MAMMON, n. The god of the world's leading religion. The chief temple is in the holy city of New York.
Ambrose BierceLOVE, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage or by removal of the patient from the influences under which he incurred the disorder.
Ambrose BierceWit - the salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out.
Ambrose BiercePOTABLE, n. Suitable for drinking. Water is said to be potable; indeed, some declare it our natural beverage, although even they find it palatable only when suffering from the recurrent disorder known as thirst, for which it is a medicine. Upon nothing has so great and diligent ingenuity been brought to bear in all ages and in all countries, except the most uncivilized, as upon the invention of substitutes for water. To hold that this general aversion to that liquid has no basis in the preservative instinct of the race is to be unscientific-and without science we are as the snakes and toads.
Ambrose Bierce