The Devil's Dictionary, Tales, and Memoirs: The Devil's Dictionary, Tales, and Memoirs

by Ambrose Bierce

  CERBERUS, n. The watch-dog of Hades, whose duty it was to guard the entrance—against whom or what does not clearly appear; everybody, sooner or later, had to go there, and nobody wanted to carry off the entrance. Cerberus is known to have had three heads, and some of the poets have credited him with as many as a hundred. Professor Graybill, whose clerky erudition and profound knowledge of Greek give his opinion great weight, has averaged all the estimates, and makes the number twenty-seven—a judgment that would be entirely conclusive if Professor Graybill had known (a) something about dogs, and (b) something about arithmetic.

  CHILDHOOD, n. The period of human life intermediate between the idiocy of infancy and the folly of youth—two removes from the sin of manhood and three from the remorse of age.

  CHRISTIAN, n. One who believes that the New Testament is a divinely inspired book admirably suited to the spiritual needs of his neighbor. One who follows the teachings of Christ in so far as they are not inconsistent with a life of sin.

  I dreamed I stood upon a hill, and, lo!

  The godly multitudes walked to and fro

  Beneath, in Sabbath garments fitly clad,

  With pious mien, appropriately sad,

  While all the church bells made a solemn din—

  A fire-alarm to those who lived in sin.

  Then saw I gazing thoughtfully below,

  With tranquil face, upon that holy show

  A tall, spare figure in a robe of white,

  Whose eyes diffused a melancholy light.

  “God keep you, stranger,” I exclaimed. “You are

  No doubt (your habit shows it) from afar;

  And yet I entertain the hope that you,

  Like these good people, are a Christian too.”

  He raised his eyes and with a look so stern

  It made me with a thousand blushes burn

  Replied—his manner with disdain was spiced:

  “What! I a Christian? No, indeed! I’m Christ.”

  G. J.

  CIRCUS, n. A place where horses, ponies and elephants are permitted to see men, women and children acting the fool.

  CLAIRVOYANT, n. A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron—namely, that he is a blockhead.

  CLARIONET, n. An instrument of torture operated by a person with cotton in his ears. There are two instruments that are worse than a clarionet—two clarionets.

  CLERGYMAN, n. A man who undertakes the management of our spiritual affairs as a method of bettering his temporal ones.

  CLIO, n. One of the nine Muses. Clio’s function was to preside over history—which she did with great dignity, many of the prominent citizens of Athens occupying seats on the platform, the meetings being addressed by Messrs. Xenophon, Herodotus and other popular speakers.

  CLOCK, n. A machine of great moral value to man, allaying his concern for the future by reminding him what a lot of time remains to him.

  A busy man complained one day:

  “I get no time!” “What’s that you say?”

  Cried out his friend, a lazy quiz;

  “You have, sir, all the time there is.

  There’s plenty, too, and don’t you doubt it—

  We’re never for an hour without it.”

  Purzil Crofe.

  CLOSE-FISTED, adj. Unduly desirous of keeping that which many meritorious persons wish to obtain.

  “Close-fisted Scotchman!” Johnson cried

  To thrifty J. Macpherson;

  “See me—I’m ready to divide

  With any worthy person.”

  Said Jamie: “That is very true—

  The boast requires no backing;

  And all are worthy, sir, to you,

  Who have what you are lacking.”

  Anita M. Bobe.

  CŒNOBITE, n. A man who piously shuts himself up to meditate upon the sin of wickedness; and to keep it fresh in his mind joins a brotherhood of awful examples.

  O Coenobite, O coenobite,

  Monastical gregarian,

  You differ from the anchorite,

  That solitudinarian:

  With vollied prayers you wound Old Nick;

  With dropping shots he makes him sick.

  Quincy Giles.

  COMFORT, n. A state of mind produced by contemplation of a neighbor’s uneasiness.

  COMMENDATION, n. The tribute that we pay to achievements that resemble, but do not equal, our own.

  COMMERCE, n. A kind of transaction in which A plunders from B the goods of C, and for compensation B picks the pocket of D of money belonging to E.

  COMMONWEALTH, n. An administrative entity operated by an incalculable multitude of political parasites, logically active but fortuitously efficient.

  This commonwealth’s capitol’s corridors view,

  So thronged with a hungry and indolent crew

  Of clerks, pages, porters and all attachés

  Whom rascals appoint and the populace pays

  That a cat cannot slip through the thicket of shins

  Nor hear its own shriek for the noise of their chins.

  On clerks and on pages, and porters, and all,

  Misfortune attend and disaster befall!

  May life be to them a succession of hurts;

  May fleas by the bushel inhabit their shirts;

  May aches and diseases encamp in their bones,

  Their lungs full of tubercles, bladders of stones;

  May microbes, bacilli, their tissues infest,

  And tapeworms securely their bowels digest;

  May corn-cobs be snared without hope in their hair,

  And frequent impalement their pleasure impair.

