St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1879-07-04
Don't Be Funny.


Don't Be Funny.
Fun is like murder, in that there are
two kinds of people who ought not to
be punished for committing it-thOse
who cannot help it, and those who do
not know they are guilty of it. But
any individual, who with malice afore-
thought and no provocation, goes to
work to be funny ought to be put out
charged with wit they can no more
hinder its flash than a summer cloud
bristling with electricity can smother
up the lightning. Such men are public
blessings, for pure wit clears up muggy
vapors and sweetens the social air.
Again their are humorous people, full
of oldest conceits, all their own, who
make dull outlOoks sunshiny. They
may not be heroic characters, or even
self-sacrificing but martyrs are not
grilled on gridirons every day, nor
countries saved at regular intervals so
the hero market is never exhausted,
while the demand is constant for these
gay peacemakers. Their value never
tiuctuates. We have heard of a home
possessing one-a house wherin the
cook gets periodically, as the humble
preacher put it, "fearfully and wonder
fully mad" She strides up stairs to give
"warnin'," putting, blowing, spirting
out wrath like an over-hOt tea-kettle.
The good man, who can't help being
funny, sits in judgment on her case.
The result is always the same. Bridget
steels sheepishly out; ut intervals
through the day, she filings her apron
over her head and relapses into wild
levity. Ask, "What ails you, Biddy ?"
and the answer is also the same "Oh,
but the masther passes such comics on
me-" The baby cries after him, as the
true soothing syrup, and the children
get jOked out of awkwardness, mean
ness, and juvenile frailties. The little
mother, tired and just ready to scold,
turns a sharp corner into some closet
and laughs Historically at his timely
Jest. Woman like, if he can make her
do it, he shall not see his triumph. To
know the warmth, the geniel, loving at
mOsphere such a man ditfuses, read
the memories of Sidney Smith, and
thank heaven for the people who can't
help being funny.
Then there is this other class, who
are funny but don't know it. One melt
ing summer day a fat old bear in Cen
trail Park felt herself overcome with
heat. She went to her trough
and sat down in it, leaned away back
with both paws Tapping the air like
limp hands. With eyes half shut and
mouth open, she put on so precisely the
airs of some lackadaisical old lady that
every bystander roared with laughter
but she TRANQUILITY blinked and had no
And so the world is full of human Oddi-
ties, us all-uncOncious of their mirth-
provoking qualities. Only rude or bru-
tai persons laugh at such to their hurt
while only the dullest fail to be amused.
In Il world where, as Sammy Weller
says, '"There is nothin' that amt" we
need among the many who grieve us,
hurt us, do us all manner of evil-we
need some who only amuse us. This is
the reason we find children entertain
ing; they are funny i'll proportion as
they do not know they are.
But to the real subjects of our scruti-
ny the people whose fancies are ''as
dry as the remainder biscuit after a
voyage" but who cherish the idea that
witticisms are as easy to make as good
resolutions, if one just goes systemati-
cally to work. 1t would be a revelation
to them to realize that one joke differs
from another, as a fly-specked lemon
drop, out of an antique grocery, differs
from a strawberry crisp with dew.
Let man be lacking in almost any
other mental endowment and if he does
not openly acknowledge it, he is par
ticularly careful to avoid any strain in
the direction of that missing link. What
man ignorant of time, rhythm, notes
and the whole theory of music, ever
offers to lead a choir or to perform a
solo in public? Where is there one
without mathematical mind who longs
to calculate eclipses7 But the world is
overrun with people who are forever
trying to be funny, although they have
not wit enough to salt them.
1t is the clown, not the wit, who for
ever grins and giggles-only the fool
who never appears without his cap and
bells. Eyes keen to catch and first to
sparkle over some comic touch in life
are as quick to dim at sorrow, the hint
of which escapes the next man, and SO
the true wit may get from you a tear
instead of a laugh. England's great
satirist wrote, 81 begin to find the world
growing more pathetic daily and
laugh less every year of my life !! Why
laugh at idle hopes, vain purposes, OIL
even utter blundering self-confidence
Let us be gentle"-not funny, o friend
If the good God gave you the gift OF
wit use it well; if you are without il
take heed to old Thomas a Kempis
"What thou art that thou art, and thou
canst not make thyself other."-C Chris
tian Weekly.