46 
Butler—Phases of Witticism. 
each other but have not before been seen to be. In unfitness 
wit shows a fitness, or a semblance of it. 
On this principle Alexander equipped notorious cowards with 
armor which covered their breasts but left their backs unde¬ 
fended. 
In a similar vein, when certain wild fellows had pulled down 
the sign of a fire insurance office, they put it up over the door 
of a Universalist church. 
I once fell asleep one morning in an Italian diligence, and a, 
native remarked: “No wonder you are drowsy for it is not yet 
daylight in your country. ” 
There was wonder that Brigham Young never laid a mile of 
pipe from the sulphur spring to his harem bath. Wits, however, 
said that was nothing strange, since Brigham knew that he would 
smell brimstone soon enough at all events. 
When others were shocked at the oaths of a swearer, a wit 
declared that a man on the way to the court of Satan might well 
labor to learn the dialect of devils. 
When the Austrian eagle was put in place of St. Stephen 
on the topmost pinnacle of his cathedral in Vienna many found 
fault. But wits saw a fitness in the change inasmuch as all the 
highest places there were occupied by brutes. 
Many have wondered that no snakes are found in Ireland. 
One wit said that Nature needed so much venom for Burke that 
she had none to spare for serpents. 
Lean folks are long-lived. A wit would say that Death spares- 
them because he is very lean himself, and fellow-feeling makes, 
wondrous kind. 
A wit was asked why King George III had not a fool as well 
as a poet laureate. His answer was; “No greater fool than 
the king himself can be discovered. ” 
Byron said that he preferred Confucius to the ten command¬ 
ments. “Well he may”, remarked a wit, “for 
“ ‘No rogue ere felt halter draw 
With good opinion of the law’.” 
When Xantippe, perceiving that her scolding did not disturb 
the equanimity of Socrates, drenched him with dishwater, the 
