APHORISM, n. Predigested wisdom. The flabby wine-skin of his brain Yields to some pathologic strain, And voids from its unstored abysm The driblet of an aphorism. “The Mad Philosopher,” 1697.
Fear has no brains; it is an idiot.
Cynicism is that blackguard defect of vision which compels us to see the world as it is, instead of as it should be.
Mausoleum, n: the final and funniest folly of the rich.
A chop is a piece of leather skillfully attached to a bone and administered to the patients at restaurants.
An auctioneer is a man who proclaims with a hammer that he has picked a pocket with his tongue.
The wife, or bitter half.
Confidante: One entrusted by A with the secrets of B confided to herself by C.
Gout, a physician’s name for the rheumatism of a rich patient.
When in Rome, do as Rome does.
Dictionary: a malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic.
Phoenix, n. The classical prototype of the modern ‘small hot bird.’
SYCOPHANT- One who approaches Greatness on his belly so that he may not be commanded to turn and be kicked. He is sometimes an editor.
Boundary, n. In political geography, an imaginary line between two nations, separating the imaginary rights of one from the imaginary rights of another.
HOMOEOPATHY, n. A school of medicine midway between Allopathy and Christian Science. To the last both the others are distinctly inferior, for Christian Science will cure imaginary diseases, and they can not.
ORTHOGRAPHY, n. The science of spelling by the eye instead of the ear.
PHRENOLOGY, n. The science of picking the pocket through the scalp. It consists in locating and exploiting the organ that one is a dupe with.
CONSOLATION, n. The knowledge that a better man is more unfortunate than yourself.
IGNORAMUS, n. A person unacquainted with certain kinds of knowledge familiar to yourself, and having certain other kinds that you know nothing about.
LOGOMACHY, n. A war in which the weapons are words and the wounds punctures in the swim-bladder of self-esteem – a kind of contest in which, the vanquished being unconscious of defeat, the victor is denied the reward of success.
REBEL, n. A proponent of a new misrule who has failed to establish it.