POETRY, n. A form of expression peculiar to the Land beyond the Magazines.
INGRATE, n. One who receives a benefit from another, or is otherwise an object of charity.
ENOUGH, pro. All there is in the world if you like it.
Opposition, n. In politics the party that prevents the government from running amuck by hamstringing it.
INTERPRETER, n. One who enables two persons of different languages to understand each other by repeating to each what it would have been to the interpreter’s advantage for the other to have said.
VITUPERATION, n. Saite, as understood by dunces and all such as suffer from an impediment in their wit.
WAR, n. A by-product of the arts of peace. The most menacing political condition is a period of international amity.
PREHISTORIC, adj. Belonging to an early period and a museum. Antedating the art and practice of perpetuating falsehood.
MANICHEISM, n. The ancient Persian doctrine of an incessant warfare between Good and Evil. When Good gave up the fight the Persians joined the victorious Opposition.
MESMERISM, n. Hypnotism before it wore good clothes, kept a carriage and asked Incredulity to dinner.
NEPOTISM, n. Appointing your grandmother to office for the good of the party.
WASHINGTONIAN, n. A Potomac tribesman who exchanged the privilege of governing himself for the advantage of good government. In justice to him it should be said that he did not want to.
Liar: A lawyer with a roving commission.
If you would be accounted great by your contemporaries, be not too much greater than they.
SCRAP-BOOK, n. A book that is commonly edited by a fool. Many persons of some small distinction compile scrap-books containing whatever they happen to read about themselves or employ others to collect.
USAGE, n. The First Person of the literary Trinity, the Second and Third being Custom and Conventionality. Imbued with a decent reverence for this Holy Triad an industrious writer may hope to produce books that will live as long as the fashion.
GUILLOTINE, n. A machine which makes a Frenchman shrug his shoulders with good reason.
GOOD, adj. Sensible, madam, to the worth of this present writer. Alive, sir, to the advantages of letting him alone.
Pun: A form of wit, to which wise men stoop and fools aspire.
PRESIDE, v. To guide the action of a deliberative body to a desirable result. In Journalese, to perform upon a musical instrument; as, “He presided at the piccolo.”