The Mt. Sterling advocate. (Mt. Sterling, Ky.) 1890-current, 1900-06-19

man Who Tries to Be Funny Is Seldom
Taken Seriously.

'NAAhcH6 eHS eau, 4dii4iAoi SOn1luoh-
places of life is the fact that no hui
man being ever perfectly under
stands another. Any difference in
knowledge, capacity or antecedents
is enough to disturb perfect CORE
spondence between speakerand hearer.
People, however, continue to 60 about
with the pathetic illusion that they
are understood, and many pairs of
them really believe that they are
cone" The philosopher knows that
they are not, that when they seem to
say or to desire the same thing the
thought is different.
A familiar and elementary fact of
life, and vet though ak this is so,
though even wien a man tries lis ut
most to say what he really thinks,
some different thought will certain
ly be attributed to him, people are
actually found who deliberately say
what they do not think ard We. 4pect
their real thoughts to be discovered!
When once a habit of irony has grown
upon a man be ccrrot resist it, how
ever frequent his experience that he
will be taken literally. Statistically
worked out, the proportion of he race
that understands irony j. roughly
.0OO00001. But you can never per-
suade the ironical man that he will be
taken seriously; editors il particular
are always trying to persu'd de him.
The ironical man expounds some
monstrous heresy by way Of a joke;
Immediately he is surrounded by an
infatuated crowd which has put him
down for a monstrous hereto. In
vain does he declare that he was only
in fun; if the subject-matter is seri-
Gus he viii very likely be prosecuted
to the end of his life. But he goes on
his ironical path incorrigible. | am
not sure, indeed, that IL he does sue
coed in convincing people that he was
in fun his case will not be even worse.
For then he will never be allowed TO
be in earnest; nobody will credit him
with sincerity, and at his most sincere
moment he wiz merely be thought
guilty of an unusually poor joke.
Disraeli was great master of irony,
and much of the misunderstanding
and distrust there were of him came
from that fact. Here is a trivial but
significant instance. He was once
showing Sir William Harcourt, or
some other important person, over
Hughenden, and remarked as a mild
joke against himself, Hughenden be-
ing but a small place: excuse the
vanity of landed proprietor" 1
have seen that remark quoted hun
dreds of times, and every time as an
instance, not Of playfulness at his own
expense, but of ridiculous pomposity.
Lord Salisbury is another ironical
person, and I notice that the conf
dence England places in him general
ly seems to be slightly diminished
when he has made speech. 1t is your
absolutely matter-of-fact man with
n
whom people feel secure. A part Of
the odium which Byron incurred, and
which to us seems so strange, was
probably due to his habit, in mere
humor and good spirits, Of falling in
with his critics preconceived idea
that he was very wicked man. my
self-to come to insignificant things
pay two penalties to this day for
having written an ironical little book;
part of that portion Of the human race
which has read it insisting that |
meant it all in propria persona, and
the other part (Which has very kindly
gone through the labor OF finding out
that l meant to be funny refusing to
believe that ever mean to be any
thing else.-G. S. Street, in Saturday
Evening Post.