Category Archives: Ambrose Bierce

August 13, 2017 · 6:55 pm

The Devil’s Dictionary: “Insurance”

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

A young Ambrose Bierce

For example, here is a definition for the word Insurance. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definition is mine. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITION
Insurance, n. An ingenious modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfortable conviction that he is beating the man who keeps the table.

 

INSURANCE AGENT: My dear sir, that is a fine house – pray let me insure it.

HOUSE OWNER: With pleasure. Please make the annual premium so low that by the time when, according to the tables of your actuary, it will probably be destroyed by fire I will have paid you considerably less than the face of the policy.

INSURANCE AGENT: O dear, no – we could not afford to do that. We must fix the premium so that you will have paid more.

HOUSE OWNER: How, then, can _I_ afford _that_?

INSURANCE AGENT: Why, your house may burn down at any time. There was Smith’s house, for example, which —

HOUSE OWNER: Spare me – there were Brown’s house, on the contrary, and Jones’s house, and Robinson’s house, which—

INSURANCE AGENT: Spare _me_!

HOUSE OWNER: Let us understand each other. You want me to pay you money on the supposition that something will occur previously to the time set by yourself for its occurrence. In other words, you expect me to bet that my house will not last so long as you say that it will probably last.

INSURANCE AGENT: But if your house burns without insurance it will be a total loss.

HOUSE OWNER: Beg your pardon – by your own actuary’s tables I shall probably have saved, when it burns, all the premiums I would otherwise have paid to you – amounting to more than the face of the policy they would have bought. But suppose it to burn, uninsured, before the time upon which your figures are based. If I could not afford that, how could you if it were insured?

INSURANCE AGENT: O, we should make ourselves whole from our loss.

HOUSE OWNER: And virtually, then, don’t I help to pay their losses? Are not their houses as likely as mine to burn before they have paid you as much as you must pay them? The case stands this way: you expect to take more money from your clients than you pay to them, do you not?

INSURANCE AGENT: Certainly; if we did not—

HOUSE OWNER: I would not trust you with my money. Very well then. If it is _certain_, with reference to the whole body of your clients, that they lose money on you it is _probable_, with reference to any one of them, that _he_ will. It is these individual probabilities that make the aggregate certainty.

INSURANCE AGENT: I will not deny it – but look at the figures in this pamph—

HOUSE OWNER: Heaven forbid!

INSURANCE AGENT: You spoke of saving the premiums which you would otherwise pay to me. Will you not be more likely to squander them? We offer you an incentive to thrift.

HOUSE OWNER: The willingness of A to take care of B’s money is not peculiar to insurance, but as a charitable institution you command esteem. Deign to accept its expression from a Deserving Object.

 

NEW DEFINITION
Insurance, n. A broad term covering several versions of an ingenious and something disingenuous modern game of chance in which the player is permitted to enjoy the comfortable conviction person that he is getting what he paid his premiums for. This is especially true in health insurance and policies such as long term disability.

ACCOUNT MANAGER (now they call them account managers): Sir, I only received the files from the short term disability people. It will take us a week to input them into our system.

POLICY OWNER (though he or she actually owns nothing): I will call you back in a week, then.

 

A week later.

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes, the files are input, but we need something from your employer stating that you are eligible for long term disability. I have sent them an e-mail, but have heard nothing back. I can’t send your files on to the medical staff for review until I get that information.

POLICY OWNER: How long will the medical review take?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: At least a week.

POLICY OWNER: Then I will have long term disability?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: If they have enough information and if they agree, you will then qualify.

 

POLICY OWNER: (Dials his employer’s benefits number.) After pressing several buttons to get through the gauntlet of the automated menu, finally, after one or two transfers, reaches the “right” person and explains the situation.

LTD BENEFITS PERSON: Yes, I received the e-mail, but it was only on Friday and today is Tuesday. Besides, I need a current job description before I can send a response. (Pauses as if something is wrong, or she may have discovered something.) I will need to check into this.

 

On Friday of the same week.

ACCOUNT MANAGER: I received a response, but they did not include information when the policy was effective. Even if it was years ago that it first became active, we need to know that date.

POLICY OWNER: The date of the policy?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes.

