New-York tribune., 1909-07-03
DOES RIDICULE KILL?
Some Proofs to the Contrary Id
Uanced by AndrezC Lang.
From ahe London Morning Post.
Sticks and stones
Can break your bones,
But words can never hurt VOL

says the Scottish saw. but have the opposite
saying that Nothing kills like ridtcule" The
author of an interesting life Of that most re-
markable woman, Lola Montez, observes that
ridcule is the weapon of authority, of the Con-
servative party, and produces effect. Social
ism suffragette the Temperance" party -four
ish the the they ridiculed in
/ racing rags 1t may be assumed that the
persons attacked do not read the sporting pa
pers, but if they did. effect would be pro-
duced. Conscious virtue despises ridicule and
all the parties mentioned are full of conscious
merit. Women who would insist on breaking
the law or Dian could not be moved Dy the
chaff of the late Mr. Trails "Barbarous Brit
ishers'; in their virtue. like the Roman poets,
they involved themselves.
Ridicue is in fact usually the weapon Of
authority and is futile. Nothing could be fun
nier than the attacks premature Ibsenism,
Darwinism and Radicalsm in the Poetry of
the Anti-Jacobin." To read The ROvers." which
nobody does, is to find the most amusing parody
of the Ibsenism of the German theatre of the
day. But the fun did not prevent the re1ncarna-
tion of the old spirit in DR. Ibsen and his ad-
mirers any more than the Epic on Civilization,
and the blessed thing that II Is to be IN state
of Nature. and The Loves Of the Triangles"
killed the spirit of the earlier in the later Oar
win, Charles the Conqueror. Chaff assailed
The VeStiges of Creation Disraeli sneered it
away, and Mr.. Darwins own doctrines were the
butt of all the arrows of ridicue- But they
blunted against the shield Of that scfen-
tifc Ajax: the question being one Of facts
Various morasts, from Sir George Mackenzie
two hundred and fifty years ago. to BOD Acres
have attempted to reform the vicious by dis
playing the ludicrous nature of vice Yet
"damns have" not had their day." and con-
spicuous moral progress is reported. If ridicule
could kill free thinking" it would not have sur
vived Swift's argument against the wisdom OF
instantly abolishing the Christian religion. one
of the most mirth provoking essays OF the
author of "A Tale OF Tub" itself not a sue
cessful Eirenicon. II chan could demolish a
party Swifts burlesque of the trial OF Atterbury
lin "Gullivers Travels) would nave succeeded
but know, matter Of demonstrable fact.
that Atterbury up TO the eyes in Jacobite
guilt and that the little dog Harlequin, was a
ING Witness against
It not the party in authority that used the
weapon Of ridicule; however, the Opposition
Tory than the government
The comic stage. when il stands at bay against
Jesuits Puritans always maintains that. Ike
the author Of Murder as Fine Art 1t is all
for virtue and order and that kind or thlnS.
Moliere very strong on this head; he 'cast-
gat ridendo." he makes vice ludicrous; the
clergy ought TO welcome him as an ally. He
does not fog religion. but hypocrisy, in Tar
ture' not virtue. but libertinism. in Don
Juan" who. somehow. rather engages, like
Satan in Paradise Lost" the sympathies Of
the audience. Milton never thought, like the
authors of the old Interludes. of making Satan
ridiculous. kind of celestial Thersites,
The Tory party in Athens excelled in ridicuIe.
II chaff could dominate democracy 1t would have
died with Cleon and the sausage seller. Eurip
ides was damned. to a considerable degree. h
Aristophanes who did not like the feminist
and the sophist. Mr.. Swinburne was here on the
side Of Aristophanes and Toryism but Euripides
has been rehabilitated by Professor Murray. and
Mr.. Verrall has elabOrately proved that it is as
easy to make TennysOn ludicrous Euripides.
of Aristophanes, when he took Socrates in hand
but. after ALL the fatal charge against Socrates
was not that he was too absurd 70 live. but that
he too impiOus. We do not hear that PlatOs
very amusing chan in the "Thrasymachus'
robbed the sophists of their audiences and their
fees The exquisite humor of Homer in his
treatment OF the Olympians had no effect In
purifying Greek religious myth and XenOphanes.
in place OF appreciatng HOmers irony accused
him Of being the fountain head Of false religion.
How authors are miscOnstruedi Homer had the
best religious ideas, but he aimed at reform OF
myth through ridicule. The nagging wife, Hera;
Zeus, the typical father, who deliberately. the
poet tells US, drew" 'riled' his wife. and
lost his temper when she lost hers. and then
yielded the point-"anything for a quiet wife,
under air of buster These are divine char
acters whom Homer found made TO his hand IN
mythology. So is the bully, Ares. so IS the
lady OF pleasure Aphrodite The poet merely
accentuated their foibles. None of his human
characters is ludicrous except the demagogue
Thersites; and on the other side he placed his
own conception of the gods, as they whom all
men yearn after; the guardians Of all the
virtues, the protectors Of the aged and the poor,
the beggar and the supplant. the guardians of
the OATH the masters of prayer and penitence.
Thus we find Homer as didactic writer In dis
guise, exhibiting the absurdity OF mythlca! con-
Ceptions of Deity. He was misunderstood; IN
deed. I do not know that any critic has taken his
so his ridicule was worse than wasted!
II is only the weak things Of this world that
are killed b. ridicule. Could II slay. what would
have become of the great Puritan movement?
All the comic writers were against 1t, except
Shakespeare who was an extremely cautious
crease the prejudice OF the citizens or LONDON
and give fury their against the theatre.
The crop-eared, snuffling, psalm singing knaves
bantered every side, but they did not
attend the playhouse, they did not read lewd
ballads, and they won the match till the glorious
Twenty ninth of May subdued them for season.
II has passed. that season of defeat. at
Oxford on the Twenty ninth of May. and for
the first time did not oak apple in the
streets of that loyal town.
A master OF ridiCule not usually found on the
Tory side was Dickens. Perhaps his Mr.. Bundle
and his CircumocutiOn Office. and his ChanCery
suit did abate the evils which he made grOtesque.
The sisterhood of Mrs Camp also suffered from
his TfdicUle- But Dickens warred vatnly against
Puritanism. against Chadband and the Shepherd
and the kind of philanthropist. Mr.. Honeythun-
der. who appears in Edwin brood" Slightly
modified. they are doing a great work in our
midst: the flowing tide is with them. and mis-
sionaries do not suffer for Mrs Jellyby and
Borrioboola Cha The subjects of ridicule have
seldom any sense of humOr; to poke fun at them
is merely to stir the fire
Lockhart thought and said that Orthodoxy
ought TO make fun OF the Higher Criticism. II
is not difficult the task is tempting; the Ortho-
dox make no profit OF the innumerable absurd-
ties Of the higher critics. If only knew Hebrew
| would eftSoons take shot at them. but the
people who do know Hebrew do not seize their
opportunity. II they did serious minds of their
party would be better pleased by the glun
attack than by the gay defence.
Even foolish fashions, like crinoline can
weather without an effort long continued bliz-
yards of ridcule. Leech could not kill crinoline:
if l am mistaken 1t outlived him. being
much more durable than most fashions il was
dued neither by chaff by Seymour; and
neither prophets satirists produce the faint
est effect on the use of paint and powder by the
fair sex Voltaire's ridicule often remark
ably effective. and in this case not the
weapon of conservatism exactly But his poem
la Pucelle' did not leave a smirch on the fame
of his victim. ia mort ny mord." That ridicule
cannot harm the boundlesS popularity of the
most absurd novelist we are only too well aware.