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| author | Charles.Forsyth <devnull@localhost> | 2006-12-22 20:52:35 +0000 |
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| committer | Charles.Forsyth <devnull@localhost> | 2006-12-22 20:52:35 +0000 |
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diff --git a/lib/ebooks/devils/R.html b/lib/ebooks/devils/R.html new file mode 100644 index 00000000..915a3506 --- /dev/null +++ b/lib/ebooks/devils/R.html @@ -0,0 +1,728 @@ +<?xml version="1.0"?> +<!DOCTYPE package PUBLIC "+//ISBN 0-9673008-1-9//DTD OEB 1.0 Package//EN" + "http://openebook.org/dtds/oeb-1.0/oebdoc1.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/x-oeb1-document; charset=utf-8" /> +<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/x-oeb1-css" href="devil.css" /> +<title>The Devil’s Dictionary: R</title> +</head> +<body lang="en-US"> + + + +<h1>R</h1> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rabble</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In a +republic, those who exercise a supreme authority tempered by fraudulent +elections. The rabble is like the sacred Simurgh, of Arabian fable—omnipotent +on condition that it do nothing. (The word is Aristocratese, and has no exact +equivalent in our tongue, but means, as nearly as may be, “soaring swine.”)</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rack</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An +argumentative implement formerly much used in persuading devotees of a false +faith to embrace the living truth. As a call to the unconverted the rack never +had any particular efficacy, and is now held in light popular esteem.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rank</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Relative +elevation in the scale of human worth.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">He held at court a rank so high</p> +<p class="poetry">That other noblemen asked why.</p> +<p class="poetry">“Because,” ‘twas answered, “others lack</p> +<p class="poetry">His skill to scratch the royal back.”</p> +<p class="citeauth">Aramis Jukes</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ransom</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +purchase of that which neither belongs to the seller, nor can belong to the +buyer. The most unprofitable of investments.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rapacity</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Providence +without industry. The thrift of power.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rarebit</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +Welsh rabbit, in the speech of the humorless, who point out that it is not a +rabbit. To whom it may be solemnly explained that the comestible known as +toad-in-a-hole is really not a toad, and that <i>riz-de-veau +a la financiere</i> is not the smile of a calf prepared after the recipe +of a she banker.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rascal</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A fool +considered under another aspect.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rascality</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Stupidity +militant. The activity of a clouded intellect.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rash</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Insensible +to the value of our advice.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">“Now lay your bet with mine, nor let</p> +<p class="poetry">These gamblers take your cash.”</p> +<p class="poetry">“Nay, this child makes no bet.” “Great snakes!</p> +<p class="poetry">How can you be so rash?”</p> +<p class="citeauth">Bootle P. Gish</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rational</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Devoid +of all delusions save those of observation, experience and reflection.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rattlesnake</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Our +prostrate brother, <i>Homo ventrambulans</i>.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">razor</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An +instrument used by the Caucasian to enhance his beauty, by the Mongolian to make +a guy of himself, and by the Afro-American to affirm his worth.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reach</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +radius of action of the human hand. The area within which it is possible (and +customary) to gratify directly the propensity to provide.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">This is a truth, as old as the hills,</p> +<p class="poetry">That life and experience teach:</p> +<p class="poetry">The poor man suffers that keenest of ills,</p> +<p class="poetry">An impediment of his reach.</p> +<p class="citeauth">G. J.</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reading</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +general body of what one reads. In our country it consists, as a rule, of +Indiana novels, short stories in “dialect” and humor in slang.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">We know by one’s reading</p> +<p class="poetry">His learning and breeding;</p> +<p class="poetry">By what draws his laughter</p> +<p class="poetry">We know his Hereafter.</p> +<p class="poetry">Read nothing, laugh never—</p> +<p class="poetry">The Sphinx was less clever!</p> +<p class="citeauth">Jupiter Muke</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">radicalsim</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +conservatism of to-morrow injected into the affairs of to-day.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">radium</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +mineral that gives off heat and stimulates the organ that a scientist is a fool +with.