POLICY OWNER: I took out the policy when it was first offered to me over seven years ago. So, it’s over seven years.

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes.

POLICY OWNER: Yes?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes, but they need to send me the date.

POLICY OWNER: Since your company is carrying the policy, don’t you have that date?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Your employer needs to send me the date.

POLICY OWNER: Once you get the date, you can submit the files to the medical people?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes, but once they take a look at, if they approve, it then goes to my supervisor, who send it up to the directors’ level.

POLICY OWNER: Why?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Because this was a previously closed case, and to fully reopen it, the directors will have to approve.

POLICY OWNER: How long will that take?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: That can take up to two months.

POLICY HOLDER: Two months?

ACCOUNT MANAGER: Yes.

The sound of yes begins to sound very much like “No.” It is only used in response to delays and additional obstacles.

POLICY OWNER: (Dials his employer. Gets shoved into a voice mail que, where he leaves his name, who he wants to speak with, and what it is about. This is roughly at 10 AM. At 3 PM he calls back and after punching his way through several automated menus, he reaches the same voice mail que, but this time he is told it is full and the system hangs up on him.)

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May 20, 2017 · 11:59 pm

The Devil’s Dictionary: “Egotist”

A young Ambrose Bierce

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for the word Egotist. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definition is mine. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITION
Egotist, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.

Megaceph, chosen to serve the State
In the halls of legislative debate,
One day with all his credentials came
To the capitol’s door and announced his name.
The doorkeeper looked, with a comical twist
Of the face, at the eminent egotist,
And said: “Go away, for we settle here
All manner of questions, knotty and queer,
And we cannot have, when the speaker demands
To be told how every member stands,
A man who to all things under the sky
Assents by eternally voting ‘I’.”

 

NEW DEFINITION
Egotist, n. A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me. See, Donald J. Trump

Donald, chose to run for president
Saying only he could truly represent
The interest of those who had been ignored
Or in some other way had been deplored.
He marched into office, saying hugely
It was and always about yours truly.
What some still fail to understand
Is that “yours truly” is about the man
And not a form of salutation
Meant for the greater good of the nation.
It has always been about him:
The hymn of him, of him the hymn.

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April 13, 2014 · 9:31 pm

New words to live by: “Biercism”

A young Ambrose Bierce

A young Ambrose Bierce

“Cynic. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be.”
–Ambrose Bierce

Biercism, n. dry wit on par with that of Ambrose Bierce.

Old biercism (original): Love, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage or by removal of the patient from the influences under which he incurred the disorder. This disease, like caries and many other ailments, is prevalent only among civilized races living under artificial conditions; barbarous nations breathing pure air and eating simple food enjoy immunity from its ravages. It is sometimes fatal, but more frequently to the physician than to the patient.

Modern biercism: Love, n. a meeting of the mind and the loins, one hopes somewhere around the heart. A volatile mixture often given to displays of insanity, vitriol, and occasionally violence. The world seems turned upside down by love – and often is. You fall in love and fall out of love, but the violence appears to be less to the shins, knees, hands, arms, or back, and more to the internal organs.

[Editor’s note: one might consider this both a new word to live byand a Devil’s Dictionary entry all mashed up (or rolled up) into one. In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries. Click on new word or new words below to see some other new words, such as congressed or obsurd or fogget or awfulizer. Words that should be in the modern lexicon, but aren’t … yet.]

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January 11, 2014 · 10:46 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: “Academe, Academy, University”

A young Ambrose Bierce

A young Ambrose Bierce

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here are definitions for Academe and Academy. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definitions are mine or somebody else contemporary. The new definitions can also be simply examples of The Devil’s Dictionary definitions. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITIONS:

ACADEME, n. An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught.

ACADEMY, n. (from academe). A modern school where football is taught.

NEW DEFINITIONS:

ACADEME, n. An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. (No such place exists in America today.)

ACADEMY, n. (from academe). A modern school where football is taught.

UNIVERSITY, n. A very modern school where only football is taught. It is also often the moral and philosophical code of many of the students, alumni, and politicians of such institutions. Such universities belong to aggregations that go by acronyms such as SEC, Big Ten, ACC, etc. Such Universities also serve the One True Higher Authority: the ABS — the Almighty Buck Speaks. Like any true higher authority, often times what is enunciated by the ABS and what is heard by the Students, Alumni, and Politicians (SAPs) are a Babel of pontifications.

