rather see me stand on my head than use it for any purpose of

thought. Does not my friend, the Professor, receive at least two
letters a week, requesting him to. . . . , - on the strength of

some youthful antic of his, which, no doubt, authorizes the
intelligent constituency of autograph-hunters to address him as a

harlequin?
- Well, I can't be savage with you for wanting to laugh, and I like

to make you laugh, well enough, when I can. But then observe this:
if the sense of the ridiculous is one side of an impressible

nature, it is very well; but if that is all there is in a man, he
had better have been an ape at once, and so have stood at the head

of his profession. Laughter and tears are meant to turn the wheels
of the same machinery of sensibility; one is wind-power, and the

other water-power; that is all. I have often heard the Professor
talk about hysterics as being Nature's cleverest illustration of

the reciprocal convertibility of the two states of which these acts
are the manifestations; But you may see it every day in children;

and if you want to choke with stifled tears at sight of the
transition, as it shows itself in older years, go and see Mr. Blake

play JESSE RURAL.
It is a very dangerous thing for a literary man to indulge his love

for the ridiculous. People laugh WITH him just so long as he
amuses them; but if he attempts to be serious, they must still have

their laugh, and so they laugh AT him. There is in addition,
however, a deeper reason for this than would at first appear. Do

you know that you feel a little superior to every man who makes you
laugh, whether by making faces or verses? Are you aware that you

have a pleasant sense of patronizing him, when you condescend so
far as to let him turn somersets, literal or literary, for your

royal delight? Now if a man can only be allowed to stand on a
dais, or raised platform, and look down on his neighbor who is

exerting his talent for him, oh, it is all right! - first-rate
performance! - and all the rest of the fine phrases. But if all at

once the performer asks the gentleman to come upon the floor, and,
stepping upon the platform, begins to talk down at him, - ah, that

wasn't in the programme!
I have never forgotten what happened when Sydney Smith - who, as

everybody knows, was an exceedinglysensible man, and a gentleman,
every inch of him - ventured to preach a sermon on the Duties of

Royalty. The "Quarterly," "so savage and tartarly," came down upon
him in the most contemptuous style, as "a joker of jokes," a

"diner-out of the first water," in one of his own phrases; sneering
at him, insulting him, as nothing but a toady of a court, sneaking

behind the anonymous, would ever have been mean enough to do to a
man of his position and genius, or to any decent person even. - If

I were giving advice to a young fellow of talent, with two or three
facets to his mind, I would tell him by all means to keep his wit

in the background until after he had made a reputation by his more
solid qualities. And so to an actor: HAMLET first, and BOB LOGIC

afterwards, if you like; but don't think, as they say poor Liston
used to, that people will be ready to allow that you can do

anything great with MACBETH'S dagger after flourishing about with
PAUL PRY'S umbrella. Do you know, too, that the majority of men

look upon all who challenge their attention, - for a while, at
least, - as beggars, and nuisances? They always try to get off as

cheaply as they can; and the cheapest of all things they can give a
literary man - pardon the forlorn pleasantry! - is the FUNNY-bone.

That is all very well so far as it goes, but satisfies no man, and
makes a good many angry, as I told you on a former occasion.

- Oh, indeed, no! - I am not ashamed to make you laugh,
occasionally. I think I could read you something I have in my desk

which would probably make you smile. Perhaps I will read it one of
these days, if you are patient with me when I am sentimental and

reflective; not just now. The ludicrous has its place in the
universe; it is not a human invention, but one of the Divine ideas,

illustrated in the practical jokes of kittens and monkeys long
before Aristophanes or Shakspeare. How curious it is that we

always consider solemnity and the absence of all gay surprises and
encounter of wits as essential to the idea of the future life of

those whom we thus deprive of half their faculties and then call
BLESSED! There are not a few who, even in this life, seem to be

preparing themselves for that smileless eternity to which they look
forward, by banishing all gayety from their hearts and all

joyousness from their countenances. I meet one such in the street
not unfrequently, a person of intelligence and education, but who

gives me (and all that he passes) such a rayless and chilling look
of recognition, - something as if he were one of Heaven's

assessors, come down to "doom" every acquaintance he met, - that I
have sometimes begun to sneeze on the spot, and gone home with a

violent cold, dating from that instant. I don't doubt he would cut
his kitten's tail off, if he caught her playing with it. Please

tell me, who taught her to play with it?
No, no! - give me a chance to talk to you, my fellow-boarders, and

you need not be afraid that I shall have any scruples about
entertaining you, if I can do it, as well as giving you some of my

serious thoughts, and perhaps my sadder fancies. I know nothing in
English or any other literature more admirable than that sentiment

of Sir Thomas Browne "EVERY MAN TRULY LIVES, SO LONG AS HE ACTS HIS
NATURE, OR SOME WAY MAKES GOOD THE FACULTIES OF HIMSELF."

I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand,
as in what direction we are moving: To reach the port of heaven,

we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it, -
but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor. There is one

very sad thing in old friendships, to every mind that is really
moving onward. It is this: that one cannot help using his early

friends as the seaman uses the log, to mark his progress. Every
now and then we throw an old schoolmate over the stern with a

string of thought tied to him, and look - I am afraid with a kind
of luxurious and sanctimonious compassion - to see the rate at

which the string reels off, while he lies there bobbing up and
down, poor fellow! and we are dashing along with the white foam and

bright sparkle at our bows; - the ruffled bosom of prosperity and
progress, with a sprig of diamonds stuck in it! But this is only

the sentimental side of the matter; for grow we must, if we outgrow
all that we love.

Don't misunderstand that metaphor of heaving the log, I beg you.
It is merely a smart way of saying that we cannot avoid measuring

our rate of movement by those with whom we have long been in the
habit of comparing ourselves; and when they once become stationary,

we can get our reckoning from them with painfulaccuracy. We see
just what we were when they were our peers, and can strike the

balance between that and whatever we may feel ourselves to be now.
No doubt we may sometimes be mistaken. If we change our last

simile to that very old and familiar one of a fleet leaving the
harbor and sailing in company for some distant region, we can get

what we want out of it. There is one of our companions; - her
streamers were torn into rags before she had got into the open sea,

then by and by her sails blew out of the ropes one after another,
the waves swept her deck, and as night came on we left her a

seeming wreck, as we flew under our pyramid of canvas. But lo! at
dawn she is still in sight, - it may be in advance of us. Some

deep ocean-current has been moving her on, strong, but silent, -
yes, stronger than these noisy winds that puff our sails until they

are swollen as the cheeks of jubilant cherubim. And when at last
the black steam-tug with the skeleton arms, which comes out of the

mist sooner or later and takes us all in tow, grapples her and goes
off panting and groaning with her, it is to that harbor where all

wrecks are refitted, and where, alas! we, towering in our pride,
may never come.

So you will not think I mean to speak lightly of old friendships,