The Washington bee., 1910-11-05
THE MAN WHOLAUGHS
BY the Way He Does 1t He Gives
an Index to His Character.
THE POTENCY OF LAUGHTER.
Shown by the Effective Way In Which
cervantss Smiled Spain's Vain and
Foolish ChiVslry Away-Msn Who
Never Laughed and Rarely Smiled.

laugh. What sUrer cIew can we have
to both his intellect and his temper un
less it be that he seldom or never
laughs? Nothing" says Goethe, as
more significant OF mems character
than what they find laughable." You
know no man." says Tieck, It'll you
have heard him laugh-till you know
when and how he will laugh" ''The
perception Of the Iudicrous," says EN-
erson, 'ts a pledge of sanity. A rogue
alive to the ludicrous is still convert
Bile. If that sense Is lost his fellow
men can do little for him"
Lavater, the great physiognomist,
lays his great stress on the very un-
eQuivocal and derisiVe nat'Ire Of g
laugh as an index Of character. If It
be free and hearty and occasion a gen
eral and light movement In all the
features and dimple the cheek and
chin, It is an almost infallible evil
dence Of the absence OF any great ma
teriaI wickedness Of disposition. Cae-
sar mistrusted Cassius because that
lean and hungry conspirator rarely, If
ever. INDUCED In laughter. When Hor
ace Walpole was in Paris in 1765 he
found that laughing was out Of fash
ion in that gay capital. Good folks"
be writes, they have no time to laugh.
There are God and the king 10 be
pulled down first, and men and WON
en-, one and all. are devoutIy employed
in the demolition"
How often a nan fails to betray the
tiger that turks within him until he
laughs! Is there nothing significant
in the fact recorded by Plutarch Of
Cato the younger that nothing could
make him laugh, that his cOuntenAnce
was scarcely softened even by a
smile? Is it not a characteristic trait
OF the gloomy tyrant, Philip II. Of
Spain, that he rarely smiled and that
he laughed but once In his entire life.
and that when he heard Of the massa-
ere on St BaTthOlomew's day? Is It
not q suggestive fact regarding the
gloomy, taciturn Wallenstein, the ter
rOr Of the people, at the sight OF whom
as he paced through his camp with his
lofty figure enveloped In a scarlet
mantle and with a red feather in his
cap a strange horror took possession
OF the soldiers, that he was never
seen to smile? Can we wonder that
the poor little dwarf. Alexander Pope,
the cynical satirist, AFFLICTED with asth-
ma and dropsy, tortured with rheuma-
tism, racked with headaches and
threatened with cataract, should never
have laughed, but only smiled?
1t has been said Of the greatest OF
English dramatists, who united with
his intense humor an equally intense,
piercing insight into the darkest and
most fearful depths Of human nature,
that no heart would have been strong
enough to hold the woe Of Lear and
Othello except that which he'd the IN
quenchable elasticity Of Falstafr and
the Midsummer Nights Dream"
Might not & similar remark be made
of that pendulum betwixt smile and
a fear" Abraham Lincoln, in whom
sadness and a keen sense Of the comic
were so strikingIy combined? How
exuberant was his mirth. sparkling in
jest, comic story ami anecdOte. and yet
how often the very next moment those
sad, pathecc, melancholy eyes showed
man familiar with sorrows and ac-
quainted with grief"
Who can doubt that but for the
meTriment in which he indulged-the
contagious laughter which welled up
from his soul as naturally as do bub-
bles in the springs of S"ratOga-he
would have sunk under his weary
weight Of care long before he fell by
the pistol of Booth?
1t is indeed statesmen, students and
thinkers generally who most need the
relaxation afforded by occasional mer-
Timent. Some centuries ago it was the
fashion in Europe for men Of rank to
keep a buffoon, and a banquet was
considered incomplete where a privi-
legged jester was not al attendant.
This was perhaps for those days a
wise custom. It is surprising how
much a few minutes sleep will refresh
the body and a few minutes laughter
the mind. and many a useful life might
be prolonged by the substitution Of
these remedies for "carking care" and
WEAKNESS in place Of the usual treach-
erouS tonics and stimulants.
What a dismal deduction would be
made from the happiness Of our homes
If they were robbed Of their merri-
mentl What pictures Of innocent
mirth has Goldsmith given in the
"Vicar Of Wakefield" and how artless
the remark Of the good DR.. Primrose.
eff he had little wit we had plenty
Of laughter
What a power for good and evil is
the worlds dread laugh, which scarce
the firm philosopher can scornr How
many men have been cOwed by it who
could have faced without fiinching a
battery's deadly fire. Low many bad
customs and wicked practices, how
many quixotic schemes Of philanthropy
or reform, how many absurd doctrines
in politics. theology and sociology.
which have dehed the artillery Of argu-
meut have been laughed of the pub
lie stage" never to return! DID not
Oervantes "smile Spain's vain and
foolish chivalry William Ma
thS1s IN London Great Thoughts
ii cotton goods never prospsE~Ssr-
man prnvarh