ON

Wit and humor, and the distinction between them, defy precise
definition. Luckily, they need none. To one asking what is beauty, a wit
replied: "That is the question of a blind man." Similarly, none requires
a definition of wit and humor unless he himself be lacking in all
appreciation of them, and, if he be so lacking, no amount of explanation
will avail to give him understanding. Borrow, in one of his sermons,
declared concerning wit: "It is, indeed, a thing so versatile,
multiform, appearing in so many shapes and garbs, so variously
apprehended of several eyes and judgments, that it seemeth no less hard
to settle a clear and certain notion thereof than to make a portrait of
Proteus, or to define the figure of the fleeting wind." Nor is it
fitting to attempt exact distinctions between wit and humor, which are
essentially two aspects of one thing. It is enough to realize that humor
is the product of nature rather than of art, while wit is the expression
of an intellectual art. Humor exerts an emotional appeal, produces
smiles or laughter; wit may be amusing, or it may not, according to the
circumstances, but it always provokes an intellectual appreciation.
Thus, Nero made a pun on the name of Seneca, when the philosopher was
brought before him for sentence. In speaking the decree that the old man
should kill himself, the emperor used merely the two Latin words: "Se
neca." We admit the ghastly cleverness of the jest, but we do not
chuckle over it.

The element of surprise is common to both wit and humor, and it is
often a sufficient cause for laughter in itself, irrespective of any
essentially amusing quality in the cause of the surprise. The
unfamiliar, for this reason, often has a ludicrous appeal to primitive
peoples. An African tribe, on being told by the missionary that the
world is round, roared with laughter for hours; it is told of a Mikado
that he burst a blood-vessel and died in a fit of merriment induced by
hearing that the American people ruled themselves. In like fashion, the
average person grins or guffaws at sight of a stranger in an outlandish
costume, although, as a matter of fact, the dress may be in every
respect superior to his own. Simply, its oddity somehow tickles the
risibilities. Such surprise is occasioned by contrasting circumstances.
When a pompous gentleman, marching magnificently, suddenly steps on a
banana peel, pirouettes, somersaults, and sits with extreme violence, we
laugh befo