ON LAUGHTER. 355 



things. Thus the cockney's account of his exploit at a lire (quoted 

 from the London Times) would hardly be yours or mine: "'Jump, 

 yer silly fool!' we shouted, 'we've got a sheet!' and he did Jump, and 

 there weren't no bloomin' sheet, and he broke 'is bloomin' neck. 

 Larf ! I thought I sh'd 'ave died o' larfin'." That which is hiah 

 tragedy to the gods in the gallery may be comedy to the parquet, and 

 vice versa. "Avast thou wretch!" cries the demi-mondaine actress, 

 "Far rather would I wear the filthy rags of poverty than don the 

 imperial robes of sin." The artistic part of your nature laughs while 

 your moral nature is full of pity; meanwhile there is joy in the 'nig- 

 ger heaven' over another sinner repulsed. 



Evidently the causal element lies in vaso-motor and nervous 

 processes. The sense of joy present in the feeling of Men Titre, in the 

 witticism, in the mild atmosphere of humor, is evidently due to vaso- 

 motor phenomena and a discharge of surplus-stored energy where the 

 discharge does not involve too much strain, effort or lesion. The 

 laughter as a motor phenomenon may continue automatically, jSnally 

 producing lesion and pain and in some cases death. In the more 

 highly evolved form of this process, such as in wit, the element of 

 suddenness is paramount, brought about by the coalescing of nervous 

 currents seldom or never associated and by sudden vaso-motor and 

 metabolic changes. In other words, we are dealing ultimately with 

 mild forms of vaso-motor shock. Thus Dr. Edward E. Hale was 

 taken when a boy to hear his father speak on a critical occasion. He 

 was so impressed by hearing the orator cry; "Will any man dare say 

 * * *" that he shouted from the gallery, "No, pa!" Neither of 

 these elements taken by themselves are laugh-producing, neither can 

 the ideas by themselves produce such a result, but the vaso-motor 

 shock and sudden coalescence of nervous currents may excite by asso- 

 ciation the motor centers to intense activity. 



In other words, it is not an appeal to our sense of superiority, to 

 our feeling for the ludicrous, to this feeling or to that; the enjoyment 

 we call humor or wit is the result of vaso-motor and nervous changes. 

 The objects of the humor or wit may be numberless, or rather co-ex- 

 tensive with one's experience, but the fundamental or underlying 



