are spent in the most responsible work, who goes to see Charlie Chaplin
once or twice every week, and laughs like a schoolboy all the time. I
should not trust his work less on that account: I should trust it all the
more. I should know that he did not allow it to get the whip hand of him,
that he kept sane and healthy by running out to play, as it were,
occasionally.

I think all solemn men ought to take sixpenny-worth of Charlie Chaplin
occasionally. And I'm certain they ought to play more. I believe that the
real disease of Germany is that it has never learned to play. The bow is
stretched all the time, and the nation is afflicted with a dreadful
seriousness that suggests the madhouse by its lack of humour and gaiety.
The oppressiveness of life begins with the child. Germany is one of The two
countries in the world where the suicide of children is a familiar social
fact. Years ago when I was in Cologne I christened it the City of the
Elderly Children, and no one, I think, can have had any experience of
Germany without being struck by the premature gravity of the young. If
Germany had had fewer professors and a decent sprinkling of cricket and
football grounds perhaps things might have been different. I don't
generally agree with copybook maxims, but all work and no play does make
Jack (or, rather, Hans) a dull boy.

Perhaps it is true that we play too much; but I'm quite sure that the
Germans have played too little, and if there must be a mistake on one side
or the other, let it be on the side of too much play.




ON THE INTELLIGENT GOLF BALL