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">railroad</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +chief of many mechanical devices enabling us to get away from where we are to +wher we are no better off. For this purpose the railroad is held in highest +favor by the optimist, for it permits him to make the transit with great expedition.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ramshackle</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Pertaining +to a certain order of architecture, otherwise known as the Normal American. Most +of the public buildings of the United States are of the Ramshackle order, +though some of our earlier architects preferred the Ironic. Recent additions to +the White House in Washington are Theo-Doric, the ecclesiastic order of the +Dorians. They are exceedingly fine and cost one hundred dollars a brick.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">realism</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +art of depicting nature as it is seem by toads. The charm suffusing a landscape +painted by a mole, or a story written by a measuring-worm.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reality</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +dream of a mad philosopher. That which would remain in the cupel if one should +assay a phantom. The nucleus of a vacuum.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">really</span>, <span class="pos">adv.</span> Apparently.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rear</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In +American military matters, that exposed part of the army that is nearest to Congress.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reason</span>, <span class="pos">v.i.</span> To +weight probabilities in the scales of desire.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reason</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Propensitate of prejudice.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reasonable</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Accessible +to the infection of our own opinions. </p> + +<p>Hospitable to persuasion, dissuasion and evasion.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rebel</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +proponent of a new misrule who has failed to establish it.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">recollect</span>, <span class="pos">v.</span> To +recall with additions something not previously known.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reconciliation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> +A suspension of hostilities. An armed truce for the purpose of digging up the dead.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reconsider</span>, <span class="pos">v.</span> To +seek a justification for a decision already made.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">recount</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In +American politics, another throw of the dice, accorded to the player against +whom they are loaded.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">recreation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +particular kind of dejection to relieve a general fatigue.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">recruit</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +person distinguishable from a civilian by his uniform and from a soldier by his gait.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">Fresh from the farm or factory or street,</p> + +<p class="poetry">His marching, in pursuit or in retreat,</p> +<p class="poetry">Were an impressive martial spectacle</p> +<p class="poetry">Except for two impediments—his feet.</p> + +<p class="citeauth">Thompson Johnson</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rector</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In the +Church of England, the Third Person of the parochial Trinity, the Cruate and +the Vicar being the other two.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">redemption</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Deliverance +of sinners from the penalty of their sin, through their murder of the deity +against whom they sinned. The doctrine of Redemption is the fundamental mystery +of our holy religion, and whoso believeth in it shall not perish, but have +everlasting life in which to try to understand it.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">We must awake Man’s spirit from his sin,</p> +<p class="poetry">And take some special measure for redeeming it;</p> +<p class="poetry">Though hard indeed the task to get it in</p> +<p class="poetry">Among the angels any way but teaming it,</p> +<p class="poetry">Or purify it otherwise than steaming it.</p> +<p class="poetry">I’m awkward at Redemption—a beginner:</p> +<p class="poetry">My method is to crucify the sinner.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Golgo Brone</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">redress</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Reparation +without satisfaction.</p> + +<p>Among the Anglo-Saxon a subject conceiving himself wronged by the king was permitted, on +proving his injury, to beat a brazen image of the royal offender with a switch +that was afterward applied to his own naked back. The latter rite was performed +by the public hangman, and it assured moderation in the plaintiff’s choice of a switch.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">red-skin</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +North American Indian, whose skin is not red—at least not on the outside.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">redundant</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Superfluous; +needless; <i>de trop</i>.</p> + +<div class="poem">The Sultan said: “There’s evidence abundant<br /> +To prove this unbelieving dog redundant.”<br /> +To whom the Grand Vizier, with mien impressive,<br /> +Replied: “His head, at least, appears excessive.”