The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1901-10-20
Medical Notes.

ment ascrbing preternatural wisdom,
phenomenal Sagacity and penetrating
aStutenesS to this man of limited literary
acquaintance. But that is an erroneous
impression. The man of one book has
needles eye, but not the keen point; his
eye is microscopic and his mind is COM
mensurate with his eye. He is an I'M
comfortable man; he is like the angular,
grimly austere and painfully upright
man, who is always hurting your feelings
ana eXtinguishing every spark of cheer
1ulEesS with the cold water of chilly
austerity.
Time was when the Methodists gained
an unenviable name for the repression of
cheerfulness. They threw a funeral pail
over all gaiety and communicated
pleasure even though innocent. Deacons
with long poles. with a tuft of feathers
on one end and brass knob on the
other, knocked the men on the head with
the one and tickled the women in the
neck with the other if they snored or
smiled in church.
Those Methodists were people of one
"doxy'' and that was the only ortho, or
straight doXy; all other doXies were
crooked and perverse; they did not toll
crate them in themselves or others. They
We're people of one idea, those Puritans,
followers of Wesley and Whitfield, who
lived by rule and constant method.
Yet religion borrowed the name itself
Doctors had the priority of possession in
this term, for, according to good old
John Walker a Methodist anciently sig
nlf1ed physician who practiced by the
DRY. These physicians were men of one
idea; their manner was characterized by
acerbity, untempered by suavity, as
their medicine was bitter and unsweet-
ened. From this old school, clinging to
dogmas with the tenacity of a dog to a
dry bone of contention, arose a new
school, a body of evolutionists and revo-
lutionists, who sought for light not only
in the East but in all points of the COM
pass whose Mecca encircled the entire
circumference of the world of knowledge.
Tney did not blindly follow time-honored,
tossilized creeds; they thought for them
selves and gained the name of Rational
lists, willing to try and prove all things
and to keep the best.
Among other things these rationalists,
both in religion and medicine, thought
that they could catch as many, if not
more flies with molasses, as with vine
gar. They thought that they could in
Struct a man much more pleasantly and
agreeably by tickling his fancy than by
beating it into him with a knock-down
argument punctured with a brick-bat.
AS they disguised bitter medicines with
sugar-coatings, so they made their advice
sweet words of encouragement that hid
a serious matter, but did not end with
an hac fabula docet.
Although, like true Christians, they re-
versed sacred relics of the cross and per-
haps fragments of the tomb, they did not
allow them to overshadoW the profaner
relics of mans attempts to diSpel the
clouds. The curfeW bell became relic
of the past along with the blue laws that
forbade n kiss his wife Sum
day. to smoke in the street or stay out
after dark Fires were not eXtlngulShed
or lights put out at the stroke of nor
was the Iatch-string drawn in; there was
more latitude in the matter OF night
keys.
The theater was not considered so much
of an evil and its foyer was not so much
identified with the front door to hell; in
fact the stage invaded the church in
mild way, Reformed actors came down
from the stage to ascend the pulpit and
dofing the tinsel stage-robes for the
sIrplice. put off the buskins for the
pilgrims sandals.
Even the lottery installed itself at
church fairs and other worldly means
were adopted to make money for the
cause which, being righteous IN ltselt,
naturally and presumably took or the
curse from the means.
FOLKS even began to think that it was
not so very wicked to laugh, but they
VOC nor boisterous with unmitigated
i1ilarity: they had been glum so long that
it took time to get used to 1t ana long
ard persistent practice was necessary
Even the Methodist doctors began 10
,,e,-,amber that there was such a thing as
a muscle called ''Risorious Santorfni, the
laughing muscle. which an anonymous
meet has apostrophized in the following
words:
Close to the corners of the mouth you
cling;
And scornful sneers, with angry. caustic
string.
b. thy quick action into being spring.
All kinds of laughter into life you bring
Light as the dew upon the hum-bird S
Strong as the three-fold cord, quick as
flash,
Soft as the breath of music, loud as or
chestral crash,
Tender as love, harsh as the breath of
Sad with despair, with brightest hope
elate,
Melting With pity, cruel with fiendish
SCorn,
Darker than midnight, lovelier than the
Wreathing an angels prayer, bIghted
with sin,
Whispering peace, hooking with angry
din,
Curved in a blessing, curled in hateful
Making good better, making evil worse
Golden with wisdom, lighter than empty
chaff,
Risorious Santorini, stand up and laugh!
Perhaps the humorists knew the value
o. laughing; their name suggests it; but
unfortunately for them history records
that they believed in a different kind of
humor. One of these humors was bile
and another was atrabile OF course
everyone knows that a bilious person is
ir olined to be imbued with the bitterness
of gall and although the substance itself
is yellow, it makes them blue" Hence,
the humorists after all may have believed
In the efficacy of a cheerful heart and a
happy environment.
The atrabile, black bile, or black
hunor, about which the humoriSts made
such ado was supposed, by the ancients,
to be secured by the supra-renal cap
stiles, and when in excess was thought to
give rise to melancholy, but all that is
now exploded although the name melan-
cholv still remains meaning black bile.
The atrabiIians are not all ancient men.
In 1873 a book was published entitled
'"rhe Philosophy of Laughter and Smil-
Ing" of which the author says in his
preface, although its subject is laugh
ter the volume is by no means a jest
OCOh anu Liz SubJONS vi Ac@06AiSNA -
no laughing matter" I take some ex-
tracts from this book as a text for COM
ment, promising these remarks with the
statement that they are such that none
but an atrabilian would promulgate or
iptlorse them.
lie says: Laughter is restricted to
these countries where what is called
civilization has made considerable
progress, where vice and dissipation and
all manner Of crime abound, and, above
all. where levity and frivolity and every