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| The real Ambrose Bierce? |
Our good friend Edgar Lores has reminded us of the import of the letter P. Indeed, the letter P is one we would have a hard time doing without.
Here are
some excerPts from "The Devil's Dictionary" by our long-gone whacko American friend
Ambrose Bierce. If the words dance
unintelligibly on the lip, keep reading, and by the end, you, too, will be
speaking in a high-minded way that amazes and confounds your listeners. You don't even have to know what you are
talking about.
PAIN, n.
An uncomfortable frame of mind that may have a physical basis in
something that is being done to the body, or may be purely mental, caused by
the good fortune of another.
PAINTING, n. The art of protecting flat
surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.
PARDON, v. To remit a
penalty and restore to the life of crime.
To add to the lure of crime the temptation of
ingratitude.
PASSPORT, n. A document treacherously
inflicted upon a citizen going abroad, exposing him as an alien and pointing
him out for special reprobation and outrage.
PAST, n. That part of Eternity with some
small fraction of which we have a slight and regrettable acquaintance. A moving line called the Present parts it
from an imaginary period known as the Future.
These two grand divisions of Eternity, of which the one is continually
effacing the other, are entirely unlike.
The one is dark with sorrow and disappointment, the other bright with
prosperity and joy. The Past is the region of sobs, the Future is the realm of song. In the one crouches Memory, clad in sackcloth
and ashes, mumbling penitential prayer; in the sunshine of the other Hope flies
with a free wing, beckoning to temples of success and bowers of ease. Yet the Past is the Future of yesterday, the
Future is the Past of to-morrow. They are
one--the knowledge and the dream.
PATIENCE, n. A minor form of despair,
disguised as a virtue.
PATRIOT, n. One to whom the interests of
a part seem superior to those of the whole.
The dupe of statesmen and the tool of conquerors.
PATRIOTISM, n. Combustible rubbish read
to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name.
In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of
a scoundrel. With all due respect to an
enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the
first.
PEACE, n. In international affairs, a
period of cheating between two periods of fighting.
PERSEVERANCE, n. A lowly virtue whereby
mediocrity achieves an inglorious success.
"Persevere, persevere!" cry
the homilists all,
Themselves, day and night, persevering
to bawl.
"Remember the fable of tortoise
and hare--
The one at the goal while the other
is--where?"
Why, back there in Dreamland, renewing
his lease
Of life, all his muscles preserving the
peace,
The goal and the rival forgotten
alike,
And the long fatigue of the needless hike.
His spirit a-squat in the grass and the
dew
Of the dogless Land beyond the
Stew,
He sleeps, like a saint in a holy
place,
A winner of all that is good in a
race.
Sukker Uffro
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon
the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist
with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile.
PHILANTHROPIST, n. A rich (and usually
bald) old gentleman who has trained himself to grin while his conscience is picking
his pocket.
PHILOSOPHY, n. A route of
many roads leading from nowhere to nothing.
PHYSICIAN, n. One upon whom we set our
hopes when ill and our dogs when well.
PIANO, n. A parlor utensil for subduing
the impenitent visitor. It is operated
by pressing the keys of the machine and the spirits of the
audience.
PIETY, n. Reverence for the Supreme
Being, based upon His supposed resemblance to man.
The pig is taught by sermons and
epistles
To think the God of Swine has snout and
bristles.
Judibras
PIGMY, n. One of a tribe of very small
men found by ancient travelers in many parts of the world, but by modern in
Central Africa only. The Pigmies are so
called to distinguish them from the bulkier Caucasians --who are Hogmies.
PITIFUL, adj. The state of an enemy of
opponent after an imaginary encounter with oneself.
PLAGIARIZE, v. To take the thought or
style of another writer whom one has never, never read.
PLAN, v.t. To bother about the best
method of accomplishing an accidental result.
PLATITUDE, n. The fundamental element
and special glory of popular literature. A thought that snores in words that
smoke. The wisdom of a million fools in
the diction of a dullard. A fossil
sentiment in artificial rock. A moral without the
fable. All that is mortal of a departed
truth. A demi-tasse of
milk-and-mortality. The Pope's-nose of a
featherless peacock. A jelly-fish
withering on the shore of the sea of thought. The cackle surviving the
egg. A desiccated
epigram.
PLAUDITS, n. Coins with which the
populace pays those who tickle and devour it.
PLEASE, v. To lay the foundation for a
superstructure of imposition.
PLEASURE, n. The least hateful form of
dejection.
