The Literature Network - Ambrose Bierce's Definitions in The Devil's Dictionary U, V

Ambrose Bierce's Definitions in The Devil's Dictionary U, V

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From: CCPA Monitor
Date: 20061101
Author:Bierce, Ambrose

ULTIMATUM: In diplomacy, a last demand before resorting to concessions.

UN-AMERICAN: Wicked, heathenish, intolerable.

UNDERSTANDING: A cerebral secretion that enables one having it to know a house from a horse by the roof on the house.

USAGE: 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.

VALOR: A soldierly compound of vanity, duty, and the gambler's hope.

VANITY: The tribute of a fool to the worth of the ...

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