II. CHARACTER SKETCHES.
| “——Now, by two-headed Janus, Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time; Some that will evermore peep through their eyes, And laugh like parrots at a bag-piper; And other of such vinegar aspect, That they’ll not show their teeth by way of smile, Tho’ Nestor swore the jest were laughable.”— Merchant of Venice. |
CHARACTER SKETCHES.
“With what prudence does the Son of Sirach caution us in the choice of our friends. And with what strokes of Nature, (I could almost say of Humour,) has he described the behavior of a treacherous and self-interested friend!”—Addison.
“The history of the ancient Hebrews,” says George Eliot, “gives the idea of a people who went about their business and their pleasures as gravely as a society of beavers; the smile and laugh are often mentioned metaphorically; but the smile is one of complacency, the laugh of scorn.”
Against the authority of so illustrious a name, the writer of these pages confesses a somewhat different impression. It is difficult to believe that such sentiments as the following could have arisen among a people whose only smile was that of complacency, whose only laughter that of scorn: