LAUGHTER QUOTES III
quotations about laughter
Laughter was the most terrible weapon: you can kill anything with laughter.
YEVGENY ZAMYATIN
We
Nothing is more silly than silly laughter.
CATULLUS
Carmina
O, you shall see him laugh till his face be like a wet cloak ill laid up.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Henry IV, Part II
Ridicule is a weak weapon, when leveled at a strong mind; But common men are cowards, and dread an empty laugh.
MARTIN FARQUHAR TUPPER
Proverbial Philosophy
Comedy naturally wears itself out--destroys the very food on which it lives; and by constantly and successfully exposing the follies and weaknesses of mankind to ridicule, in the end leaves itself nothing worth laughing at.
WILLIAM HAZLITT
"On Modern Comedy", The Round Table
He who laughs last didn't get the joke at first.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
In regard to health care, we've all heard that laughter is the best medicine. Laughter is also our least costly healthcare option.
DANNY MURPHY
"If elected president, I promise a laugh in every belly!", The Florida Times-Union, April 1, 2016
It may be remarked in general, that the laugh of men of wit is for the most part but a feint, constrained kind of half-laugh, as such persons are never without some diffidence about them; but that of fools is the most honest, natural, open laugh in the world.
RICHARD STEELE
The Guardian, Apr. 14, 1713
You can turn painful situations around through laughter. If you can find humor in anything, even poverty, you can survive it.
BILL COSBY
attributed, Humor Me
Against the assault of laughter nothing can stand.
MARK TWAIN
The Mysterious Stranger
Casting for a comedy is not that difficult because laughing is an involuntary thing. They make you laugh? That's the person you should cast.
DAVID CASPE
"The Oral History of 'Happy Endings'", Complex, April 5, 2016
How many people are actually 'laughing out loud' when they send LOL? These days, I'd argue that LOL (commonly without caps) barely indicates an internal, silent chuckle, never mind an uproarious, audible guffaw.
GRETCHEN MCCULLOCH
"How many people are actually 'laughing out loud' when they send LOL?", Slate, May 23, 2014
I laugh until I weep
And weep until I smile
RAY BRADBURY
"Christ, Old Student in a New School"
Laughter is free, free your laughter.
ANONYMOUS
Man is the only animal that laughs and weeps; for he is the only animal that is struck with the difference between what things are, and what they ought to be.
WILLIAM HAZLITT
Lectures on the English Comic Writers
The immoderate cannot laugh moderately.
JOHANN KASPAR LAVATER
Aphorisms on Man
Laughing cheerfulness throws the light of day on all the paths of life.
JEAN PAUL RICHTER
attributed, Day's Collacon
The fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.
CARL SAGAN
Broca's Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science
Laugh at your friends, and if your friends are sore;
So much the better, you may laugh the more.
ALEXANDER POPE
Epilogue to Satire
Twenty years ago, ten years ago, I should have laughed, and have professed to you that I had merely smiled. A very young man is not content to be very young, nor even a young man to be young: he wants to share the dignity of his elders. There is no dignity in laughter, there is much of it in smiles. Laughter is but a joyous surrender, smiles give token of mature criticism. It may be that in the early ages of this world there was far more laughter than is to be heard now, and that aeons hence laughter will be obsolete, and smiles universal--every one, always, mildly, slightly, smiling. But it is less useful to speculate as to mankind's past and future than to observe men. And you will have observed with me in the club-room that young men at most times look solemn, whereas old men or men of middle age mostly smile; and also that those young men do often laugh loud and long among themselves, while we others--the gayest and best of us in the most favourable circumstances--seldom achieve more than our habitual act of smiling. Does the sound of that laughter jar on us? Do we liken it to the crackling of thorns under a pot? Let us do so. There is no cheerier sound. But let us not assume it to be the laughter of fools because we sit quiet. It is absurd to disapprove of what one envies, or to wish a good thing were no more because it has passed out of our possession.
MAX BEERBOHM
"Laughter", And Even Now