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diff --git a/lib/ebooks/devils/B.html b/lib/ebooks/devils/B.html new file mode 100644 index 00000000..d8d4e5b7 --- /dev/null +++ b/lib/ebooks/devils/B.html @@ -0,0 +1,398 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "+//ISBN 0-9673008-1-9//DTD OEB 1.0 Document//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: B</title> +</head> + +<body lang="en-US"> + +<h1>B</h1> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Baal,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">babe</span> or <span class="def">baby,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="poind3">Ere babes were invented</p> +<p class="poind3">The girls were contended.</p> +<p class="poind3">Now man is tormented</p> +<p class="po">Until to buy babes he has squandered</p> +<p class="po">His money. And so I have pondered</p> +<p class="poind3">This thing, and thought may be</p> +<p class="poind3">’T were better that Baby</p> +<p class="po">The First had been eagled or condored.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Ro Amil.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Bacchus,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A convenient +deity invented by the ancients as an excuse for getting drunk.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Is public worship, then, a sin,</p> +<p class="poind2">That for devotions paid to Bacchus</p> +<p class="po">The lictors dare to run us in,</p> +<p class="poind2">And resolutely thump and whack us?</p> +<p class="citeauth">Jorace.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">back,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> That part of your +friend which it is your privilege to contemplate in your adversity.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">backbite,</span> <span class="pos">v.t.</span> To speak of a man as +you find him when he can’t find you.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bait,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A preparation +that renders the hook more palatable. The best kind is beauty.</p> + +<p id="baptism" class="entry"><span class="def">baptism,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">But whether the plan of immersion</p> +<p class="po">Is better than simple aspersion</p> +<p class="poind1">Let those immersed</p> +<p class="poind1">And those aspersed</p> +<p class="po">Decide by the Authorized Version,</p> +<p class="po">And by matching their agues tertian.</p> +<p class="citeauth">G. J.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">barometer,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> An ingenious +instrument which indicates what kind of weather we are having.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">barrack,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A house in which +soldiers enjoy a portion of that of which it is their business to deprive others.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">basilisk,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bastinado,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> The act of walking +on wood without exertion.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bath,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A kind of mystic ceremony +substituted for religious worship, with what spiritual efficacy has not been determined.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">The man who taketh a steam bath</p> +<p class="po">He loseth all the skin he hath,</p> +<p class="po">And, for he’s boiled a brilliant red,</p> +<p class="po">Thinketh to cleanliness he’s wed,</p> +<p class="po">Forgetting that his lungs he’s soiling</p> +<p class="po">With dirty vapors of the boiling.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Richard Gwow.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">battle,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A method of untying +with the teeth of a political knot that would not yield to the tongue.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">beard,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> The hair that is commonly +cut off by those who justly execrate the absurd Chinese custom of shaving the head.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">beauty,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> The power by which a woman +charms a lover and terrifies a husband.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">befriend,</span> <span class="pos">v.t.</span> To make an ingrate.</p> + +<p class="entry" id="beg"><span class="def">beg,</span> <span class="pos">v.</span> To ask for something with +an earnestness proportioned to the belief that it will not be given.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Who is that, father?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">A mendicant, child,</p> +<p class="po">Haggard, morose, and unaffable—wild!</p> +<p class="po">See how he glares through the bars of his cell!</p> +<p class="po">With Citizen Mendicant all is not well.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Why did they put him there, father?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">Because</p> +<p class="po">Obeying his belly he struck at the laws.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">His belly?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">Oh, well, he was starving, my boy—</p> +<p class="po">A state in which, doubtless, there’s little of joy.</p> +<p class="po">No bite had he eaten for days, and his cry</p> +<p class="po">Was “Bread!” ever “Bread!”</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">What’s the matter with pie?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">With little to wear, he had nothing to sell;</p> +<p class="po">To beg was unlawful—improper as well.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Why didn’t he work?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">He would even have done that,</p> +<p class="po">But men said: “Get out!” and the State remarked:</p> +<p class="po">“Scat!”</p> +<p class="po">I mention these incidents merely to show</p> +<p class="po">That the vengeance he took was uncommonly low.</p> +<p class="po">Revenge, at the best, is the act of a Siou,</p> +<p class="po">But for trifles—</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">Pray what did bad Mendicant do?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Stole two loaves of bread to replenish his lack</p> +<p class="po">And tuck out the belly that clung to his back.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Is that <i>all</i> father dear?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">There’s little to tell:</p> +<p class="po">They sent him to jail, and they’ll send him to—well,</p> +<p class="po">The company’s better than here we can boast,</p> +<p class="po">And there’s—</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: center">Bread for the needy, dear father?</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po" style="text-align: right">Um—toast.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Atka Mip.