Page:Observations on Man 1834.djvu/310

 surprise by some more than ordinary degree of contrast or coincidence; and have at the same time a due connexion with pleasure and pain, and their several associations of fitness, decency, inconsistency, absurdity, honour, shame, virtue, and vice; so as neither to be too glaring on the one hand, nor too faint on the other. In the first case, the representation raises dislike and abhorrence; in the last, it becomes insipid.

From hence may be seen, that in different persons the occasions of laughter must be as different as their opinions and dispositions; that low similitudes, allusions, contrasts, and coincidences, applied to grave and serious subjects, must occasion the most profuse laughter in persons of light minds; and, conversely, increase this levity of mind, and weaken the regard due to things sacred; that the vices of gluttony, lewdness, vain-glory, self-conceit, and covetousness, with the concomitant pleasures and pains, hopes, fears, dangers, &c. when represented by indirect circumstances, and the representation heightened by contrasts and coincidences, must be the most frequent subject of mirth, wit, and humour, in this mixed degenerate state, where they are censured upon the whole; and yet not looked upon with a due degree of severity, distance, and abhorrence; that company, feasting, and wine, by putting the body into a pleasurable state, must dispose to laughter upon small occasions; and that persons who give themselves much to mirth, wit, and humour, must thereby greatly disqualify their understandings for the search after truth; inasmuch as by the perpetual hunting after apparent and partial agreements and disagreements, as in words, and indirect accidental circumstances, whilst the true natures of the things themselves afford real agreements and disagreements, that are very different, or quite opposite, a man must by degrees pervert all his notions of things themselves, and become unable to see them as they really are, and as they appear to considerate sober-minded inquirers. He must lose all his associations of the visible ideas of things, their names, symbols, &c. with their useful practical relations and properties; and get, in their stead, accidental, indirect, and unnatural conjunctions of circumstances, that are really foreign to each other, or oppositions of those that are united; and after some time, habit and custom will fix these upon him.

The most natural occasions of mirth and laughter in adults seem to be the little mistakes and follies of children, and the smaller inconsistencies and improprieties which happen in conversation, and the daily occurrences of life; inasmuch as these pleasures are, in great measure, occasioned, or at least supported, by the general pleasurable state, which our love and affection to our friends in general, and to children in particular, put the body and mind into. For this kind of mirth is always checked where we have a dislike; also where the mistake or inconsistency rises beyond a certain limit; for then it produces concern,