THE GOSPEL OF LAUGHTER. THE GOSPEL OF LAUGHTER.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7329, 15 February 1902, Page 3

THE GOSPEL OF LAUGHTER.

An American writer, dealing with the "Gospel of Laughter," says many good things about an old and very true subject. Here are some extracts. " Its moral effect is beyond computation. It has killed more ridiculous superstitions by its rollicking roars of unbelief than any other agency. What can be more derisive than a laugh? The man who laughs never kills himself. That is the reason so few Irishmen commit suicide." Who does not recognise this little touch about the husband who comes home at night? "He is tired and hungry and cross. He vents his ill-humour on his wife. Why shouldn't he? That's what he got her for. But she only laughs. Then, after the soup and the roast, and about coffee-time, she springs her joke: 'John, why is a goat nearly?' And he roars over the 'all butt' and frightens away, the howling fiends of care." The author winds up with an exhortation to this effect : " Let us change the curriculum in our colleges and public schools. Let us endow a professorship of Laughter, so that our sons and daughters may learn to become adepts in the art^of being cheefcful. We'll make 'em happy^in spite of themselves, even as the benevolent old gentleman, in addressing a Sunday school full of little children, said: 'Confound you, little children, love one another!"