"Here goes," said I, and for the next few minutes, and in my very
best style, I hung Jeff Davis on the sour apple-tree, and I sent
the soul of John Brown marching onward with an altogether
unnecessary number of hallelujahs.
I think sometimes that people--whole families of 'em--literally
perish for want of a good, hearty, whole-souled, mouth-opening,
throat-stretching, side-aching laugh. They begin to think
themselves the abused of creation, they begin to advise with
their livers and to hate their neighbours, and the whole world
becomes a miserable dark blue place quite unfit for human
habitation. Well, all this is often only the result of a neglect
to exercise properly those muscles of the body (and of the soul)
which have to do with honest laughter.
I've never supposed I was an especially amusing person, but
before I got through with it I had the Clark family well loosened
up with laughter, although I wasn't quite sure some of the time
whether Mrs. Clark was laughing or crying. I had them all
laughing and talking, asking questions and answering them as
though I were an old and valued neighbour.
Isn't it odd how unconvinced we often are by the crises in the
lives of other people? They seem to us trivial or unimportant;
but the fact is, the crises in the life of a boy, for example, or
of a poor man, are as commanding as the crises in the life of the
greatest statesman or millionaire, for they involve equally the
whole personality, the entire prospects.
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