<br /> +<p class="citeauth">Habeeb Suleiman</p> +</div> + +<p class="quote">Mr. Debs is a redundant citizen. Theodore Roosevelt</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">referendum</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +law for submission of proposed legislation to a popular vote to learn the +nonsensus of public opinion.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reflection</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An +action of the mind whereby we obtain a clearer view of our relation to the +things of yesterday and are able to avoid the perils that we shall not again encounter.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reform</span>, <span class="pos">v.</span> A thing +that mostly satisfies reformers opposed to reformation.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">refuge</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Anything +assuring protection to one in peril. Moses and Joshua provided six cities of +refuge—Bezer, Golan, Ramoth, Kadesh, Schekem and Hebron—to which one who had +taken life inadvertently could flee when hunted by relatives of the deceased. This +admirable expedient supplied him with wholesome exercise and enabled them to +enjoy the pleasures of the chase; whereby the soul of the dead man was +appropriately honored by observations akin to the funeral games of early +Greece.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">refusal</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Denial +of something desired; as an elderly maiden’s hand in marriage, to a rich and +handsome suitor; a valuable franchise to a rich corporation, by an alderman; +absolution to an impenitent king, by a priest, and so forth. Refusals are +graded in a descending scale of finality thus: the refusal absolute, the +refusal condition, the refusal tentative and the refusal feminine. The last is +called by some casuists the refusal assentive.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">regalia</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Distinguishing +insignia, jewels and costume of such ancient and honorable orders as Knights of +Adam; Visionaries of Detectable Bosh; the Ancient Order of Modern Troglodytes; +the League of Holy Humbug; the Golden Phalanx of Phalangers; the Genteel +Society of Expurgated Hoodlums; the Mystic Alliances of Georgeous Regalians; Knights and Ladies +of the Yellow Dog; the Oriental Order of Sons of the West; the Blatherhood of +Insufferable Stuff; Warriors of the Long Bow; Guardians of the Great Horn +Spoon; the Band of Brutes; the Impenitent Order of Wife-Beaters; the Sublime Legion +of Flamboyant Conspicuants; Worshipers at the Electroplated Shrine; Shining +Inaccessibles; Fee-Faw-Fummers of the inimitable Grip; Jannissaries of the +Broad-Blown Peacock; Plumed Increscencies of the Magic Temple; the Grand Cabal +of Able-Bodied Sedentarians; Associated Deities of the Butter Trade; the Garden +of Galoots; the Affectionate Fraternity of Men Similarly Warted; the Flashing +Astonishers; Ladies of Horror; Cooperative Association for Breaking into the Spotlight; Dukes of Eden; +Disciples Militant of the Hidden Faith; Knights-Champions of the Domestic Dog; the Holy +Gregarians; the Resolute Optimists; the Ancient Sodality of Inhospitable Hogs; +Associated Sovereigns of Mendacity; Dukes-Guardian of the Mystic Cess-Pool; the Society for +Prevention of Prevalence; Kings of Drink; +Polite Federation of Gents-Consequential; the Mysterious Order of the +Undecipherable Scroll; Uniformed Rank of Lousy Cats; Monarchs of Worth and +Hunger; Sons of the South Star; Prelates of the Tub-and-Sword.</p> + +<p id="religion" class="entry"><span class="def">religion</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.</p> + +<span class="dialoge"> +<p>“What is your religion my son?” inquired the Archbishop of Rheims.</p> +<p>“Pardon, monseigneur,” replied Rochebriant; “I am ashamed of it.”</p> +<p>“Then why do you not become an atheist?”</p> +<p>“Impossible! I should be ashamed of atheism.”</p> +<p>“In that case, monseiegneur, you should join the Protestants.”</p> +</span> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reliquary</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +receptacle for such sacred objects as pieces of the true cross, short-ribs of +the saints, the ears of Balaam’s ass, the lung of the cock that called Peter to +repentance and so forth. Reliquaries are commonly of metal, and provided with a +lock to prevent the contents from coming out and performing miracles at +unseasonable times. A feather from the wing of the Angel of the Annunciation +once escaped during a sermon in Saint Peter’s and so tickled the noses of the +congregation that they woke and sneezed with great vehemence three times each. It +is related in the “Gesta Sanctorum” that a sacristan in the Canterbury +cathedral surprised the head of Saint Dennis in the library. Reprimanded by its +stern custodian, it explained that it was seeking a body of doctrine. This +unseemly levity so raged the diocesan that the offender was publicly +anathematized, thrown into the Stour and replaced by another head of Saint +Dennis, brought from Rome.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">renown</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +degree of distinction between notoriety and fame—a little more supportable than +the one and a little more intolerable than the other. Sometimes it is conferred +by an unfriendly and inconsiderate hand.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">I touched the harp in every key,</p> +<p class="poetry">But found no heeding ear;</p> +<p class="poetry">And then Ithuriel touched me</p> +<p class="poetry">With a revealing spear.</p> +<p class="poetry">Not all my genius, great as ‘tis,</p> +<p class="poetry">Could urge me out of night.</p> +<p class="poetry">I felt the faint appulse of his,</p> +<p class="poetry">And leapt into the light!</p> +<p class="citeauth">W. J. Candleton</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reparation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Satisfaction +that is made for a wrong and deducted from the satisfaction felt in committing it.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">repartee</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Prudent +insult in retort. Practiced by gentlemen with a constitutional aversion to +violence, but a strong disposition to offend. In a war of words, the tactics of +the North American Indian.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">repentance</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +faithful attendant and follower of Punishment. It is usually manifest in a +degree of reformation that is not inconsistent with continuity of sin.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">Desirous to avoid the pains of Hell,</p> +<p class="poetry">You will repent and join the Church, Parnell?</p> +<p class="poetry">How needless!—Nick will keep you off the coals +And add you to the woes of other souls.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Jomater Abemy</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">replica</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +reproduction of a work of art, by the artist that made the original. It is so +called to distinguish it from a “copy,” which is made by another artist. When +the two are mae with equal skill the replica is the more valuable, for it is +supposed to be more beautiful than it looks.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reporter</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +writer who guesses his way to the truth and dispels it with a tempest of words.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">“More dear than all my bosom knows, O thou Whose ‘lips are sealed’ and will not disavow!” So +sang the blithe reporter-man as grew Beneath his hand the leg-long “interview.”</p> +<p class="citeauth">Barson Maith</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">repose</span>, <span class="pos">v.i.</span> To +cease from troubling.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">representative</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> +In national politics, a member of the Lower House in this world, and without +discernible hope of promotion in the next.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reprobation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In +theology, the state of a luckless mortal prenatally damned. The doctrine of +reprobation was taught by Calvin, whose joy in it was somewhat marred by the +sad sincerity of his conviction that although some are foredoomed to perdition, +others are predestined to salvation.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">republic</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +nation in which, the thing governing and the thing governed being the same, +there is only a permitted authority to enforce an optional obedience. In a +republic, the foundation of public order is the ever lessening habit of +submission inherited from ancestors who, being truly governed, submitted +because they had to. There are as many kinds of republics as there are +graduations between the despotism whence they came and the anarchy whither they +lead.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">requiem</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A mass +for the dead which the minor poets assure us the winds sing o’er the graves of +their favorites. Sometimes, by way of providing a varied entertainment, they sing a dirge.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">resident</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Unable +to leave.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">resign</span>, <span class="pos">v.t.</span> To +renounce an honor for an advantage. To renounce an advantage for a greater advantage.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">‘Twas rumored Leonard Wood had signed</p> +<p class="poetry">A true renunciation</p> +<p class="poetry">Of title, rank and every kind</p> +<p class="poetry">Of military station—</p> +<p class="poetry">Each honorable station.</p> +<p class="poetry">By his example fired—inclined</p> +<p class="poetry">To noble emulation,</p> +<p class="poetry">The country humbly was resigned</p> +<p class="poetry">To Leonard’s resignation—</p> +<p class="poetry">His Christian resignation.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Politian Greame</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">resolute</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Obstinate +in a course that we approve.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">respectability</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> +The offspring of a <i>liaison</i> between a bald head and a bank account.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">respirator</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An +apparatus fitted over the nose and mouth of an inhabitant of London, whereby to +filter the visible universe in its passage to the lungs.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">respite</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +suspension of hostilities against a sentenced assassin, to enable the Executive +to determine whether the murder may not have been done by the prosecuting +attorney. Any break in the continuity of a disagreeable expectation.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">Altgeld upon his incandescend bed</p> +<p class="poetry">Lay, an attendant demon at his head.</p> +<p class="poetry">“O cruel cook, pray grant me some relief—</p> +<p class="poetry">Some respite from the roast, however brief.”</p> +<p class="poetry">“Remember how on earth I pardoned all Your friends in Illinois when held in thrall.”</p> +<p class="poetry">“Unhappy soul! for that alone you squirm O’er fire unquenched, a never-dying worm.</p> +<p class="poetry">“Yet, for I pity your uneasy state,</p> +<p class="poetry">Your doom I’ll mollify and pains abate.</p> +<p class="poetry">“Naught, for a season, shall your comfort mar,</p> +<p class="poetry">Not even the memory of who you are.”