Quotes about laughter
44 quotes from 38 people
Never laugh when you’re being sarcastic. It will ruin the effect.
Scott Adams1957–2026The Joy of Work (1998)
Joseph Addison1672–1719The Spectator (1711–1714), No. 494 (26 September 1712)
W. H. Auden1907–1973The Dyer’s Hand, and Other Essays (1962)To listen to some devout people, one would imagine that God never laughs.
Sri Aurobindo1872–1950Sri Aurobindo: The Hour of God, and Other Writings (1970)For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?
I hasten to laugh at everything, for fear of being obliged to weep.
Pierre Beaumarchais1732–1799Le Barbier de Séville (1773), Act I, sc. ii (Figaro). Harbottle and Dalbiac (1904) p. 63
Ambrose Bierce1842–1914The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)- Ambrose Bierce1842–1914Epigrams, p. 346
The man who laughs has simply not yet had the terrible news.
Bertolt Brecht1898–1956“To Those Born Later”, part of the Svendborg Poems (1939)Some things are of that nature as to make
One’s fancy chuckle, while his heart doth ache.
John Bunyan1628–1688The Pilgrim’s Progress, Part II (1684), verse preface “The Author’s Way of Sending Forth His Second Part of the Pilgrim”And if I laugh at any mortal thing,
’Tis that I may not weepNo man who has once heartily and wholly laughed can be altogether irreclaimably bad.
Thomas Carlyle1795–1881Sartor Resartus (1833–1834), Bk. I, ch. 4.
