Thus Hazlitt: yet it is not necessary to be so verbose in the matter of discriminating wit from humor.
They are intrinsically different though often outwardly alike.
Wit is intensive or incisive, while humor is expansive. Wit is rapid, humor is slow. Wit is sharp, humor is gentle. Wit is intentional, humor is fortuitous.
But to my mind the great difference lies in the fact that wit is subjective while humor is objective.
Wit is the invention of the mind of its creator; humor lies in the object that he observes. Wit originates in one’s self, humor outside one’s self.
Again, wit is art, humor is nature. Wit is creative fancy, more or less educated and skilled. Humor is found in a simple object, and is unintentional.
Yet in these, as in all definitions, we must stretch a point when necessary; we must make allowances for viewpoints and opinions, and we must agree that the question is not one that may be answered by the card.
Nor is it necessary in the present undertaking.
An Outline of Humor is planned to include all sorts and conditions of fun, all types and distinctions of wit and humor from the earliest available records, or deductions from records, down to the dawn of the Twentieth Century.