</p> +<p class="poetry">Throughout eternal space dread silence fell;</p> +<p class="poetry">Heaven trembled as Compassion entered Hell.</p> +<p class="poetry">“As long, sweet demon, let my respite be As, governing down here, I’d respite thee.”</p> +<p class="poetry">“As long, poor soul, as any of the pack You thrust from jail consumed in getting back.”</p> +<p class="poetry">A genial chill affected Altgeld’s hide While they were turning him on t’other side.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Joel Spate Woop</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">resplendent</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Like +a simple American citizen beduking himself in his lodge, or affirming his +consequence in the Scheme of Things as an elemental unit of a parade.</p> + +<p class="cite">The Knights of +Dominion were so resplendent in their velvet- and-gold that their masters would +hardly have known them. “Chronicles of the Classes”</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">respond</span>, <span class="pos">v.i.</span> To +make answer, or disclose otherwise a consciousness of having inspired an interest +in what Herbert Spencer calls “external coexistences,” as Satan “squat like a +toad” at the ear of Eve, responded to the touch of the angel’s spear. To +respond in damages is to contribute to the maintenance of the plaintiff’s +attorney and, incidentally, to the gratification of the plaintiff.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">responsibility</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> +A detachable burden easily shifted to the shoulders of God, Fate, Fortune, Luck +or one’s neighbor. In the days of astrology it was customary to unload it upon a star.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">Alas, things ain’t what we should see</p> +<p class="poetry">If Eve had let that apple be;</p> +<p class="poetry">And many a feller which had ought</p> +<p class="poetry">To set with monarchses of thought,</p> +<p class="poetry">Or play some rosy little game</p> +<p class="poetry">With battle-chaps on fields of fame,</p> +<p class="poetry">Is downed by his unlucky star</p> +<p class="poetry">And hollers: “Peanuts!—here you are!”</p> +<p class="citeauth">“The Sturdy Beggar”</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">restitutions</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +founding or endowing of universities and public libraries by gift or bequest.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">restitutor</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Benefactor; +philanthropist.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">retaliation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +natural rock upon which is reared the Temple of Law.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">retribution</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +rain of fire-and-brimstone that falls alike upon the just and such of the +unjust as have not procured shelter by evicting them.</p> + +<p>In the lines following, addressed to an Emperor in exile by Father Gassalasca Jape, the +reverend poet appears to hint his sense of the improduence of turning about to +face Retribution when it is talking exercise:</p> + +<p>What, what! Dom Pedro, you desire to go</p> + +<p>Back to Brazil to end your days in quiet?</p> + +<p>Why, what assurance have you ‘twould be so?</p> + +<p>‘Tis not so long since you were in a riot,</p> + +<p>And your dear subjects showed a will to fly at</p> + +<p>Your throat and shake you like a rat. You know That empires are ungrateful; are you certain +Republics are less handy to get hurt in?</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reveille</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +signal to sleeping soldiers to dream of battlefields no more, but get up and +have their blue noses counted. In the American army it is ingeniously called +“rev-e-lee,” and to that pronunciation our countrymen have pledged their lives, +their misfortunes and their sacred dishonor.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">revelation</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +famous book in which St. John the Divine concealed all that he knew. The +revealing is done by the commentators, who know nothing.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">reverence</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The +spiritual attitude of a man to a god and a dog to a man.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">review</span>, <span class="pos">v.t.</span></p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">To set your wisdom (holding not a doubt of it,</p> +<p class="poetry">Although in truth there’s neither bone nor skin to it)</p> +<p class="poetry">At work upon a book, and so read out of it</p> +<p class="poetry">The qualities that you have first read into it.</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">revolution</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In +politics, an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment. Specifically, in +American history, the substitution of the rule of an Administration for that of +a Ministry, whereby the welfare and happiness of the people were advanced a +full half-inch. Revolutions are usually accompanied by a considerable effusion +of blood, but are accounted worth it—this appraisement being made by +beneficiaries whose blood had not the mischance to be shed. The French +revolution is of incalculable value to the Socialist of to-day; when he pulls +the string actuating its bones its gestures are inexpressibly terrifying to +gory tyrants suspected of fomenting law and order.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rhadomancer</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> One +who uses a divining-rod in prospecting for precious metals in the pocket of a fool.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ribaldry</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Censorious +language by another concerning oneself.