J is for "The Devil's Dictionary" (No. 129 in a series)

The Devil's Dictionary is a satirical dictionary written by Ambrose Bierce (1842-c.1914, caricatured above by David Levine). Bierce was an American author who began the book as a newspaper serial. First published in 1906 as The Cynic's Word Book, it was retitled in 1911, using the name we know it by today, which is the title that Bierce preferred. Some of the definitions have not aged all that well, but many have.

JESTER, n. An officer formerly attached to a king's household, whose business it was to amuse the court by ludicrous actions and utterances, the absurdity being attested by his motley costume. The king himself being attired with dignity, it took the world some centuries to discover that his own conduct and decrees were sufficiently ridiculous for the amusement not only of his court but of all mankind. The jester was commonly called a fool, but the poets and romancers have ever delighted to represent him as a singularly wise and witty person. In the circus of to-day the melancholy ghost of the court fool effects the dejection of humbler audiences with the same jests wherewith in life he gloomed the marble hall, panged the patrician sense of humor and tapped the tank of royal tears.