evised and edited.
The Duchess of Orleans relates that the irreverent old
calumniator, Marshal Villeroi, who in his youth had known St. Francis
de Sales, said, on hearing him called saint: "I am delighted to hear
that Monsieur de Sales is a saint. He was fond of saying indelicate
things, and used to cheat at cards. In other respects he was a
perfect gentleman, though a fool."
SALACITY, n. A certain literary quality frequently observed in
popular novels, especially in those written by women and young girls,
who give it another name and think that in introducing it they are
occupying a neglected field of letters and reaping an overlooked
harvest. If they have the misfortune to live long enough they are
tormented with a desire to burn their sheaves.
SALAMANDER, n. Originally a reptile inhabiting fire; later, an
anthropomorphous immortal, but still a pyrophile. Salamanders are now
believed to be extinct, the last one of which we have an account
having been seen in Carcassonne by the Abbe Belloc, who exorcised it
with a bucket of holy water.
SARCOPHAGUS, n. Among the Greeks a coffin which being made of a
certain kind of carnivorous stone, had the peculiar property of
devouring the body placed in it. The sarcophagus known to modern
obsequiographers is commonly a product of the carpenter's art.
SATAN, n. One of the Creator's lamentable mistakes, repented in
sashcloth and axes. Being instated as an archangel, Satan made
himself multifariously objectionable and was finally expelled from
Heaven. Halfway in his descent he paused, bent his head in thought a
moment and at last went back. "There is one favor that I should like
to ask," said he.
"Name it."
"Man, I understand, is about to be created. He will need laws."
"What, wretch! you his appointed adversary, charged from the dawn
of eternity with hatred of his soul--you ask for the right to make
his laws?"
"Pardon; what I have to ask is that he be permitted to make them
himself."
It was so ordered.
SATIETY, n. The feeling that one has for the plate after he has eaten
its contents, madam.
SATIRE, n. An obsolete kind of literary composition in which the
vices and follies of the author's enemies were expounded with
imperfect tenderness. In this country satire never had more than a
sickly and uncertain existence, for the soul of it is wit, wherein we
are dolefully deficient, the humor that we mistake for it, like all
humor, being tolerant
|