This
week we are looking at words beginning with “B” from The Devil's Dictionary.
B
BAAL, n. An old deity formerly much worshiped under various
names. As Baal he was popular with the Phoenicians; as Belus or Bel he had the
honor to be served by the priest Berosus, who wrote the famous account of the
Deluge; as Babel he had a tower partly erected to his glory on the Plain of
Shinar. From Babel comes our English word "babble." Under whatever
name worshiped, Baal is the Sun-god. As Beelzebub he is the god of flies, which
are begotten of the sun's rays on the stagnant water. In Physicia Baal is still
worshiped as Bolus, and as Belly he is adored and served with abundant
sacrifice by the priests of Guttledom.
BABE or BABY, n. A misshapen creature of no
particular age, sex, or condition, chiefly remarkable for the violence of the
sympathies and antipathies it excites in others, itself without sentiment or
emotion. There have been famous babes; for example, little Moses, from whose
adventure in the bulrushes the Egyptian hierophants of seven centuries before
doubtless derived their idle tale of the child Osiris being preserved on a
floating lotus leaf.
Ere babes were invented
The girls were contended.
Now man is tormented
Until to buy babes he has squandered
His money.
And so I have pondered
This thing, and thought may be
'T were better that Baby
The First had been eagled or condored.
Ro Amil
BACCHUS, n. A convenient deity invented by the
ancients as an excuse for getting drunk.
Is public
worship, then, a sin,
That for
devotions paid to Bacchus
The lictors
dare to run us in,
And
resolutely thump and whack us?
Jorace
BACK, n. That part of your friend which it is your
privilege to contemplate in your adversity.
BACKBITE, v.t. To speak of a man as you find him
when he can't find you.
BAIT, n. A preparation that renders the hook more
palatable. The best kind is beauty.
BAPTISM, n. A sacred rite of such efficacy that he
who finds himself in heaven without having undergone it will be unhappy
forever. It is performed with water in two ways—by immersion, or plunging, and
by aspersion, or sprinkling.
But whether the plan of immersion
Is better than simple aspersion
Let those immersed
And those aspersed
Decide by the Authorized Version,
And by matching their agues tertian.
G.J.
BAROMETER, n. An ingenious instrument which
indicates what kind of weather we are having.
BARRACK, n. A house in which soldiers enjoy a
portion of that of which it is their business to deprive others.
BASILISK, n. The cockatrice. A sort of serpent
hatched form the egg of a cock. The basilisk had a bad eye, and its glance was
fatal. Many infidels deny this creature's existence, but Semprello Aurator saw
and handled one that had been blinded by lightning as a punishment for having
fatally gazed on a lady of rank whom Jupiter loved. Juno afterward restored the
reptile's sight and hid it in a cave. Nothing is so well attested by the
ancients as the existence of the basilisk, but the cocks have stopped laying.
BASTINADO, n. The act of walking on wood without
exertion.
BATH, n. A kind of mystic ceremony substituted for
religious worship, with what spiritual efficacy has not been determined.
The man who taketh a steam bath
He loseth all the skin he hath,
And, for he's boiled a brilliant red,
Thinketh to cleanliness he's wed,
Forgetting that his lungs he's soiling
With dirty vapors of the boiling.
Richard Gwow
BATTLE, n. A method of untying with the teeth of a
political knot that would not yield to the tongue.
BEARD, n. The hair that is commonly cut off by those
who justly execrate the absurd Chinese custom of shaving the head.
BEAUTY, n. The power by which a woman charms a lover
and terrifies a husband.
BEFRIEND, v.t. To make an ingrate.
BEG, v. To ask for something with an earnestness
proportioned to the belief that it will not be given.
Who is that, father?
A mendicant, child,
Haggard, morose, and unaffable—wild!
See how he glares through the bars of his
cell!
With Citizen Mendicant all is not well.
Why did they put him there, father?
Because
Obeying his belly he struck at the laws.
His belly?
Oh, well, he was starving, my
boy—
A state in which, doubtless, there's little
of joy.
No bite had he eaten for days, and his cry
Was "Bread!" ever
"Bread!"
What's the matter
with pie?
With little to wear, he had nothing to sell;
To beg was unlawful—improper as well.
Why didn't he work?
He would even have done that,
But men said:
"Get out!" and the State remarked: "Scat!"
I mention these incidents merely to show
That the vengeance he took was uncommonly
low.
Revenge, at the best, is the act of a Siou,
But for trifles—
Pray what did bad Mendicant
do?
Stole two loaves of bread to replenish his
lack
And tuck out the belly that clung to his
back.
Is that all father dear?
There's little to
tell:
They sent him to jail, and they'll send him
to—well,
The company's better than here we can boast,
And there's—
Bread for the needy, dear
father?
Um—toast.
Atka Mip
BEGGAR, n. One who has relied on the assistance of
his friends.
BEHAVIOR, n. Conduct, as determined, not by
principle, but by breeding. The word seems to be somewhat loosely used in Dr.
Jamrach Holobom's translation of the following lines from the Dies Irae:
Recordare, Jesu pie,
Quod sum causa tuae viae.
Ne me perdas illa die.