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">beggar,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> One who has relied +on the assistance of his friends.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">behavior,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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 <i>Dies Iræ</i>:</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<div xml:lang="la"> +<p class="poind2">Recordare, Jesu pie,</p> +<p class="poind2">Quod sum causa tuae viæ.</p> +<p class="poind2">Ne me perdas illa die.</p></div> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Pray remember, sacred Savior,</p> +<p class="po">Whose the thoughtless hand that gave your</p> +<p class="po">Death-blow. Pardon such behavior.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Belladonna,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> In Italian a beautiful +lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the essential identity of the two tongues.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Benedictines,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> An order of monks +otherwise known as black friars.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">She thought it a crow, but it turn out to be</p> +<p class="poind1">A monk of St. Benedict croaking a text.</p> +<p class="po">“Here’s one of an order of cooks,” said she—</p> +<p class="poind1">“Black friars in this world, fried black in the next.”</p> +<p class="citeauth">“The Devil on Earth” <span style="font-style: normal">(<i>London</i>, 1712.)</span></p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">benefactor,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> One who makes +heavy purchases of ingratitude, without, however, materially affecting the price, which is still within +the means of all.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">Berenice’s Hair,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A constellation +(<span xml:lang="la"><i>Coma Berenices</i></span>) named in honor of one who sacrificed her hair to +save her husband.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">Her locks an ancient lady gave</p> +<p class="po">Her loving husband’s life to save;</p> +<p class="po">And men—they honored so the dame—</p> +<p class="po">Upon some stars bestowed her name.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">But to our modern married fair,</p> +<p class="po">Who’d give their lords to save their hair,</p> +<p class="po">No stellar recognition’s given.</p> +<p class="po">There are not stars enough in heaven.</p> +<p class="citeauth">G. J.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bigamy,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A mistake in taste +for which the wisdom of the future will adjudge a punishment called trigamy.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bigot,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> One who is obstinately +and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not entertain.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">billingsgate,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> The invective of +an opponent.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">birth,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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 Ætna, and I have myself seen a man come out of a wine cellar.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">blackguard,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">blank-verse,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">body-snatcher,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A robber of grave-worms. +One who supplies the young physicians with that with which the old physicians have supplied the undertaker. +The hyena.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">“One night,” a doctor said, “last fall,</p> +<p class="po">I and my comrades, four in all,</p> +<p class="poind1">When visiting a graveyard stood</p> +<p class="po">Within the shadow of a wall.</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">“While waiting for the moon to sink</p> +<p class="po">We saw a wild hyena slink</p> +<p class="poind1">About a new-made grave, and then</p> +<p class="po">Begin to excavate its brink!</p> +</div> + +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">“Shocked by the horrid act, we made</p> +<p class="po">A sally from our ambuscade,</p> +<p class="poind1">And, falling on the unholy beast,</p> +<p class="po">Dispatched him with a pick and spade.”</p> +<p class="citeauth">Bettel K. Jhones.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bondsman,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A fool who, having +property of his own, undertakes to become responsible for that entrusted to another to a third.</p> + +<p class="indentpara">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.”</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bore,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A person who talks +when you wish him to listen.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">botany,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bottle-nosed,</span> <span class="pos">adj.</span> Having a +nose created in the image of its maker.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">boundary,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> In political +geography, an imaginary line between two nations, separating the imaginary rights of one from +the imaginary rights of the other.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bounty,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> The liberality +of one who has much, in permitting one who has nothing to get all that he can.</p> + +<p class="quote">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.—<i>Henry Ward Beecher</i></p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">brahma,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<blockquote class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="po">O Brahma, thou rare old Divinity,</p> +<p class="po">First Person of the Hindoo Trinity,</p> +<p class="po">You sit there so calm and securely,</p> +<p class="po">With feet folded up so demurely—</p> +<p class="po">You’re the First Person Singular, surely.</p> +<p class="citeauth">Polydore Smith.</p> +</div> +</blockquote> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">brain,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> An apparatus with which +we think what we think. That which distinguishes the man who is content to <i>be</i> something from +the man who wishes to <i>do</i> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">brandy,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> 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.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">bride,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> A woman with a fine prospect +of happiness behind her.</p> + +<p class="entry"><span class="def">brute,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> See +<a href="H.html#husband"><span class="def">husband</span></a>.</p> + +</body> +</html>
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