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beholding familiar faces, and giving vent to the mirth which an interchange of happy thoughts and fancies provokes! Think of a friendly gathering without laughter a May without flowers. a summer without a sun! Think of the kindly greeting without the smile society without laughter! Imagination cannot conjecture such a monstrosity! We might conjure up in fancy, perhaps, a world of strangers; but it would be a world devoid of all that is lovable in life — a vast charnel-house, peopled with skeletons. But the supremest benefit of laughter is displayed in the closer and dearer relations of life. This it is which unites household bands; this it is which gives the hearth its charm, and makes the fire gleam warm and bright. Yea, the old home we were born in is filled with laughter from cellar to garret. In every room old echoes for ever linger of old laughters which we loved. To be sure, there is no home but there are sorrows which may sanctify it; but it is not for the tears we have shed within the threshold that we adore it. God knows we have sufferings and griefs enough in the broad and garish light of the world, that home should not be endeared to us by afflictions and woes. No, it is for its joys and pleasures, not its sighs and sadness; its sun-shine, not its gloom; its laughter, not its sorrow, that we love it. Out upon your grave parents in the family circle! They freeze rapture in the fountain. Their children are not children. They are old as soon as out of the cradle; and when they finally become men and women, like their parents, they are not men and women; they are mere entities.

Having now, as we think, in this and the former paper shown the uses and benefits of laughter, it remains for us to fulfill the promise of further considering the subject, and to lay down certain precepts for the guidance and governance of such as would make themselves familiar with this ancient divinity.

There is a certain propriety to be observed in the expression of our mirth and gladness. By this propriety is signified that it is, under certain circumstances, proper to laugh unrestrainedly, that we may display our merriment to the world; a distinction being made between the laugh manifest and the laugh concealed and internal. It is proper to laugh whenever we may do so without uselessly giving pain to our fellows, and without injuring a good cause. It is proper because it is our duty to do so. Laughter was not given us to be wrapt in a napkin and hid in the earth; but like the faithful servant, we are to put it out at usury, so that when we render an account of it to our great BENEFACTOR, we may repay it, and hear the welcome which that faithful servant received. It is proper to laugh when the mean are thwarted, the wicked disconcerted, the vile checked, the malicious prevented; and though this may seem contradictory to the proposition with which this portion of this essay started, as it may give pain to the disappointed, yet our smile will not be unavailing, as it will aid to cover them with confusion; and thus the enemies of every good work may be deterred and discouraged. It is proper to laugh when great and good principles triumph, though those defeated may have been urged by as honest thinkers and earnest labors as those which are in the ascendant; for by so doing, though we may grieve those overthrown, and that too in

the darkest hour of their affliction, when their cause can receive no further condemnation, yet by heaping shame and ignominy on the combatants for the wrong, it will be a lesson to others to look well before engaging in an enterprise which will call down upon their heads contempt and ridicule the especial horror of humanity. We should always laugh whenever we can, and wherever we are, unless the time and the place imperatively forbid; for this laughter is a sun-shine which every person may carry in his face, with which he may illume not only his own pathway, but that of his fellow, whose countenance is not irradiated from within, and to whom custom or misfortune has made darkness better than the light. Whenever wit commands us, wherever joy provokes us, whenever ridicule demands, wherever pleasure invites us, and whenever and wherever we may spread the sway and dominion of laughter, without irreverence, without injury to the good, and without giving needless umbrage to our fellows, then and there we should laugh, and laugh heartily, as if it were not the labor we delight in,' but the faculty which rules over us.

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The preceding paper and this, thus far, having been devoted to showing what laughter is, what its uses and benefits are, it remains for us to consider how it may be cultivated. No one, we are certain, after having witnessed its beneficial effects upon humanity, and (to be a little facetious) after having read these pages, will ask, Why should we seek to improve in this?' unless he be of that class whose divinity hath a throne in the hearts of every one of its members, which hearts are not in the mortal frames of the possessors, but are 'cribbed, cabined, and confined' in iron safes and gloomy vaults. The good we cannot have in too great perfection or abundance. We may make blessings like dew upon the sand, or like refreshing rains upon the fruitful field. Laughter, like music, is susceptible of cultivation. We know but very little of it in our days. As an art, it is yet in its infancy. The ancients were almost unacquainted with the provocatives of laughter. It was not until the fifteenth century that Rabelais, the forerunner of the great genius of laughter, was heard stirring up mirth in the departing gloom of the dark ages. After the way had been prepared, then, like a sunshine in a shady place,' came the illustrious Cervantes. After these high-priests succeeded the great tribe of Levi, the ministers to laughter Molière, Sterne, Swift, Smollett, Goldsmith, Pope, Byron, Lamb, Irving, and last, and most lovable of them all, poor Tom Hood, who

'Walked through the world with bleeding feet and smiled.'

Then if laughter was not taken from its cradle until five thousand years had bloomed and faded over its head, can we expect that in four centuries it has reached maturity? No! no! It is for us to aid in the support and establishing of this glory of these later days. True, we may not live to see it assume the toga virilis; but we may be blessed beyond measure by seeing it increase and grow in strength under our fostering care. Then what means shall we make use of in the cultivation of laughter?

