,

To come again and part him from his roll.

 

Offenbach Stutz

 

WEAKNESSES, n.pl. Certain primal powers of Tyrant Woman wherewith she

holds dominion over the male of her species, binding him to the

service of her will and paralyzing his rebellious energies.

 

WEATHER, n. The climate of the hour.