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EAT, v. i. To perform successively (and successfully) the functions of mastication, humectation, and deglutition.
EAVESDROP, v. i. Secretly to overhear a catalogue of the crimes and vices of another or yourself.
ECCENTRICITY, n. A method of distinction so cheap that fools employ it to accentuate their incapacity. ECONOMY, n. Purchasing the barrel of whiskey that you do not need for the price of the cow that you cannot afford. EDIBLE, adj. Good to eat, and wholesome to digest, as a worm to a toad, a toad to a snake, a snake to a pig, a pig to a man, and a man to a worm. EDITOR, n. A person who combines the judicial functions of Minos, Rhadamanthus and Aeacus, but is placable with an obolus; a severely virtuous censor, but so charitable withal that he tolerates the virtues of others and the vices of himself; who flings about him the splintering lightning and sturdy thunders of admonition till he resembles a bunch of firecrackers petulantly uttering his mind at the tail of a dog; then straightway murmurs a mild, melodious lay, soft as the cooing of a donkey intoning its prayer to the evening star. Master of mysteries and lord of law, high-pinnacled upon the throne of thought, his face suffused with the dim splendors of the Transfiguration, his legs intertwisted and his tongue a-cheek, the editor spills his will along the paper and cuts it off in lengths to suit. And at intervals from behind the veil of the temple is heard the voice of the foreman demanding three inches of wit and six lines of religious meditation, or bidding him turn off the wisdom and whack up some pathos.
EDUCATION, n. That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding. EFFECT, n. The second of two phenomena which always occur together in the same order. The first, called a Cause, is said to generate the other – which is no more sensible than it would be for one who has never seen a dog except in the pursuit of a rabbit to declare the rabbit the cause of a dog. EGOTIST, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.
EJECTION, n. An approved remedy for the disease of garrulity. It is also much used in cases of extreme poverty. ELECTOR, n. One who enjoys the sacred privilege of voting for the man of another man's choice. ELECTRICITY, n. The power that causes all natural phenomena not known to be caused by something else. It is the same thing as lightning, and its famous attempt to strike Dr. Franklin is one of the most picturesque incidents in that great and good man's career. The memory of Dr. Franklin is justly held in great reverence, particularly in France, where a waxen effigy of him was recently on exhibition, bearing the following touching account of his life and services to science:
ELOQUENCE, n. The art of orally persuading fools that white is the color that it appears to be. It includes the gift of making any color appear white.
The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, online at Fun-With-Words.com.
The second, which we recommend highly, is The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, which has about 1,600 citations.
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