The Daily bulletin., 1893-12-21
A Humorist on Humor.
| BY the late james Russell Lowell.


sentially a humorist-his most APP
preciative admirers prefer to think
of him as the author of the inimita-
Bile "Biglow Papers" rather than as
tho professor, the diplomatist or
man of the world-that any posthu-
nous thing he has to say upon
humor will be welcomed as coming
from an expert, the more so since
until now it had never seen the
light of cold print. Lowell deliver
ed many lectures during. the years
of his professorship of Belles-Lettres
at Harvard. They wore rapidly
written: many of them bear marks
Of hastiness of composition, and
some, indeed, were delivered extern
poraneously from full notes, while
others have never yet been printed.
In the new number of the Century
Magazine one of these old lectures
is published for tho first time, but
in the predatory note which intro
duces it we are warned that "frag-
ments must be read with the fact
constantly held in mind that they
do not always represent Lowelps
mature opinions; that, in some in
stances, they give but the first form
of thoughts developed in other con-
nections in one or other of his later
essays; that they have not received
his last revision; that they have tho
form of discourse addressed to the
ear, rather than that of literary
work finished for the eye"
THE FIVE PERIODS OF A MANS LIFE.
Lowell disagrees with Hippel, the
German satirist, who divides the
life of a man into five periods. Six,
he thinks, is the more accurate num-
ber. This passage, moreover, forms
an interesting "reminiscences of the
poets early life, since in it we are
introduced to that famous garret in
which he wrote so much of his most
charming poetry
Hippel, the German satirist,
divides the life of man into five
periods, according to the ruling de-
sires which successfully displace
each other in the human soul. Our
first longing, he says, is for trousers,
the second for a watch, the third for
an angel in pink muslin, the fourth
for money, and the fifth for "place"
in the country. l think he has over
looked one, which l should be in
clined to place second in point of
time-the ambition to escape the
gregarious nursery, and to be master
of chamber to ones self. y 's *
L remember for l must call my
memory back from this garrulous
rookery of the past to some perch
nearer the matter in hand) that
when l was first installed lord OF
such amanor, and found myself the
Crusoe Of that remote attic-island
which for near thirty years was to
be my unmolested hermitage, l cast
about for works of art with which
to adorn it. The garret, that El
Dorado of boys, supplied me with
some prints which had once been
the chief ornament of my great,
grandfather's study, but which the
growth of taste or luxury had ban
ished from story to story till they
had arrived where malice could pur
sue them no further. These were
heads of ancient worthies-Plato to
Pythagoras, Socrates, Seneca, anC
} Cicero, whom, from a prejudice ac
quired at school, 7 shortly banishet
again with quousQue tandem! Be
sides those l have mentioned, there
: were Democritus and Heraclitus
5 which last, in those days less tn,
| slave of tradition, / called Hera
: clitus-an error which my excellen
2 schoolmaster q thank him for it
l would have expelled from my heat
by the judicious application Of ;
Q counter-irritant; for he regarded th
birch as a kind of usher to tn
, laurel, as indeed tho true treo o
> knowledge, whose advantages coult
Adam have enjoyed during early life
he had known better than to hav
yielded to the temptation of an.
other.
IL A DEFINITION OF HUMoR.
Lowell gives definition of humo
:, and at tho same time contrasts
n with mere wit:
Humor-taken in the sense of tn
faculty to perceive what is humo1
Gus, and to give it expression-seem
to be greatly matter of tempera
ment. Hence, probably, its name
~ II 10 sOLloIuiuS qulle luuouudDlt
diffused through the whole natur
Of the man; so that it is related c
the great comic actors that the at
=. dience begin to laugh as soon a
y they show their faces, or before the
d, have spoken a word. The sense c
the humorous is certainly closel
y. allied with the understanding, an
no race has shown so much Of it o
6 the whole as the English, and mex
or to them the Spanish-both incline
" to gravity. Let us not be ashame
n to confess that, if we find the tr;
gedy bore, we take the profoundes
satisfaction in the farce. 1t is
mark of sanity. Humor, in il
s. highest level, is the sense of comi
contradiction which arises from th
perpetual comment which the ul
derstanding makes upon the impre'
sion received through the imagin;
ton. We find it very natur;
accordingly to speak of til
It. breadth of humor, while wit
" by the necessity of its bein
as narrow as flash of ligh
I'd ming, and as sudden. Humor ma
pervade whole page without o,
being able to put our finger on al
ID passage and say, "It is here" w
must SnarkIa and snan in avarv lin