Archive

Quotes

A jest breaks no bones.

—Samuel Johnson, 1781

Jests and scoffs do lessen majesty and greatness and should be far from great personages and men of wisdom.

—Henry Peacham, 1622

A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.

—George Eliot, 1876

I said of laughter, “It is mad,” and of pleasure, “What use is it?”

—Book of Ecclesiastes, 225 BC

A joke is at most a temporary rebellion against virtue, and its aim is not to degrade the human being but to remind him that he is already degraded.

—George Orwell, 1945
  •