The Washington bee., 1910-11-12
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 ChiyaIry Away-Msn Who
Never Laughed and Rarely Smiled.

less it be that he seldom or never
laughs? Nothing" say Goethe, 'is
more significant OF mems character
than what they find laughable." You
know no man." says Tieck, "till you
have heard him laugh-til you know
when and how he will laugh" "The
perception Of the Iudicrous," says En-
erson, lis pledge OF sanity. A rogue
alive to the ludicrOus is still converu-
BILE. II that sense is lost his fellow
men can do littls for him."
Lavater. the great physiognomist,
lays his great stress on the very un-
eduiYocaI and derisive natrre OF a
laugh as an index of character. II 1t
be free and hearty and occasion 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
terial wickedness OF disposition. Cae-
gar 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 or fash
ion in that gay capital. Good folks"
he writes, they have no time to laugh.
There are God and the king to be
pulled down first, and men and WON
en-, one and all, are deVOutly employed
in the demolition"
How often a man 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 q
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. Bartholomew's day? Is It
not a 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 smiledf
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 Falstaff and
| the Midsummer Nights Dream"
Might not a similar remark be made
of that pendulum betwiXt a smile and
a fear" Abraham Lincoln, in whom
/ sadness and q keen sense Of the comic
were so strikingly combined? How
exuberant was his miTth. sparkling In
| jest, comic story and anecdote, and yet
| how often the very next moment those
sad, pathetic. melancholy eyes showed
q man familiar with sorrows and ac-
! quainted with grief"
| Who can doubt that but for the
| merriment in which he indulged-the
| contagious laughter which welled up
| from his soul as naturally as do bub-
/ bIes 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?
| It is indeed statesmen, students and
! thinkers generally who most need the
| relaxation afforded by occasional mer-
riment. 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 ali attendant.
/ This was perhaps for those days a
/ wise custom. 1t is surprising how
much a few minutes sleep viii refresh
/ the body and a few minutes laughter
| the mind, and many 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 etimulants.
| What a dismal deduction would be
made from the happiness Of our homes
| If they were robbed Of their merri-
ment! What pictures Of innocent
mirth has Goldsmith given in the
! Vicar of Wakefield" and how artless
I the remark Of the good DR.. Primrose,
! ''If he had little wit we had plenty
/ OF laughter
What a power for good and evn is
/ the worlds "dread laugh, which scarce
/ the firm philosopher can scornw How
many men have been cowed by It who
could have faced without finching 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 defied the artillery Of 6rgu-
meut have been laughed of the pub
lie stage" never to return! Did not
Cervautes "smlle Spain's vain and
foolish chivalry awayr'-William Ma
thews In London Great Thoughts.
III cotton goods never prospef-GsF-
man Proverb.