Click two alphabet buttons and all
occurrences of the two letters swap. Quotes are from The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce. |
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“Think
of Ambrose Bierce as the forgotten brother
of Mark Twain. Both had remarkably similar
lives, were good friends, and lived in San
Francisco around the same time. Bierce,
however, followed a different path than
Twain. “While both had similar humor, and were equals in their genius, Bierce clearly was the sharper when it came to wit. Public figures quaked in fear of his satirical pen, and newspapers sales soared when he was published. Over the years, many of his jabs at the establishment appeared in local newspapers and were later collected into The Devil’s Dictionary, one of the greatest works of satire of the 19th century.” |
| The FOOL is a person who pervades the domain of intellectual speculation and diffuses himself through the channels of moral activity. He is omnific, omniform, omnipercipient, omniscient, omnipotent. He it was who invented letters, printing, the railroad, the steamboat, the telegraph, the platitude, and the circle of the sciences. He created patriotism and taught the nations war. He founded theology, philosophy, law, medicine, and Chicago. He established monarchical and republican government. He is from everlasting to everlasting, such as creation’s dawn beheld he fooleth now. In the morning of time he sang upon primitive hills, and in the noonday of existence headed the procession of being. His grandmotherly hand was warmly tucked-in the set sun of civilization, and in the twilight he prepares Man’s evening meal of milk-and-morality and turns down the covers of the universal grave. And after the rest of us shall have retired for the night of eternal oblivion he will sit up to write a history of human civilization. |