The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-03-21

WYE are a misguided folk, perpet-
M ually doing wrong things And
w not the least of these is to de-
scribe as frivolous, giddy, not-to-pe-heiu-
accountable, etc, etc, those joyous souis
who watch the life panorama with SINH
ing faces. To be drugged and Vioien'ly
destroyed is not a graceful ehoins "
make nor a desirable one. But the while
we punish crime and wrong-doins' WHY
not make q clean sweep OF the GRIM
inals make an end, too, OF mir'n-ue-
stroyers and the balance of that unhappy
uk who encourage despair and lamenta-
ton in the world?
Seeing that there is already enough
tragedy to overbrim all the tear Jugs Oh
all the yesterdays, we cannot any iohsei
forward the tyranny of tears. Let US
give large gifts to the clowns OF the ear,h
and thereby encourage clownng. Ii
necessary. let us dispense with all SILK
hats, all derbies apd crush hats ana pam
amas, and enact laws making 1t COM
pulsory for all to wear the cap and bells.
The rulers of ancient Europe appreciated
their fools, and theirs was no small share
in the building of empires To the jingle
of bells we. too, may become constructive
inventive, fertile-brained.
I love the sound of bells, far or near.
1t is like laughter.
And I would rather be a first-class
clown than to be senator. more especially
in these trying days when a senator can
know Just how long his head viii last.
ia rather Jingle bells than be chief for
ester any day.
Whoever first invented good stories was
benefactor who all the ages following;
and for him who mixed wit into his tell
ing OF the nrst really funny yarn let the
highest praises bel For him let. mem
cries be raised; for him let myrtle
wreaths be woven In all spring and sum
mer lands where children are and wherO
blind tragedy stalks Wheresoever vo-
cabularies have been developed let there
be lasting memory of the first funny
man.
We must go further back than the
time of Aesop, or Aristophanes, or Boo
caccio, or Rabelais, or Montague for
an image of our jeeter-even to a time an
tedating the glacial period, / fancy. Be
cause there are some thoroughly good
tales to be told OF icebergs and frozen
fields. Even In our prosy. comfortable
times near the burning equator we have
not quite lost the art of making stories
OF icy chimes, for consider the two really
good tales we have listened to during the
past year, Indeed, the field was ripe for
story-tellers during the glacial era. No
doubt the percentage of explorers was
greater than at the present time. don't
you think?
When he have found our jester. let us
shrine him high: because he was the first
useful pioneer in literature, the most use
full citizen of primitive ages, even II he
was entirely clothed in hair-even II he
jabbered his jest. Whatever he lacked
in knowledge of evening clothes or of
| stock fluctuations or of Turkish cigar
cites he still served his time in fashion.
For he bulks large against the pages of
history-bigger than some of those we
call the lawgivers and saviors of the hui
man race. No doubt in his time he served
| and saved many miserable men-men
without joy in their lives-from the sheer
abyss OF despair-tui1,ed them back
through mere joy for the ring in his
laughter. And that ring in his laughter
Ia still Unfinished. The echoes of ii are
saving you and me from many dangerous
precipices.
Now it is the shadow profile of him
that looms large. and not the mans self.
larger thing than man is the memory
he bequeaths-that larger part of him that
posterity wins and knows him to have
been. We get truer perspective at half
removes Let him strut and fret ever
so much on his narrow stage, we know a
man best when time weaves her magic
garment about him. Not till then can we
know him as comrade and friend--not
til then can we know how near of kin
we are. 1 know my comrade of yester-
day better, now that the petty gestures
of chance acquaintance recall his kingly
ones And directly he becomes enhaloed.
Oliver Herford, Arthur Guitrman, Wal
lace Irwin and Gelett Burgess give me
faithful enough image of him who evoked
the first ringing laughter, and l don't
dare go appearing into the archives OF the
past to find the master of the merri-
ment.
The noble life Of Socrates would have
been nobler, to my thinking. had he not
derisively referred to Aristophanes az
that comic poet" Can it be that the
mighty lessons Of Socrates and his tell
ing Of them in that eloquent Apology"
was more than counterbalanced, In the
judges eyes. by his careless ridicule OF
a contemporaneous funny man? Who can
say how many jolly laughs this mirth-
maker had created for the stern Athen-
ians and their little children? 1t contents
me to know that all the bloodless stoi-
cism of the Nietzsches and Schopenhauers
through all the years since have not en-
tirely repressed those springs Of humor
yelling up from the human heart. We
may well deplore the existence of giant
intellectualism in the world If 1t initiates
In any fashion against deep-chested. spoA-
taneous laughter. When men and women
have no time for laughter, We may well
despair, even II the good habit gets quite
lost in laboratories where quite lifeless
frogs legs are made to throb convul-
sively. Who knows, after all, IL the gem
uine fun of getting sprayed In saline
solution doesn't literally convulse those
sections of frogs that get sprayed?