faults and unimportant turpitudes; and sometimes, perhaps, though rarely, from that sort of pride, which is described in the passage quoted from Mr. Hobbes by Addison.

All these accounts agree in this, that the cause of laughter is something compounded; or something that disposes the mind to form a comparison, by passing from one object or idea to another. That this is in fact the case, cannot be proved a priori; but this holds in all the examples hitherto given, and will be found to hold in all that are given hereafter. May it not then be laid down as a principle, that "laughter "arises from the view of two or more objects "or ideas, disposing the mind to form a com"parison?" According to the theory of Hobbes, this comparison would be between the ludicrous object and ourselves; according to those writers who misapply Aristotle's definition, it would seem to be formed between the ludicrous object and other things or persons in general; and if we incline to Hutcheson's theory, which is the best of the three, we shall think that there is a comparison of the parts of the ludicrous object, first with one another, and secondly with ideas or things extraneous.

Further: Every appearance that is made up of parts, or that leads the mind of the beholder

to form a comparison, is not ludicrous. The body of a man or woman, of a horse, a fish, or a bird, is not ludicrous, though it consists of many parts; and it may be compared to many other things without raising laughter: but the picture described in the beginning of the epistle to the Pisoes, with a man's head, a horse's neck, feathers of different birds, limbs of different beasts, and the tail of a fish, would have been thought ludicrous eighteen hundred years ago, if we believe Horace, and in certain circumstances would no doubt be so at this day. It would seem then, that "the parts of a laughable assem"blage must be in some degree unsuitable and "heterogeneous."

Moreover: Any one of the parts of the Horatian monster, a human head, a horse's neck, the tail of a fish, or the plumage of a fowl, is not ludicrous in itself; nor would those several parts be ludicrous, if attended to in succession, without any view to their union. For to see them disposed on different shelves of a museum, or even on the same shelf, nobody would laugh, except perhaps the thought of uniting them were to occur to his fancy, or the passage of Horace to his memory. It seems to follow, "that the in"congruous parts of a laughable idea or object "must either be combined so as to form an as

"semblage, or must be supposed to be so com"bined."

May we not then conclude, that "laughter "arises from the view of two or more incon"sistent, unsuitable, or incongruous parts or "circumstances, considered as united in one "complex object or assemblage, or as acquir"ing a sort of mutual relation from the pecu"liar manner in which the mind takes notice "of them?” The lines from Akenside, formerly referred to, seem to point at the same doctrine:

Where'er the power of Ridicule displays

Her quainteyed visage, some incongruous form,
Some stubborn dissonance of things combined,
Strikes on the quick observer.

And, to the same purpose, the learned and ingenious Dr. Gerard, in his Essay on Taste: "The sense of ridicule is gratified by an incon"sistence and dissonance of circumstances in "the same object, or in objects nearly related " in the main; or by a similitude or relation un"expected between things on the whole opposite " and unlike."

And therefore, instead of saying with Hutcheson, that the cause or object of laughter is an "opposition of dignity and meanness," I would say, in more general terms, that it is," an oppo~

"sition of suitableness and unsuitableness, or of "relation and the want of relation, united, or "supposed to be united, in the same assem"blage." Thus the offices ascribed to the dagger of Hudibras seem quite heterogeneous; but we discover a bond of connection among them, when we are told, that the same weapon could occasionally perform them all. Thus, even in that mimickry, which displays no opposition of dignity and meanness, we perceive the actions of one man joined to the features and body of another; that is, a mixture of unsuitableness, a want of relation, arising from the difference of persons, with congruity and similitude, arising from the sameness of the actions. Thus, at first view, the dawn of the morning, and a boiled lobster, seem utterly incongruous, unlike, and (as Biondello says of Petruchio's stirrups) "of no "kindred;" but when a change of colour from black to red is suggested, we recognize a likeness, and consequently a relation, or ground of comparison.

And here let it be observed in general, that, the greater the number of incongruities that are blended in the same assemblage, the more ludicrous it will probably be. If, as in the last example, there be an opposition of dignity and meanness, as well as of likeness and dissimili

tude, the effect of the contrast will be more powerful, than if only one of these oppositions had appeared in the ludicrous idea. The sublimity of Don Quixote's mind contrasted and connected with his miserable equipage, forms a very comical exhibition; but when all this is still further connected and contrasted with Sancho Pancha, the ridicule is heightened exceedingly. Had the knight of the lions been better mounted and accoutred, he would not have made us smile so often; because the hero's mind and circumstances being more adequately matched, the whole group would have united fewer inconsistencies, and reconciled fewer incongruities. No particular in this equipment is without its use. The ass of Sancho, and the horse of his master; the knight tall and rawboned, the squire fat and short; the one brave, solemn, generous, learned, and courteous, the other not less remarkable for cowardice, levity, selfishness, ignorance, and rusticity; the one absurdly enamoured of an ideal mistress, the other ridiculously fond of his ass; the one devoted to glory, the other enslaved to his belly: it is not easy out of two persons, to make up a more multifarious contrast. Butler has however combined a still greater variety of uncouth and jarring circumstances in Ralpho and Hudibras: but the picture, though more VOL. VI.