[Editor’s note: Bierce did not have a definition for University, such has football grown since his time. Also note, there are some Universities where basketball is substituted for football. ]

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December 2, 2012 · 5:19 pm

The Devil’s Dictionary: Abstainer, Adage, Age

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here are definitions for Abstainer, Adage, and Age. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definitions are mine or somebody else contemporary. The new definitions can also be simply examples of The Devil’s Dictionary definitions. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

Old Definition

Abstainer, n. A weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a pleasure. A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but abstention, and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.

Adage, n. Boned wisdom from weak teeth.

Age, n. That period of life in which we compound for the vices that we still cherish by reviling those that we have no longer the enterprise to commit.

New Definition

There once was a man, an abstainer,
a four-square, by-the-book refrainer,
who couldn’t live up to the adage —
something wise and about cabbage.
He refused to believe it was a sustainer.

He did not believe he must dine
without a proper glass of red wine.
Upon such a stewed mess,
boiled and very plain no less:
the adage about cabbage, he declined.

He now hangs out in a ratty ol’ garden,
but eats only his own private slumgullion.
Yet, to all who pass by
and not wanting to know why,
he says cabbage has made him well again.

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October 14, 2012 · 12:30 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: Abridge and Abrupt

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for Abridge and Abrupt. The Old definition for each work is Bierce’s. The New definition is mine or somebody else contemporary. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITIONS
Abridge, v.t. To shorten

When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for a people to abridge their king, a decent respect for the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. – Oliver Cromwell.

Abrupt, adj. Sudden, without ceremony, like the arrival a cannon-shot and the departure of the soldier whose interests are most affected by it. Dr. Samuel Johnson beautifully said of another author’s ideas that they were “concatenated without abruption.”

NEW DEFINITIONS
Abridge, v.t. To build to nowhere.

Something you do until the courts tell you you can’t when you’re mayor of a small Alaskan town.

Abrupt, adj. How truth arrives to a political campaign, often showing candidates that what they have is abridge-ment to nowhere.

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September 1, 2012 · 1:00 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: Ability and Abnormal

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for Ability and Abnormal. The Old definition is Bierce’s. The New definition is mine or somebody else contemporary. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITIONS

Ability, n. The natural equipment to accomplish some small part of the meaner ambitions distinguishing able men from dead ones. In the last analysis ability is commonly found to consist mainly in a high degree of solemnity. Perhaps, however, this impressive quality is rightly appraised; it is no easy task to be solemn.

Abnormal, adj. Not conforming to standard. In matters of thought and conduct, to be independent is to be abnormal, to be abnormal is to be detested. Wherefore the lexicographer adviseth a striving toward a straiter resemblance to the Average Man than he hath to himself. Whoso attaineth thereto shall have peace, the prospect of death and the hope of Hell.

NEW DEFINITIONS

Ability, n. Commonly found to consist mainly in a high degree of “fake it until you make it.” Perhaps, however, this impressive quality is rightly appraised for it is no easy task to fake it.

Abnormal, adj. Not conforming to standard. In matters of thought and conduct, to be independent is to be abnormal, to be abnormal is to be detested. Even if you fake being abnormal until you achieve true abnormality, you shall be labeled be forever thought mean and will be shunned by the true mean and solemn members of society, i.e. the Average Man (and Woman).

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July 14, 2012 · 9:05 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: Abdomen

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for Abdomen. The Old definition is Bierce’s. The New definition is mine or somebody else contemporary. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITION
Abdomen, n. The temple of the god Stomach, in whose worship, with sacrificial rights, all true men engage. From women this ancient faith commands but a stammering assent. They sometimes minister at the altar in a half-hearted and ineffective way, but true reverence for the one deity that men really adore the know not. If woman had a free hand in the world’s marketing, the race would become graminivorous.

NEW DEFINITION
In this case, it’s more of an augmentation of the original definition than revision of the original.

