Title: The Devil's Dictionary
Content: known to have written witty definitions of words before him. Bierce's earliest known predecessor was the Persian poet and satirist Nizam al-Din Ubaydullah Zakani (Ubayd Zakani), who wrote his satirical "Ta'rifat" ("Definitions") in the thirteenth century. Prior to Bierce, the best-known writer of amusing definitions was Samuel Johnson. His "A Dictionary of the English Language" was published 15 April 1755. Johnson's "Dictionary" defined 42,733 words, almost all seriously. A small handful have witty definitions and became widely quoted, but they were infrequent exceptions to Johnson's learned and serious explanations of word meanings. Noah Webster earned fame for his 1806 "A

Title: Thomas Bradbury
Content: hand it is said that Harley had offered to stop his mouth with a bishopric. Bradbury's political harangues were sometimes too violent for men of his own party. Daniel Defoe may be the author of "A Friendly Epistle by way of reproof from one of the people called Quakers, to T. B., a dealer in many words", 1715, 8vo (two editions in same year). With the reference of the Exeter controversy to the judgment of the dissenting ministers of London, a large part of Bradbury's vehemence passed from the sphere of politics to that of theology. The origin of the

Title: The Idler (1758–60)
Content: trifling ambition"; on the other, it "brings many things to notice that would be neglected, and, by fixing the thoughts upon intellectual pleasures, resists the natural encroachments of sensuality." Published: Saturday, 19 May 1759 Johnson describes his companion Sophron ("wisdom"), who exemplifies prudence. He is frugal, never gossips, never takes sides in a dispute or gives advice. Yet while this approach to life has kept him safe from disadvantages, it has brought him no advantages either. Published: Saturday, 26 May 1759 Johnson observes that "pleasure is very seldom found where it is sought". Gatherings of humourists are always disappointing because

Title: Drapier's Letters
Content: authorities knew that Swift's political pamphleteering had been employed by the Tory government of Queen Anne, and that he would use his abilities to undermine the Whig government of Walpole. Swift analysed the forensic and economic disadvantages of Wood's inferior coinage and the effects it would have over Ireland in the first of the pamphlets, "A Letter to the Shop-keepers" (1724). In the pamphlet, Swift adopted the persona of the "Drapier": a common Irishman, a talented and skilled draper, a religiously devout individual who believes in scripture, and a man loyal to both the Church of Ireland and to the

Title: John Ash (divine)
Content: 1779, aged 55. Ash is best known as a lexicographer, author of: Ash's "New and Complete Dictionary" was noteworthy for the number of obsolete and provincial words contained in it. It incorporated most of Nathan Bailey's collection of canting words. This dictionary was the first to define in English the previously omitted words "fuck" and "cunt". His debt to Samuel Johnson was demonstrated in a famous error in his etymology of the word "curmudgeon", which he says derives from the French for "unknown correspondent"; Johnson's "A Dictionary of the English Language" from twenty years before had suggested (erroneously, as it

Question: Which 18th-century dictionary compiler defined himself as a "harmless drudge"?
Answer: Samuel Johnson