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ribroaster</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Censorious +language by oneself concerning another. The word is of classical refinement, +and is even said to have been used in a fable by Georgius Coadjutor, one of the +most fastidious writers of the fifteenth century—commonly, indeed, regarded as +the founder of the Fastidiotic School.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rice-water</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +mystic beverage secretly used by our most popular novelists and poets to +regulate the imagination and narcotize the conscience. It is said to be rich in +both obtundite and lethargine, and is brewed in a midnight fog by a fat which +of the Dismal Swamp.</p> + +<p id="rich" class="entry"><span class="def">rich</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> Holding +in trust and subject to an accounting the property of the indolent, the +incompetent, the unthrifty, the envious and the luckless. That is the view that +prevails in the underworld, where the Brotherhood of Man finds its most logical +development and candid advocacy. To denizens of the midworld the word means +good and wise.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">riches</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span></p> + +<p class="cite">A gift from Heaven signifying, “This is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased.” John D. Rockefeller</p> + +<p class="cite">The reward of toil and virtue. J.P. Morgan</p> + +<p class="cite">The sayings of many in the hands of one. Eugene Debs</p> + +<p class="indentpara">To these excellent definitions the inspired lexicographer feels that he can add nothing of value.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ridicule</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Words +designed to show that the person of whom they are uttered is devoid of the +dignity of character distinguishing him who utters them. It may be graphic, +mimetic or merely rident. Shaftesbury is quoted as having pronounced it the +test of truth—a ridiculous assertion, for many a solemn fallacy has undergone +centuries of ridicule with no abatement of its popular acceptance. What, for +example, has been more valorously derided than the doctrine of Infant +Respectability?</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">right</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Legitimate +authority to be, to do or to have; as the right to be a king, the right to do +one’s neighbor, the right to have measles, and the like. The first of these +rights was once universally believed to be derived directly from the will of +God; and this is still sometimes affirmed <i>in +partibus infidelium</i> outside the enlightened realms of Democracy; as +the well known lines of Sir Abednego Bink, following:</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">By what right, then, do royal rulers rule?</p> +<p class="poetry">Whose is the sanction of their state and pow’r?</p> +<p class="poetry">He surely were as stubborn as a mule</p> +<p class="poetry">Who, God unwilling, could maintain an hour +His uninvited session on the throne, or air +His pride securely in the Presidential chair.</p> +<p class="poetry">Whatever is is so by Right Divine;</p> +<p class="poetry">Whate’er occurs, God wills it so. Good land!</p> +<p class="poetry">It were a wondrous thing if His design</p> +<p class="poetry">A fool could baffle or a rogue withstand!</p> +<p class="poetry">If so, then God, Isay (intending no offence)</p> +<p class="poetry">Is guilty of contributory negligence.</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">righteousness</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +sturdy virtue that was once found among the Pantidoodles inhabiting the lower +part of the peninsula of Oque. Some feeble attempts were made by returned +missionaries to introduce it into several European countries, but it appears to +have been imperfectly expounded. An example of this faulty exposition is found +in the only extant sermon of the pious Bishop Rowley, a characteristic passage +from which is here given:</p> + +<p>“Now righteousness consisteth not merely in a holy state of mind, nor yet in performance of +religious rites and obedience to the letter of the law. It is not enough that +one be pious and just: one must see to it that others also are in the same +state; and to this end compulsion is a proper means. Forasmuch as my injustice +may work ill to another, so by his injustice may evil be wrought upon still +another, the which it is as manifestly my duty to estop as to forestall mine +own tort. Wherefore if I would be righteous I am bound to restrain my neighbor, +by force if needful, in all those injurious enterprises from which, through a +better disposition and by the help of Heaven, I do myself restrain.”</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rime</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Agreeing +sounds in the terminals of verse, mostly bad. The verses themselves, as +distinguished from prose, mostly dull. Usually (and wickedly) spelled “rhyme.”</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rimer</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A poet +regarded with indifference or disesteem.</p> +<p class="poetry">The rimer quenches his unheeded fires,<br /> +The sound surceases and the sense expires.<br /> +Then the domestic dog, to east and west,<br /> +Expounds the passions burning in his breast.</p> +<p class="poetry">The rising moon o’er that enchanted land</p> +<p class="poetry">Pauses to hear and yearns to understand.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Mowbray Myles</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">riot</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A popular +entertainment given to the military by innocent bystanders.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">R.I.P.