It must be acknowledged, however, to the credit of mankind, that there is no essential difference between the social ideal and the rule, that it is the faults of others that make us laugh, provided we add that they make us laugh by reason of their unsociability rather than of their immorality.  What, then, are the faults capable of becoming ludicrous, and in what circumstances do we regard them as being too serious to be laughed at?

We have already given an implicit answer to this question.  The comic, we said, appeals to the intelligence, pure and simple; laughter is incompatible with emotion.  Depict some fault, however trifling, in such a way as to arouse sympathy, fear, or pity; the mischief is done, it is impossible for us to laugh.  On the other hand, take a downright vice,—­even one that is, generally speaking, of an odious nature,—­you may make it ludicrous if, by some suitable contrivance, you arrange so that it leaves our emotions unaffected.  Not that the vice must then be ludicrous, but it may, from that time forth, become so.  It must not arouse our feelings; that is the sole condition really necessary, though assuredly it is not sufficient.

But, then, how will the comic poet set to work to prevent our feelings being moved?  The question is an embarrassing one.  To clear it up thoroughly, we should have to enter upon a rather novel line of investigation, to analyse the artificial sympathy which we bring with us to the theatre, and determine upon the circumstances in which we accept and those in which we refuse to share imaginary joys and sorrows.  There is an art of lulling sensibility to sleep and providing it with dreams, as happens in the case of a mesmerised person.  And there is also an art of throwing a wet blanket upon sympathy at the very moment it might arise, the result being that the situation, though a serious one, is not taken seriously.  This latter art would appear to be governed by two methods, which are applied more or less unconsciously by the comic poet.  The first consists in isolating, within the soul of the character, the feeling attributed to him, and making it a parasitic organism, so to speak, endowed with an independent existence.  As a general rule, an intense feeling successively encroaches upon all other mental states and colours them with its own peculiar hue; if, then, we are made to witness this gradual impregnation, we finally become impregnated ourselves with a corresponding emotion.  To employ a different image, an emotion may be said to be dramatic and contagious when all the harmonics in it are heard along with the fundamental note.  It is because the actor thus thrills throughout his whole being that the spectators themselves feel the thrill.  On the contrary, in the case of emotion that leaves us indifferent and that is about to become comic, there is always present a certain rigidity which prevents