Laughter tends to mock the pompous and the pretentious; all man's boastful gadding about, all his pretty pomps, his hoary customs, his wornout creeds, changing the glitter of them into the dullest hue of lead.

One inch of joy surmounts of grief a span, Because to laugh is proper to the man.

We are in the world to laugh. In purgatory or in hell we shall no longer be able to do so. And in heaven it would not be proper.

What monstrous absurdities and paradoxes have resisted whole batteries of serious arguments, and then crumbled swiftly into dust before the ringing death-knell of a laugh!

Our sincerest laughter With some pain is fraught: Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Laughter is not at all a bad beginning for a friendship, and it is far the best ending for one.

When people are laughing, they're generally not killing one another.

Among those whom I like or admire, I can find no common denominator; but among those whom I love, I can: all of them make me laugh.

I force myself to laugh at everything, for fear of being compelled to weep.

No man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad.