History of English Humour, Vol. 2

by A. G. K. L'Estrange

Now it is quite impossible to say that in any of the above cases there was a want of faith, although we are equally unable to agree with those who maintain that profane jests are most common when it is the strongest. What they show is a want of control of feeling, or a deficiency in taste, so that people do not regard such things as either injurious or important. A sceptic at the present day is generally less profane than a religious man was in the last century. Such is the result of civilization, although unbelief in itself inclines to profanity, and faith to reverence.

It is self-evident that peculiar feelings and convictions will prevent our regarding things as ludicrous, at which we should otherwise be highly amused. Religious veneration, or the want of it, often causes that to appear sacred to one person which seems absurd to another. Many Jewish stories seem strange to Gentile comprehensions. Elias Levi states that he had been told by many old and pious rabbis that at the costly entertainment at which the Messiah should be welcomed among the Jews, an enormous bird should be killed and roasted, of which the Talmud says that it once threw an egg out of its nest which crushed three hundred lofty cedars, and when broken, swept away sixty villages.

The following petition was signed by sixteen girls of Charleston, S.C., and presented to Governor Johnson in 1733, and was no doubt thought to set forth a serious evil.

"The humble petition of all the maids whose names are under written. Whereas we, the humble petitioners are at present in a very melancholy disposition of mind, considering how all the bachelors are blindly captivated by widows, the consequence is this our request that your Excellency will for the future order that no widow presume to marry any young man until the maids are provided for, or else to pay each of them a fine. The great disadvantage it is to us maids, is that the widows by their forward carriages do snap up the young men, and have the vanity to think their merit beyond ours which is a just imposition on us who ought to have the preference. This is humbly recommended to your Excellency's consideration, and we hope you will permit no further insults. And we poor maids in duty bound will ever pray," &c.

It is almost impossible to limit the number of influences, which affect our appreciation of the ludicrous. "Nothing," writes Goethe, "is more significant of a man's character than what he finds laughable." We find highly intellectual men very different in this respect. Quintilian notices the different kind of humour of Aulus Galba, Junius Bassus, Cassius Severus, and Domitius Afer. In modern times Pitt was grave; Fox, Melbourne, and Canning were witty. Sir Henry Holland enumerates as the wits of his day, Canning, Sydney Smith, Jekyll, Lord Alvanley, Lord Dudley, Hookham Frere, Luttrell, Rogers, and Theodore Hook, and he adds—

"Scarcely two of the men just named were witty exactly in the same vein. In Jekyll and Hook the talent of the simple punster predominated, but in great perfection of the art, while Bishop Blomfield and Baron Alderson, whom I have often seen in friendly conflict, enriched this art by the high classical accompaniments they brought to it. The wit of Lord Dudley, Lord Alvanley, and Rogers was poignant, personal sarcasm; in Luttrell it was perpetual fun of lighter and more various kind, and whimsically expressed in his features, as well as in his words.[19] 'Natio comæda est' was the maxim of his mind and denoted the wide field of his humour. The wit of Mr. Canning was of rarer and more refined workmanship, and drew large ornament from classical sources. The 'Anti-Jacobin' shows Mr. Canning's power in his youthful exuberance. When I knew him it had been sobered, perhaps saddened, by the political contrarities and other incidents of more advanced life, but had lost none of its refinement of irony. Less obvious than the common wit of the world, it excited thought and refined it—one of the highest characteristics of this faculty.

"Lady Morley bore off the palm among the 'witty women' of the day. She was never 'willing to wound.' Her printed pieces, though short and scattered, attest the rare merits of her humour. The 'Petition of the Hens of Great Britain to the House of Commons against the Importation of French eggs,' is an excellent specimen of them."

In corroboration of this view of the different complexion of men's humour I may mention that in the course of this work I have often had the sayings of various wits intermixed and have always been able easily to assign each to its author.

Considering the great diversity in the appreciation of the ludicrous, the question arises is it merely a name for many different emotions, or has it always some invariable character. To decide this we may ask the question, Is one kind of humour better than another? Practically the answer is given every day, one saying being pronounced "good" if not "capital," and another "very poor," or a "mild" joke; and when we see humour varying with education, and with the ages of men and nations, we cannot but suppose that there are gradations of excellence in it.

Now, if we allow generally this ascending scale in the ludicrous, we admit a basis of comparison, and consequently a link between the various circumstances in which it is found. It may be objected that in the somewhat similar case of Beauty, there is no connection between the different kinds. But the ludicrous stands alone among the emotions, and is especially in contrast with that of Beauty in this—that it is peculiarly dependent on the judgment, as beauty is on the senses. That we understand more about the ludicrous than about beauty is evident from its being far easier to make what is beautiful appear ludicrous than what is ludicrous appear beautiful.