Deliberation, n. The art of examining oneʼs bread to see which side it is buttered on.
Dentist, n. A prestidigitator who, putting metal into your mouth, pulls coins out of your pocket.
Decide, v. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.
Deluge, n. A notable first experiment in baptism, which washed away the sins (and sinners) of the world.
Since apparently it is so difficult for people to remember the Ten Commandments as written, Ambrose Bierce has reformulated them using rhyme. Here are some of the results, as set forth in the Devilʼs Dictionary
Thou shalt no God but me adore:
ʼTwere too expensive to have more.
Work not on Sabbath days at all,
But go to see the teams play ball.
Honor thy parents. That creates
For life insurance lower rates.
Kiss not thy neighborʼs wife, unless
Thine own thy neighbor doth caress.
Donʼt steal. Thouʼlt never thus compete
Successfully in business. Cheat.
Bear not false witness – that is low –
But “hear ʼtis rumored so and so.”
Dawn, n. The time when the man of reason goes to bed. Certain old men prefer to rise at about that time, taking a cold bath and a long walk with an empty stomach, and otherwise mortifying the flesh. They then point with pride to these practices as the cause of their sturdy health and ripe years; the truth being that they are hearty and old, not because of their habits, but in spite of them. The reason we find only robust persons doing this thing is that it has killed all the others who have tried it.
Critic, n. A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries to please him.
Cynic, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be. Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking out a cynicʼs eyes to improve his vision.
– Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
Consult, v.t. To seek anotherʼs approval for a course already decided on.
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.
“Emperor Justinian said, ‘Truth shines with its own light.’ Fools assured him that this proposition was heretical because they strongly sensed heresy in it, and that the contrary axiom was orthodox, universal and Greek. ‘Truth cannot shine with its own light. It is only by burning infidels that minds can be illuminated.’ ” – Voltaire, The Ingénue
“The generations that wrote and ratified the Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment did not presume to know the extent of freedom in all of its dimensions, and so they entrusted to future generations a charter protecting the right of all persons to enjoy liberty as we learn its meaning.” – Justice Anthony Kennedy, in Obergefell v. Hodges (2015)
“Doubt with regard to what we ought to know is a condition too violent for the human mind; it cannot long be endured; in spite of itself the mind decides one way or another, and it prefers to be deceived rather than to believe nothing.” Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile
Compromise, n. Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction of thinking he has got what he ought not to have, and is deprived of nothing except what was justly his due.
Conservative, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.
Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
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