n. An incombustible mineral substance which, woven into cloth, was formerly much used for making shrouds for the dead. It is no longer believed that the soul will be permitted to wear the body's cerements, and asbestine shrouds have gone out of fashion.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. A certain engaging quality to which women attain by long study and severe practice upon the admiring male, who is pleased to fancy it resembles the candid simplicity of his young.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. This word has no definition. Its origin is related as follows by the ingenious Father Gassalasca Jape, S.J.
One day a wag—what would the wretch be at?—
Shifted a letter of the cipher RAT,
And said it was a god's name! Straight arose
Fantastic priests and postulants (with shows,
And mysteries, and mummeries, and hymns,
And disputations dire that lamed their limbs)
To serve his temple and maintain the fires,
Expound the law, manipulate the wires.
Amazed, the populace the rites attend,
Believe whate'er they cannot comprehend,
And, inly edified to learn that two
Half-hairs joined so and so (as Art can do)
Have sweeter values and a grace more fit
Than Nature's hairs that never have been split,
Bring cates and wines for sacrificial feasts,
And sell their garments to support the priests.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
One day a wag—what would the wretch be at?—
Shifted a letter of the cipher RAT,
And said it was a god's name! Straight arose
Fantastic priests and postulants (with shows,
And mysteries, and mummeries, and hymns,
And disputations dire that lamed their limbs)
To serve his temple and maintain the fires,
Expound the law, manipulate the wires.
Amazed, the populace the rites attend,
Believe whate'er they cannot comprehend,
And, inly edified to learn that two
Half-hairs joined so and so (as Art can do)
Have sweeter values and a grace more fit
Than Nature's hairs that never have been split,
Bring cates and wines for sacrificial feasts,
And sell their garments to support the priests.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. A kind of cosmetic greatly affected by the ladies, whom it greatly affects in turn.
"Eat arsenic? Yes, all you get,"
Consenting, he did speak up;
"'Tis better you should eat it, pet,
Than put it in my teacup."
—Joel Huck
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
"Eat arsenic? Yes, all you get,"
Consenting, he did speak up;
"'Tis better you should eat it, pet,
Than put it in my teacup."
—Joel Huck
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
v.t. Formally to detain one accused of unusualness.
God made the world in six days and was arrested on the seventh.
—The Unauthorized Version
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
God made the world in six days and was arrested on the seventh.
—The Unauthorized Version
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. (In deference to the feelings of a large and worthy class of our subscribers and advertisers, the definition of this word is withheld.)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
pp. Drawn up and given an orderly disposition, as a rioter hanged to a lamp-post.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. A class of non-producers who defend the nation by devouring everything likely to tempt an enemy to invade.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. Government by the best men. (In this sense the word is obsolete; so is that kind of government.) Fellows that wear downy hats and clean shirts—guilty of education and suspected of bank accounts.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. An instrument of torture for violently unkinking the small intestine of that religious persecutor, the Pope. (Local.)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. In politics, an imaginary rat-pit in which the statesman wrestles with his record.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. One who drafts a plan of your house, and plans a draft of your money.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. An ecclesiastical dignitary one point holier than a bishop.
If I were a jolly archbishop,
On Fridays I'd eat all the fish up—
Salmon and flounders and smelts;
On other days everything else.
—Jodo Rem
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
If I were a jolly archbishop,
On Fridays I'd eat all the fish up—
Salmon and flounders and smelts;
On other days everything else.
—Jodo Rem
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n.
1.A modern device for promoting strife by substituting for an original dispute a score of inevitable disagreements as to the manner of submitting it for settlement.
2.A patent medicine for allaying international heat, designed to supersede the old-school treatment of blood-letting. It makes the unsuccessful party to the dispute hate two or more nations instead of one—to the unspeakable advantage of peace.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
1.A modern device for promoting strife by substituting for an original dispute a score of inevitable disagreements as to the manner of submitting it for settlement.
2.A patent medicine for allaying international heat, designed to supersede the old-school treatment of blood-letting. It makes the unsuccessful party to the dispute hate two or more nations instead of one—to the unspeakable advantage of peace.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
, n. A scourge created in order that the wicked may torture us by mispronouncing his tribal designation. For our sins they call it Ay-rab.
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
n. A piece of cloth worn in front to keep the clothes from soiling the hands.
She wore an apron ('tis a thing I loathe),
A dress beneath—a corset á la mode.
No further seek her merits to disclothe,
Nor draw her frailties from their dread abode.
—Gray
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
She wore an apron ('tis a thing I loathe),
A dress beneath—a corset á la mode.
No further seek her merits to disclothe,
Nor draw her frailties from their dread abode.
—Gray
(also: The Devil's Dictionary)
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