PLUNDER, v. To take the property of
another without observing the decent and customary reticences of theft. To effect a change of ownership with the
candid concomitance of a brass band. To
wrest the wealth of A from B and leave C lamenting a vanishing
opportunity.
POCKET, n. The cradle of motive and the
grave of conscience. In woman this organ
is lacking; so she acts without motive, and her conscience, denied burial,
remains ever alive, confessing the sins of others.
POLICE, n. An armed force
for protection and participation.
POLITENESS, n. The most acceptable
hypocrisy.
POLITICS, n. A strife of interests
masquerading as a contest of principles.
The conduct of public affairs for private
advantage.
POLITICIAN, n. An eel in the fundamental
mud upon which the superstructure of organized society is reared. When we wriggles he mistakes the agitation of
his tail for the trembling of the edifice. As compared with the statesman, he
suffers the disadvantage of being alive.
POSITIVE, adj. Mistaken at the top of
one's voice.
POSITIVISM, n. A philosophy that denies
our knowledge of the Real and affirms our ignorance of the Apparent. Its longest exponent is Comte, its broadest
Mill and its thickest Spencer.
POVERTY, n. A file provided for the
teeth of the rats of reform. The number
of plans for its abolition equals that of the reformers who suffer from it,
plus that of the philosophers who know nothing about it. Its victims are distinguished by
possession of all the virtues and by their faith in leaders seeking to conduct
them into a prosperity where they believe these to be unknown.
PRAY, v. To ask that the laws of the
universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner confessedly
unworthy.
PREDILECTION, n. The preparatory stage
of disillusion.
PRE-EXISTENCE, n. An unnoted factor in
creation.
PREFERENCE, n. A sentiment, or frame of
mind, induced by the erroneous belief that one thing is better than
another.
An ancient philosopher, expounding his conviction that life is no
better than death, was asked by a disciple why, then, he did not
die.
"Because," he replied, "death is no better than
life."
It is longer.
PREJUDICE, n. A vagrant opinion without
visible means of support.
PRELATE, n. A church officer having a
superior degree of holiness and a fat preferment. One of Heaven's aristocracy. A gentleman of God.
PREROGATIVE, n. A sovereign's right to
do wrong.
PRESCRIPTION, n. A physician's guess at
what will best prolong the situation with least harm to the
patient.
PRESENT, n. That part of eternity
dividing the domain of disappointment from the realm of
hope.
PRESENTABLE, adj. Hideously appareled
after the manner of the time and place.
In Boorioboola-Gha a man is presentable on occasions of ceremony
if he have his abdomen painted a bright blue and wear a cow's tail; in
New York he may, if it please him, omit the paint, but after sunset
he
must wear two tails made of the wool of a sheep and dyed
black.
PRESIDENT, n. The leading figure in a
small group of men of whom-- and of whom only--it is positively known that
immense numbers of their countrymen did not want any of them for
President.
PREVARICATOR, n. A liar in the
caterpillar estate.
PRICE, n. Value, plus a reasonable sum
for the wear and tear of conscience in demanding it.
PRIMATE, n. The head of a church,
especially a State church supported by involuntary contributions. The Primate of England is the Archbishop of
Canterbury, an amiable old gentleman, who occupies Lambeth Palace when living and Westminster Abbey when dead. He is commonly dead.
PRISON, n. A place of punishments and
rewards. The poet assures us
that--
"Stone walls do not a prison
make,"
but a combination of the stone wall, the political parasite and the moral
instructor is no garden of sweets.
PROJECTILE, n. The final arbiter in
international disputes. Formerly these
disputes were settled by physical contact of the disputants, with such simple
arguments as the rudimentary logic of the times could supply--the sword, the
spear, and so forth. With the growth of
prudence in military affairs the projectile came more and more into favor, and
is now held in high esteem by the most courageous. Its capital defect is that it requires personal attendance at the point of
propulsion.
PROOF, n. Evidence having a shade more
of plausibility than of unlikelihood.
The testimony of two credible witnesses as opposed to that of only
one.
PROPHECY, n. The art and practice of
selling one's credibility for future delivery.
PROSPECT, n. An outlook, usually
forbidding. An expectation,
usuallyforbidden.
Blow, blow, ye spicy
breezes--
O'er Ceylon blow your breath,
Where every prospect
pleases,
Save only that of
death.
Bishop Sheber
PUBLISH, n. In literary affairs, to
become the fundamental element in a cone of critics.
PUSH, n. One of the two things mainly
conducive to success, especially in politics.
The other is Pull.
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