  Disturbed be their dreams by the awful discourse

  Of audible sofas sepulchrally hoarse,

  By chairs acrobatic and wavering floors—

  The mattress that kicks and the pillow that snores!

  Sons of cupidity, cradled in sin!

  Your criminal ranks may the death angel thin,

  Avenging the friend whom I couldn’t work in.

  K. Q.

  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.

  COMPULSION, n. The eloquence of power.

  CONDOLE, v. i. To show that bereavement is a smaller evil than sympathy.

  CONFIDANT, CONFIDANTE, n. One entrusted by A with the secrets of B, confided by him to C.

  CONGRATULATION, n. The civility of envy.

  CONGRESS, n. A body of men who meet to repeal laws.

  CONNOISSEUR, n. A specialist who knows everything about something and nothing about anything else.

  An old wine-bibber having been smashed in a railway collision, some wine was poured upon his lips to revive him. “Pauillac, 1873,” he murmured and died.

  CONSERVATIVE, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

  CONSOLATION, n. The knowledge that a better man is more unfortunate than yourself.

  CONSUL, n. In American politics, a person who having failed to secure an office from the people is given one by the Administration on condition that he leave the country.

  CONSULT, v. i. To seek another’s approval of a course already decided on.

  CONTEMPT, n. The feeling of a prudent man for an enemy who is too formidable safely to be opposed.

  CONTROVERSY, n. A battle in which spittle or ink replaces the injurious cannon-ball and the inconsiderate bayonet.

  In controversy with the facile tongue—

  That bloodless warfare of the old and young—

  So seek your adversary to engage

  That on himself he shall exhaust his rage,

  And, like a snake that’s fastened to the ground,

  With his own fangs inflict the fatal wound.

  You ask me how this miracle is done?
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  Adopt his own opinions, one by one,

  And taunt him to refute them; in his wrath

  He’ll sweep them pitilessly from his path.

  Advance then gently all you wish to prove,

  Each proposition prefaced with, “As you’ve

  So well remarked,” or, “As you wisely say,

  And I cannot dispute,” or, “By the way,

  This view of it which, better far expressed,

  Runs through your argument.” Then leave the rest

  To him, secure that he’ll perform his trust

  And prove your views intelligent and just.

  Conmore Apel Brune.

  CONVENT, n. A place of retirement for women who wish for leisure to meditate upon the vice of idleness.

  CONVERSATION, n. A fair for the display of the minor mental commodities, each exhibitor being too intent upon the arrangement of his own wares to observe those of his neighbor.

  CORONATION, n. The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and visible signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite bomb.

  CORPORAL, n. A man who occupies the lowest rung of the military ladder.

  Fiercely the battle raged and, sad to tell,

  Our corporal heroically fell!

  Fame from her height looked down upon the brawl

  And said: “He hadn’t very far to fall.”

  Giacomo Smith.

  CORPORATION, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.

  CORSAIR, n. A politician of the seas.

  COURT FOOL, n. The plaintiff.

  COWARD, n. One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.

  CRAFT, n. A fool’s substitute for brains.

  CRAYFISH, n. A small crustacean very much resembling the lobster, but less indigestible.

  In this small fish I take it that human wisdom is admirably figured and symbolized; for whereas the crayfish doth move only backward, and can have only retrospection, seeing naught but the perils already passed, so the wisdom of man doth not enable him to avoid the follies that beset his course, but only to apprehend their nature afterward. —Sir James Merivale.

  CREDITOR, n. One of a tribe of savages dwelling beyond the Financial Straits and dreaded for their desolating incursions.

  CREMONA, n. A high-priced violin made in Connecticut.

  CRITIC, n. A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody tries to please him.

  There is a land of pure delight,

  Beyond the Jordan’s flood,

  Where saints, apparelled all in white,

  Fling back the critic’s mud.

  And as he legs it through the skies,

  His pelt a sable hue,

  He sorrows sore to recognize

  The missiles that he threw.

  Orrin Goof.

  CROSS, n. An ancient religious symbol erroneously supposed to owe its significance to the most solemn event in the history of Christianity, but really antedating it by thousands of years. By many it has been believed to be identical with the crux ansata of the ancient phallic worship, but it has been traced even beyond all that we know of that, to the rites of primitive peoples. We have to-day the White Cross as a symbol of chastity, and the Red Cross as a badge of benevolent neutrality in war. Having in mind the former, the reverend Father Gassalasca Jape smites the lyre to the effect following:

  “Be good, be good!” the sisterhood

  Cry out in holy chorus,

  And, to dissuade from sin, parade

  Their various charms before us.

  But why, O why, has ne’er an eye

  Seen her of winsome manner

  And youthful grace and pretty face

  Flaunting the White Cross banner?

  Now where’s the need of speech and screed

  To better our behaving?

