One may see this even from the old and the new comedies;
to the authors of the former indecency of language was amusing, to
those of the latter innuendo is more so; and these differ in no
small degree in respect of propriety. Now should we define the man who
jokes well by his saying what is not unbecoming to a well-bred man, or
by his not giving pain, or even giving delight, to the hearer? Or is
the latter definition, at any rate, itself indefinite, since different
things are hateful or pleasant to different people? The kind of
jokes he will listen to will be the same; for the kind he can put up
with are also the kind he seems to make. There are, then, jokes he
will not make; for the jest is a sort of abuse, and there are things
that lawgivers forbid us to abuse; and they should, perhaps, have
forbidden us even to make a jest of such. The refined and well-bred
man, therefore, will be as we have described, being as it were a law
to himself.
Such, then, is the man who observes the mean, whether he be called
tactful or ready-witted. The buffoon, on the other hand, is the slave
of his sense of humour, and spares neither himself nor others if he
can raise a laugh, and says things none of which a man of refinement
would say, and to some of which he would not even listen.
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