Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1874-08-09

Suppose from all the good sayings
which pass current in society, to say
nothing of those which are written In
books, We were to remove three classes
of witticism-those, namely, which
SAVIOR of profanity, those which are
more or less indecent, and those which
are sharp personalities-and how much
would be left asks the Saturday Re
Uie1C, Rogers was spiteful himself and
the cause of spite In others. His
well-known remark about the for
tunate man whom everybody had
been praising for his good looks,
his wealth, and his rank, "Thank God,
he has got bad teeth 10 was frank ex-
preston of the malice which animates
most of his witticisms. When Hook
advised Rogers in his turn not to at
tend Byron's funeral for fear the I'M
dertaker would claim him as a corpse
inferred six months before, the face
tlOusness covered a brutal remark
upon a personal popularity. Tallry-
rand's sayings are still more offensive.
The answer ALREADY" to the man who
said he was feeling the torrents of
he'll, ana the remark to the man
who said that his mother had been a
beauty. "C'etait done, monsieur, votre
Pere qul n'etat pas 81 bein 20 strike us
as owing nearly all the merit to their
lncivility. The last saying quoted. for
example, is not one which could have
occurred to anybody else, but simply
one which nobody else would have ven
tured to utter. Talleyrand and Rogers.
OF course, have a name for cynicism;
but we do not find that men of greater
good nature are always much more
agreeable. An aide-de-camp we are
told, asked Whately, pretty much
an his Own style, What is the differ
ance between a Roman Catholic Bishop
and a Jackass:" the answer being. that
Zone wears 4 cross upon his back. and
the other upon his breast" What is
the difference" retOrted Whately, be-
tween an aidedecamp and a donkey"
Il don't KNOW replied the aide
camp, lnterrogatIvely. Nor I either"
said Whately. After all, there is
nothing very funny IN calling a man
donkey to his face, and the particular
turn given to the remark is one which
we suspect to have been hit upon by
some hundreds of schoolboys before it
occurred to the Archbishop. Lamb was
one of the kindliest of men. and his
humor has the smallest possible infu-
sion of III feeling, and yet even Lamb
must have sacrificed a friend to a Joke
pretty often. When be replied to
ColerIdge's question, Did you ever
hear me preach2" q never heard you
do anything else" we may be pretty
sure the remark did not strike Cole
ndge as altogether pleasant. 1t is
quite possible, in short, to be a good
Christian and a professed wit. And,
II wit passes into cruelty on one side,
does 1t not constantly descend to buff
fOOneryon theother? Alas these stories
OF departed fun are about as cheerful as
the sight of a dinner table after the
guests have gone, and left nothing but
half empty glasses and cigar ashes.
And yet We can derive some kind of
consolation even from reading the best
sayings Of departed humorists. A wit |
ticism has kind Of immortality indie
pendent of the originator. The really
good sayings we find have never been
first invented by anybody. They are
handed down from one generation
to another, and are much improved |
IN the process. Then, again. we COM
pare actual reports of conversation
with the written records of thought, |
we are struck by the obvious fact that |
what man writes is generally much |
better than what he says. Even the |
greatest Of wits is happier in his study, |
where he can polish his own good |
things and introduce them in their due |
place, than IN the random flashes of |
fun which owe half their merit to their
temporary surroundings.