Pray remember, sacred Savior,
Whose the thoughtless hand that gave your
Death-blow.
Pardon such behavior.
BELLADONNA, n. In Italian a beautiful lady; in
English a deadly poison. A striking example of the essential identity of the
two tongues.
BENEDICTINES, n. An order of monks otherwise known
as black friars.
She thought it a crow, but it turn out to be
A monk of St. Benedict croaking a text.
"Here's one of an order of cooks,"
said she—
"Black friars in this world, fried
black in the next."
"The
Devil on Earth" (London, 1712)
BENEFACTOR, n. One who makes heavy purchases of
ingratitude, without, however, materially affecting the price, which is still
within the means of all.
BERENICE'S HAIR, n. A constellation (Coma Berenices)
named in honor of one who sacrificed her hair to save her husband.
Her locks an ancient lady gave
Her loving husband's life to save;
And men—they honored so the dame—
Upon some stars bestowed her name.
But to our modern married fair,
Who'd give their lords to save their hair,
No stellar recognition's given.
There are not stars enough in heaven.
G.J.
BIGAMY, n. A mistake in taste for which the wisdom
of the future will adjudge a punishment called trigamy.
BIGOT, n. One who is obstinately and zealously
attached to an opinion that you do not entertain.
BILLINGSGATE, n. The invective of an opponent.
BIRTH, n. The first and direst of all disasters. As
to the nature of it there appears to be no uniformity. Castor and Pollux were
born from the egg. Pallas came out of a skull. Galatea was once a block of
stone. Peresilis, who wrote in the tenth century, avers that he grew up out of
the ground where a priest had spilled holy water. It is known that Arimaxus was
derived from a hole in the earth, made by a stroke of lightning. Leucomedon was
the son of a cavern in Mount Aetna, and I have myself seen a man come out of a
wine cellar.
BLACKGUARD, n. A man whose qualities, prepared for
display like a box of berries in a market—the fine ones on top—have been opened
on the wrong side. An inverted gentleman.
BLANK-VERSE, n. Unrhymed iambic pentameters—the most
difficult kind of English verse to write acceptably; a kind, therefore, much
affected by those who cannot acceptably write any kind.
BODY-SNATCHER, n. A robber of grave-worms. One who
supplies the young physicians with that with which the old physicians have
supplied the undertaker. The hyena.
"One night," a doctor said,
"last fall,
I and my comrades, four in all,
When visiting a graveyard stood
Within the shadow of a wall.
"While waiting for the moon to sink
We saw a wild hyena slink
About a new-made grave, and then
Begin to excavate its brink!
"Shocked by the horrid act, we made
A sally from our ambuscade,
And, falling on the unholy beast,
Dispatched him with a pick and spade."
Bettel K. Jhones
BONDSMAN, n. A fool who, having property of his own,
undertakes to become responsible for that entrusted to another to a third.
Philippe of Orleans wishing to appoint one of his
favorites, a dissolute nobleman, to a high office, asked him what security he
would be able to give. "I need no bondsmen," he replied, "for I
can give you my word of honor." "And pray what may be the value of
that?" inquired the amused Regent. "Monsieur, it is worth its weight
in gold."
BORE, n. A person who talks when you wish him to
listen.
BOTANY, n. The science of vegetables—those that are
not good to eat, as well as those that are. It deals largely with their
flowers, which are commonly badly designed, inartistic in color, and
ill-smelling.
BOTTLE-NOSED, adj. Having a nose created in the
image of its maker.
BOUNDARY, n. In political geography, an imaginary
line between two nations, separating the imaginary rights of one from the
imaginary rights of the other.
BOUNTY, n. The liberality of one who has much, in
permitting one who has nothing to get all that he can.
A single swallow, it is said, devours ten
millions of insects
every year.
The supplying of these insects I take to be a signal
instance of the Creator's bounty in providing
for the lives of His
creatures.
Henry Ward Beecher
BRAHMA, n. He who created the Hindoos, who are
preserved by Vishnu and destroyed by Siva—a rather neater division of labor
than is found among the deities of some other nations. The Abracadabranese, for
example, are created by Sin, maintained by Theft and destroyed by Folly. The
priests of Brahma, like those of Abracadabranese, are holy and learned men who
are never naughty.
O Brahma, thou rare old Divinity,
First Person of the Hindoo Trinity,
You sit there so calm and securely,
With feet folded up so demurely—
You're the First Person Singular, surely.
Polydore Smith
BRAIN, n. An apparatus with which we think what we
think. That which distinguishes the man who is content to be something from the
man who wishes to do something. A man of great wealth, or one who has been
pitchforked into high station, has commonly such a headful of brain that his
neighbors cannot keep their hats on. In our civilization, and under our
republican form of government, brain is so highly honored that it is rewarded
by exemption from the cares of office.
BRANDY, n. A cordial composed of one part
thunder-and-lightning, one part remorse, two parts bloody murder, one part
death-hell-and-the grave and four parts clarified Satan. Dose, a headful all
the time. Brandy is said by Dr. Johnson to be the drink of heroes. Only a hero
will venture to drink it
.
BRIDE, n. A woman with a fine prospect of happiness
behind her.
BRUTE, n. See HUSBAND.
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