thrice blessed quality which enables us to laugh, when otherwise we
should be in danger of weeping. "We are ridiculous animals," observes
Horace Walpole unsympathetically, "and if angels have any fun in
their hearts, how we must divert them."

It is this clear-sighted, non-combative humour which Americans love
and prize, and the absence of which they reckon a heavy loss. Nor
do they always ask, "a loss to whom?" Charles Lamb said it was no
misfortune for a man to have a sulky temper. It was his friends who
were unfortunate. And so with the man who has no sense of humour.
He gets along very well without it. He is not aware that anything
is lacking. He is not mourning his lot. What loss there is, his
friends and neighbours bear. A man destitute of humour is apt to be
a formidable person, not subject to sudden deviations from his chosen
path, and incapable of frittering away his elementary forces by
pottering over both sides of a question. He is often to be respected,
sometimes to be feared, and always--if possible--to be avoided. His
are the qualities which distance enables us to recognize and value
at their worth. He fills his place in the scheme of creation; but
it is for us to see that his place is not next to ours at table, where
his unresponsiveness narrows the conversational area, and dulls the
contagious ardour of speech. He may add to the wisdom of the ages,
but he lessens the gayety of life.




Goodness and Gayety

"Can surly Virtue hope to find a friend?"--DR. JOHNSON.