Chapter I: Front Matter

HISTORY OF ENGLISH HUMOUR

With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour.

by

THE REV. A. G. L'ESTRANGE,

Author of "The Life of the Rev. William Harness," "From the Thames to the Tamar," Etc.

In Two Volumes.

Vol. I.

London: Hurst and Blackett, Publishers, 13, Great Marlborough Street. 1878. All rights reserved.

CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME.

PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS.

Subjective Character of the Ludicrous--The Subject little
Studied--Obstacles to the Investigation--Evanescence--Mental
Character of the Ludicrous--Distinction between
Humour and the Ludicrous 1

INTRODUCTION.

PART I.

ORIGIN OF HUMOUR.

Pleasure in Humour--What is Laughter?--Sympathy--First
Phases--Gradual Development--Emotional Phase--Laughter
of Pleasure--Hostile Laughter--Is there any sense of the Ludicrous
in the Lower Animals?--Samson--David--Solomon--Proverbs--Fables 13

PART II.

GREEK HUMOUR.

Birth of Humour--Personalities--Story of Hippocleides--Origin
of Comedy--Archilochus--Hipponax--Democritus,
the Laughing Philosopher--Aristophanes--Humour
of the Senses--Indelicacy--Enfeeblement of the Drama--Humorous
Games--Parasites, their Position and Jests--Philoxenus--Diogenes--Court
of Humour--Riddles--Silli 52

PART III.

ROMAN HUMOUR.

Roman Comedy--Plautus--Acerbity--Terence--Satire--Lucilius--Horace
--Humour of the Cæsar Family--Cicero--Augustus--Persius--Petronius
--Juvenal--Martial--Epigrammatist--Lucian--Apuleius--Julian
the Apostate--The Misopogon--Symposius' Enigmas--Macrobius--Hierocles
and Philagrius 99

ENGLISH HUMOUR.

CHAPTER I.

MIDDLE AGES.

Relapse of Civilization in the Middle Ages--Stagnation of
Mind--Scarcity of Books--Character of reviving Literature--Religious
Writings--Fantastic Legends--Influence
of the Crusades--Romances--Sir Bevis of Hamptoun--Prominence
of the Lower Animals--Allegories 161

CHAPTER II.

Anglo-Saxon Humour--Rhyme--Satires against the Church--The
Brunellus--Walter Mapes--Goliardi--Piers the
Ploughman--Letters of Obscure Men--Erasmus--The
Praise of Folly--Skelton--The Ship of Fools--Doctour
Doubble Ale--The Sak full of Nuez--Church Ornamentation--Representations
of the Devil 179

CHAPTER III.

Origin of Modern Comedy--Ecclesiastical Buffoonery--Jougleurs
and Minstrels--Court Fools--Monks' Stories--The
"Tournament of Tottenham"--Chaucer--Heywood--Roister
Doister--Gammer Gurton 211

CHAPTER IV.

Robert Greene--Friar Bacon's Demons--The "Looking
Glasse"--Nash and Harvey 231

CHAPTER V.

Donne--Hall--Fuller 243

CHAPTER VI.

Shakespeare--Ben Jonson--Beaumont and Fletcher--The
Wise Men of Gotham 250

CHAPTER VII.

Jesters--Court of Queen Elizabeth--James I.--The
"Counterblasts to Tobacco"--Puritans--Charles II.
--Rochester--Buckingham--Dryden--Butler 271

CHAPTER VIII.

Comic Drama of the Restoration--Etheridge--Wycherley 303

CHAPTER IX.

Tom Brown--His Prose Works--Poetry--Sir Richard
Blackmore--D'Urfey--Female Humorists--Carey 312

CHAPTER X.

Vanbrugh--Colley Cibber--Farquhar 340