We have had comic pulpits, for a sign that the laughter-moving and the
worshipful may be in alliance: I know not how far comic, or how much
assisted in seeming so by the unexpectedness and the relief of its
appearance: at least they are popular, they are said to win the ear.
Laughter is open to perversion, like other good things; the scornful and
the brutal sorts are not unknown to us; but the laughter directed by the
Comic spirit is a harmless wine, conducing to sobriety in the degree that
it enlivens. It enters you like fresh air into a study; as when one of
the sudden contrasts of the comic idea floods the brain like reassuring
daylight. You are cognizant of the true kind by feeling that you take it
in, savour it, and have what flowers live on, natural air for food. That
which you give out--the joyful roar--is not the better part; let that go
to good fellowship and the benefit of the lungs. Aristophanes promises
his auditors that if they will retain the ideas of the comic poet
carefully, as they keep dried fruits in boxes, their garments shall smell
odoriferous of wisdom throughout the year.
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