Augmentation 1:
Beer Belly, n. The temple of the god Stomach after a regular and continual ingesting of liquid graminivorous forms. These graminivorous forms include ale, pale ale, stout, larger, and lite forms of these and other similar liquids.

Augmentation 2:
Six-Pack Abs, n. The flip side (so to say) of the beer belly in which attempts are made to make the temple appear like the packaging of the liquid graminivorous content and not the liquid graminivorous contents themselves.

[Editor’s note: In case you are wondering, graminivorous is a word and it is a word that Bierce used in his definition. I did not add it to show off. It means: feeding or subsisting on grass.]

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June 23, 2012 · 1:00 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: Abatis and Aborigines

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for the words Conservative and Republican, which have become synonymous. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definition is mine or somebody else contemporary. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITION
Abatis, n. Rubbish in front of a fort, to prevent the rubbish outside from molesting the rubbish inside.

Aborigines, n. Person of little worth found cumbering the soil of a newly discovered country. They soon cease to cumber; they fertilize.

Corollary: they succumb to abatis.

NEW DEFINITION
Abatis, n. Rubbish in front of the U.S. Congress, placed there to prevent the rubbish outside, the people, from molesting the rubbish inside, the bought and paid for representatives and senators. Often this rubbish is lobbyist, who themselves are many times former congressmen and senators making sure the people who hired them get what they want before the people, voters, do. See lobbyist in an earlier installment of The Devil’s Dictionary.

Aborigines, n. Person of little worth found cumbering the voting booths at election time. They soon cease to cumber; they fertilize or fodder for the plutocratic machine that is the U.S. Congress. unfortunately, this has also become increasing true of state congresses, too.

Corollary: they succumb to abatis.

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June 1, 2012 · 1:00 am

The Devil’s Dictionary: Conservative and Republican

In our continuing quest to revisit a classic, or even a curiosity from the past and see how relevant it is, we continue with The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. Originally published in newspaper installments from 1881 until 1906. You might be surprised how current many of the entries are.

For example, here is a definition for the words Conservative and Republican, which have become synonymous. The Old definitions are Bierce’s. The New definition is mine or somebody else contemporary. From time to time, just as it was originally published, we will come back to The Devil’s Dictionary, for a look at it then and how it applies today. Click on Devil’s Dictionary in the tags below to bring up the other entries.

OLD DEFINITION
Conservative, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

NEW DEFINITION
Conservative, n. I don’t think anything has changed since Bierce first defined conservative as he did, and little can be done to improve on it, other than to say that Conservative and Republican have become so interconnected in U.S. politics as to become two wings of the same buzzard. See Republican(s).

Republicans, n. Republicans are the party that says government doesn’t work, and then they get elected and prove it. –P.J. O’Rourke

In this world of sin and sorrow there is always something to be thankful for; as for me, I rejoice that I am not a Republican. –H.L. Mencken

Final thoughts:
So, here we have a political party (Republican) that purports to be the party of Conservative, heterosexual, bedrock social/Christian values, in which in Tennessee, in the county of Knox a commissioner stands (an obviously appropriate word in this case) accused of indecent exposure with another man for lewd behavior; a former Knox County mayor gets a divorce because of an alleged affair — and maybe more than one. (At least he waited until toward the end of his time in office to get divorced.); a current Knox County mayor is getting a divorce (at the start of his administration and only four years after saying “I do.”); a Tennessee state representative and a former police officer gets arrested for driving drunk in Nashville, TN, with a loaded gun in his front seat; another Tennessee state representative carves her initials in her publicly owned seat in the state capital, dresses down a Tennessee Highway Patrol Officer for a ticket she got for speeding, and has “interesting” photos of herself on the Internet; a Tennessee state senator uses bogus science and bullying logic to advance a biased personal agenda, and when challenged claims he’s being discriminated against; a national presidential candidate has more affairs than another national presidential candidate has had wives (and that takes a little doing); and that same multi-wife presidential candidate’s current wife has a debt at Tiffany’s over 5 times (and maybe even 10 times) larger than the yearly average American family household income. So with all this moral rectitude and personal frugalness coming from the political party (Republican) claiming to defend Conservative, heterosexual, bedrock social/Christian values, what I want to know is this: When did Peyton Place become a family value?

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