Lapham’s Quarterly

Laughter always arises from a gaiety of disposition, absolutely incompatible with contempt and indignation.

Wit enables us to act rudely with impunity.

No man ever distinguished himself who could not bear to be laughed at.

Laughter almost ever cometh of things most disproportioned to ourselves and nature. Laughter hath only a scornful tickling.

Big head, little wit.

Comedy, like sodomy, is an unnatural act.

Jesters do oft prove prophets.

A joke is at most a temporary rebellion against virtue, and its aim is not to degrade the human being but to remind him that he is already degraded.

There is nothing sillier than a silly laugh.

Jokes are grievances.

It is easy to distinguish between the joking that reflects good breeding and that which is coarse—the one, if aired at an apposite moment of mental relaxation, is becoming in the most serious of men, whereas the other is unworthy of any free person, if the content is indecent or the expression obscene.

A jest breaks no bones.

A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.

I used to think that everyone was just being funny. But now I don’t know. I mean, how can you tell?

Jests and scoffs do lessen majesty and greatness and should be far from great personages and men of wisdom.

He who laugheth too much, hath the nature of a fool; he that laugheth not at all, hath the nature of an old cat.

I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”

Some things are privileged from jest—namely, religion, matters of state, great persons, all men’s present business of importance, and any case that deserves pity.