First, we should recommend the habitual reading in private of the works of the wits, as being very beneficial in giving tone and vigor to

the faculty of laughter; and also as being infallible in quickening our apprehension of the gladsome and mirthful. Dullness of apprehension is the greatest obstacle our subject has met with; and the better way to overcome it is to commence in the closet with some volume of broad humor, and after having mastered all its jests, and exercised in laughing over them, gradually to ascend, step by step, to the higher repositories of the ice-brook tempered wit. Practical jokes are very beneficial upon those over and above slow to perceive; but care should be taken in the administering of these aperients, lest a too frequent repetition sour the disposition, and unfit the mind for any culture.

The moderate use of wine might not be unadvisable, if old authorities are not to be entirely disregarded in these hydro-progressive times, as appears in the following extracts: If moderately taken, (as Plutarch saith, symph. 9, quæst. 12,) it makes those which are otherwise dull to exhale and evaporate like frankincense, or quicken (Xenophon adds) as oil doth fire.' A little farther on continues our author: It glads the heart of man,' (Psalm 104: 15,) hilaritatis dulce seminarium. Helena's bowl, the sole nectar of the gods, or that true nepenthes in Homer which puts away care and grief, was naught else but a cup of good wine.' Again he says: Wine measurably drunk, and in time, brings gladness and cheerfulness of mind: it cheereth God and man,' (Judges 9: 13.) Lætitiæ Bacchus dator, it makes an old wife dance, and such as are in misery to forget evil and be merry.' The same writer, still, prescribng, doubtfully recommends: The Turks have a drink called coffee, (for they use no wine,) so named of a berry as black as soot, and as bitter, (like that black drink which was in use among the Lacedæmoniains and perhaps the same,) which they sip still of, and sup as warm of as they can suffer;' which, he affirmeth, maketh them merry, etc. But see farther, if it be your desire, Burt. Anat. Mel., Part 2, sec. 5, Mem. 1, Subs. 5.

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Solitude induces gravity. (In support of the first recommendation, we should here say, that he who hath a good book by him is never alone.) Therefore, those striving to cultivate laughter should seek the company of others merrily disposed. It is only in such gatherings that the Troglodytes of Montesquieu are to be found; among whom the interchange of good feeling and happiness was habitual, and in whose domains, celui qui donnait croyait toujours avoir l'avantage.' The society of the mirthful is the great school of laughter, where all, from the school-boy to the sage, are both scholars and preceptors. There, as occasion offers, may all the divisions of our subject be practised upon until perfection is attained. There you may be pleased with the smile, gratified with the grin, convulsed with the laugh proper, and self-astounded with the sardonic. There you may behold how the most graceful and approved laughers express their mirth and gladness, note their faults, discover new modes, attempt new methods, and while in the very heaven of enjoyment an improvement approaching perfection may be attained before you are aware of it.

Theatres, when the sock presses the boards, afford excellent opportunities for the cultivation of laughter. As the voice of the singer is, by practising, often wrought up to strength and sweetness which it did

not possess before, so is the laughter of an individual fortified and made dulcet by frequent excitation. Spectacles, amphitheatres, and all shows of a mirthful nature are very beneficial, as merriment hath a contagion which will impregnate the hearts of the most dolorous.

The streets present many occasions for the culture of laughter. There you will meet with all that is odd and burlesque; and there, in the jargon of queer phrases, strange exclamations, and pointed sentences, unless you are of uncommon frigidity, often indeed will your risibilities be brought into action. He is indeed a pattern of stolidity who goes out into the streets and returns to his room without having laughed.

Awkwardness, uncouthness, and cant will never fail to thrill the nerves, and cause us to cachinnate. Juvenal says:

'DEMOCRITUS, at every step he took,

His sides with unextinguished laughter shook.

He laughed aloud to see the vulgar fears,

Laughed at their joys, and some time at their tears.'

Old Burton, when his melancholy had increased to such a degree that naught else could move him, used to find relief from his afflictions by going to the bridge-foot,' and listening to the ribaldry of the bargemen, which never failed to throw him into a fit of laughter.

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The society of women to men, and of men to women, I would also recommend as being highly beneficial in the culture of this faculty, by reason of the strong tendency which it hath toward causing that 'sweet contraction of the muscles of the face,' and that 'pleasant agitation of the vocal organs,' spoken of by Sir Thomas Browne. Still, a certain caution is to be used in the observation of this rule; for a too constant association with one person is apt to bring about a seriousness, which it is unadvisable for one to cultivate who is not an adept in this most excellent art.

Having thus, dear reader, completed our voyage over the sea of laughter, though we have frequently departed from the direct course into useless digressions, or have been becalmed in unnecessary repetitions, and as we now seek a shelter from the shocks and buffetings of the wave, permit us to find a haven in your good wishes and approbation. May you never be able to say with Hamlet, I have of late lost all my mirth, and, indeed, it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof, fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors;' but may you

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'KNOW the ways of pleasure, the sweet strains,
The lullings, and the relishes of it;
what mirth and music mean; '

and may you be ever ready and able to say truly,

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Cultivate, dear reader, cultivate laughter as a blessing. It is a blessing twice blessed.' Darkness and sorrow are merely transient, and ever' is the earth's still moon-like confidence in joy at her full.' May this confidence be not unfounded. May we ever be seen in the ranks of the laughter-loving. Let us cultivate laughter by laughing. Well said Martial,

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