</span> A careless abbreviation of <i>requiescat in pace</i>, +attesting to indolent goodwill to the dead. According to the learned Dr. +Drigge, however, the letters originally meant nothing more than <i>reductus in pulvis</i>.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">riteE</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +religious or semi-religious ceremony fixed by law, precept or custom, with the +essential oil of sincerity carefully squeezed out of it.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ritualism</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +Dutch Garden of God where He may walk in rectilinear freedom, keeping off the +grass.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">road</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A strip +of land along which one may pass from where it is too tiresome to be to where +it is futile to go.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">All roads, howsoe’er they diverge, lead to Rome,<br /> +Whence, thank the good Lord, at least one leads back home.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Borey the Bald</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">robber</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +candid man of affairs.</p> + +<p class="indentpara">It is related of Voltaire that one night he and some traveling companion lodged at a wayside +inn. The surroundings were suggestive, and after supper they agreed to tell +robber stories in turn. “Once there was a Farmer-General of the Revenues.” Saying +nothing more, he was encouraged to continue. “That,” he said, “is the story.”</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">romance</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Fiction +that owes no allegiance to the God of Things as They Are. In the novel the +writer’s thought is tethered to probability, as a domestic horse to the +hitching-post, but in romance it ranges at will over the entire region of the +imagination—free, lawless, immune to bit and rein. Your novelist is a poor +creature, as Carlyle might say—a mere reporter. He may invent his characters +and plot, but he must not imagine anything taking place that might not occur, +albeit his entire narrative is candidly a lie. Why he imposes this hard +condition on himself, and “drags at each remove a lengthening chain” of his own +forging he can explain in ten thick volumes without illuminating by so much as +a candle’s ray the black profound of his own ignorance of the matter. There are +great novels, for great writers have “laid waste their powers” to write them, +but it remains true that far and away the most fascinating fiction that we have +is “The Thousand and One Nights.”</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rope</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> An +obsolescent appliance for reminding assassins that they too are mortal. It is +put about the neck and remains in place one’s whole life long. It has been +largely superseded by a more complex electrical device worn upon another part +of the person; and this is rapidly giving place to an apparatus known as the +preachment.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rostrum</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> In +Latin, the beak of a bird or the prow of a ship. In America, a place from which +a candidate for office energetically expounds the wisdom, virtue and power of +the rabble.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">roundhead</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +member of the Parliamentarian party in the English civil war—so called from his +habit of wearing his hair short, whereas his enemy, the Cavalier, wore his +long. There were other points of difference between them, but the fashion in +hair was the fundamental cause of quarrel. The Cavaliers were royalists because +the king, an indolent fellow, found it more convenient to let his hair grow +than to wash his neck. This the Roundheads, who were mostly barbers and +soap-boilers, deemed an injury to trade, and the royal neck was therefore the +object of their particular indignation. Descendants of the belligerents now +wear their hair all alike, but the fires of animosity enkindled in that ancient +strife smoulder to this day beneath the snows of British civility.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rubbish</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Worthless +matter, such as the religions, philosophies, literatures, arts and sciences of +the tribes infesting the regions lying due south from Boreaplas.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">ruin</span>, <span class="pos">v.</span> To +destroy. Specifically, to destroy a maid’s belief in the virtue of maids.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rum</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Generically, +fiery liquors that produce madness in total abstainers.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">rumor</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +favorite weapon of the assassins of character.</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<p class="poetry">Sharp, irresistible by mail or shield,</p> +<p class="poetry">By guard unparried as by flight unstayed,</p> +<p class="poetry">O serviceable Rumor, let me wield</p> +<p class="poetry">Against my enemy no other blade.</p> +<p class="poetry">His be the terror of a foe unseen,</p> +<p class="poetry">His the inutile hand upon the hilt,</p> +<p class="poetry">And mine the deadly tongue, long, slender, keen,</p> +<p class="poetry">Hinting a rumor of some ancient guilt. So shall I slay the wretch without a blow, Spare me to +celebrate his overthrow, And nurse my valor for another foe.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Joel Buxter</p> +</div> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Russian</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A +person with a Caucasian body and a Mongolian soul. A Tartar Emetic.</p> + +</body> +</html>
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