The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce, Fiction, Classics, Fantasy, Horror : 9781598189926

Finally published in its entirety in 1911, the definitions found therein are as apt today as they were nearly a century ago. An example: "HOMICIDE, n. The slaying of one human being by another. There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy, but it makes no great difference to the person slain whether he fell by one kind or another -- the classification is for advantage of the lawyers."

Portions of it were published in the San Francisco Wasp as a weekly column and in The Cynic's Word Book of 1906.