As melhores do Devil's Dictionary, de Ambroise Bierce

ME, pro. The objectionable case of I. The personal pronoun in English has three cases, the dominative, the objectionable and the oppressive. Each is all three.

MERCY, n. An attribute beloved of detected offenders.

EGOTIST, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.

EDUCATION, n. That which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding.

ENTERTAINMENT, n. Any kind of amusement whose inroads stop short of death by injection.

IDIOT, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant and controlling. The Idiot's activity is not confined to any special field of thought or action, but "pervades and regulates the whole." He has the last word in everything; his decision is unappealable. He sets the fashions and opinion of taste, dictates the limitations of speech and circumscribes conduct with a dead-line.

CARNIVOROUS, adj. Addicted to the cruelty of devouring the timorous vegetarian, his heirs and assigns.

VANITY, n. The tribute of a fool to the worth of the nearest ass.

RADICALISM, n. The conservatism of to-morrow injected into the affairs of to-day.

REBEL, n. A proponent of a new misrule who has failed to establish it.


Gostou? Clica aqui!
N?o gostou?

MAD, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence; not conforming to standards of thought, speech and action derived by the conformants from study of themselves; at odds with the majority; in short, unusual. It is noteworthy that persons are pronounced mad by officials destitute of evidence that themselves are sane. For illustration, this present (and illustrious) lexicographer is no firmer in the faith of his own sanity than is any inmate of any madhouse in the land; yet for aught he knows to the contrary, instead of the lofty occupation that seems to him to be engaging his powers he may really be beating his hands against the window bars of an asylum and declaring himself Noah Webster, to the innocent delight of many thoughtless spectators.