  A simpler plan for saving man

  (But, first, is he worth saving?)

  Is, dears, when he declines to flee

  From bad thoughts that beset him,

  Ignores the Law as ’t were a straw,

  And wants to sin—don’t let him.

  CUI BONO? (Latin) What good would that do me?

  CUNNING, n. The faculty that distinguishes a weak animal or person from a strong one. It brings its possessor much mental satisfaction and great material adversity. An Italian proverb says: “The furrier gets the skins of more foxes than asses.”

  CUPID, n. The so-called god of love. This bastard creation of a barbarous fancy was no doubt inflicted upon mythology for the sins of its deities. Of all unbeautiful and inappropriate conceptions this is the most reasonless and offensive. The notion of symbolizing sexual love by a semisexless babe, and comparing the pains of passion to the wounds of an arrow—of introducing this pudgy homunculus into art grossly to materialize the subtle spirit and suggestion of the work—this is eminently worthy of the age that, giving it birth, laid it on the doorstep of prosperity.

  CURIOSITY, n. An objectionable quality of the female mind. The desire to know whether or not a woman is cursed with curiosity is one of the most active and insatiable passions of the masculine soul.

  CURSE, v. t. Energetically to belabor with a verbal slap-stick. This is an operation which in literature, particularly in the drama, is commonly fatal to the victim. Nevertheless, the liability to a cursing is a risk that cuts but a small figure in fixing the rates of life insurance.

  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 cynic’s eyes to improve his vision.

  D

  DAMN, v. A word formerly much used by the Paphlagonians, the meaning of which is lost. By the learned Dr. Dolabelly Gak it is believed to have been a term of satisfaction, implying the highest possible degree of mental tranquillity. Professor Groke, on the contrary, thinks it expressed an emotion of tumultuous delight, because it so frequently occurs in combination with the word jod or god, meaning “joy.” It would be with great diffidence that I should advance an opinion conflicting with that of either of these formidable authorities.

  DANCE, v. i. To leap about to the sound of tittering music, preferably with arms about your neighbor’s wife or daughter. There are many kinds of dances, but all those requiring the participation of the two sexes have two characteristics in common: they are conspicuously innocent, and warmly loved by the vicious.

  DANGER, n.

  A savage beast which, when it sleeps,

  Man girds at and despises,

  But takes himself away by leaps

  And bounds when it arises.

  Ambat Delaso.

  DARING, n. One of the most conspicuous qualities of a man in security.

  DATARY, n. A high ecclesiastic official of the Roman Catholic Church, whose important function is to brand the Pope’s bulls with the words Datum Romæ. He enjoys a princely revenue and the friendship of God.

  DAWN, n. The time when men of reason go 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.

  DAY, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent. This period is divided into two parts, the day proper and the night, or day improper—the former devoted to sins of business, the latter consecrated to the other sort. These two kinds of social activity overlap.

  DEAD, adj.

  Done with the work of breathing; done

  With all the world; the mad race run

  Though to the end; the golden goal

  Attained and found to be a hole!

  Squatol Johnes.

  DEBAUCHEE, n. One who has so earnestly pursued pleasure
that he has had the misfortune to overtake it.

  DEBT, n. An ingenious substitute for the chain and whip of the slave-driver.

  As, pent in an aquarium, the troutlet

  Swims round and round his tank to find an outlet,

  Pressing his nose against the glass that holds him,

  Nor ever sees the prison that enfolds him;

  So the poor debtor, seeing naught around him,

  Yet feels the narrow limits that impound him,

  Grieves at his debt and studies to evade it,

  And finds at last he might as well have paid it.

  Barlow S. Vode.

  DECALOGUE, n. A series of commandments, ten in number—just enough to permit an intelligent selection for observance, but not enough to embarrass the choice. Following is the revised edition of the Decalogue, calculated for this meridian.

  Thou shalt no God but me adore:

  ’Twere too expensive to have more.

  No images nor idols make

  For Robert Ingersoll to break.

  Take not God’s name in vain; select

  A time when it will have effect.

  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.

  Kill not, abet not those who kill;

  Thou shalt not pay thy butcher’s bill.

  Kiss not thy neighbor’s wife, unless

  Thine own thy neighbor doth caress.

  Don’t steal; thou’lt never thus compete

  Successfully in business. Cheat.

  Bear not false witness—that is low—

  But “hear ’tis rumored so and so.”

  Cover thou naught that thou hast not

  By hook or crook, or somehow, got.

  G. J.

  DECIDE, v. i. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.

  A leaf was riven from a tree,

  “I mean to fall to earth,” said he.

  The west wind, rising, made him veer.

  “Eastward,” said he, “I now shall steer.”

  The east wind rose with greater force.

  Said he: “’Twere wise to change my course.”

  With equal power they contend.

  He said: “My judgment I suspend.”

  Down died the winds; the leaf, elate,