Quotes and anectdotes from the wise to the foolish, and the courageous to the drunk

humor

Things can be funny only when we are in fun. When we're 'dead earnest,' humor is the only thing that is dead. 7 quotes from Flip Wilson

Humor has justly been regarded as the finest perfection of poetic genius. 58 thoughts from Thomas Carlyle

Get well cards have become so humorous that if you don't get sick you're missing half the fun. 7 quotes from Flip Wilson

Humor is a serious thing. I like to think of it as one of our greatest earliest natural resources, which must be preserved at all cost. 14 quotes from James Thurber

Humor is a social lubricant that helps us get over some of the bad spots. 2 thoughts from Steve Allen

Humor is emotional chaos remembered in tranquility. 14 thoughts from James Thurber

I don't think humor is forced upon my universe it's a part of it. 11 quotes from Manuel Puig

My stories are very somber, so I think I need the comic ingredient. Besides, life has so much humor. 11 more views from Manuel Puig

Imagination was given to man to compensate him for what he is not a sense of humor to console him for what he is. 67 quotes from Francis Bacon

It is the ability to take a joke, not make one, that proves you have a sense of humor. 7 sayings from Max Eastman

You are not angry with people when you laugh at them. Humor teaches tolerance. 29 more sayings from W. Somerset Maugham

Humor is the instinct for taking pain playfully. 7 quotes from Max Eastman

Humor is the first of the gifts to perish in a foreign tongue. 30 wisdom & wit from Virginia Woolf

Total absence of humor renders life impossible. 9 quotes from Sidonie Gabrielle Colette

Men will confess to treason, murder, arson, false teeth, or a wig. How many of them will own up to a lack of humor? 3 views from Frank Moore Colby

Robert Walker as Bruno was excellent. He had elegance and humor, and the proper fondness for his mother. 5 more sayings from Patricia Highsmith

The overwhelming majority of Americans are possessed of two great qualities a sense of humor and a sense of proportion. 24 more sayings from Franklin D. Roosevelt

Start every day off with a smile and get it over with. 24 sayings from W. C. Fields

Common sense and a sense of humor are the same thing, moving at different speeds. A sense of humor is just common sense, dancing. 40 views from William James

A well-developed sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to your steps as you walk the tightrope of life. 14 wisdom & wit from William Arthur Ward

Good humor isn't a trait of character, it is an art which requires practice. 2 quotes from David Seabury

Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air and you. 7 thoughts from Langston Hughes

There are two insults no human being will endure: that he has no sense of humor, and that he has never known trouble. 6 quotes from Sinclair Lewis

Women, as they grow older, rely more and more on cosmetics. Men, as they grow older, rely more and more on a sense of humor. 12 sayings from George Jean Nathan

The total absence of humor from the Bible is one of the most singular things in all literature. 19 wisdom & wit from Alfred North Whitehead

Humor is laughing at what you haven't got when you ought to have it. 7 more wisdom & wit from Langston Hughes

When humor goes, there goes civilization. 33 thoughts from Erma Bombeck

Gags die, humor doesn't. 4 other quotes from Jack Benny

The satirist shoots to kill while the humorist brings his prey back alive and eventually releases him again for another chance. 10 quotes from Peter De Vries

Humor has been the balm of my life, but it's been reserved for those close to me, not part of the public Lana. 6 more thoughts from Lana Turner

There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt. 33 wisdom & wit from Erma Bombeck

I don't have a very quick sense of humor. 2 views from Florenz Ziegfeld

Humor is the most engaging cowardice. 50 sayings from Robert Frost

Bad humor is an evasion of reality good humor is an acceptance of it. 8 wisdom & wit from Malcolm Muggeridge

In conversation, humor is worth more than wit and easiness more than knowledge. 12 quotes from George Herbert

Humor is the affectionate communication of insight. 6 sayings from Leo Rosten

Humor distorts nothing, and only false gods are laughed off their earthly pedestals. 5 other quotes from Agnes Repplier

Humor brings insight and tolerance. Irony brings a deeper and less friendly understanding. 5 quotes from Agnes Repplier

All I know about humor is that I don't know anything about it. 13 other quotes from Fred Allen

Any man who has had the job I've had and didn't have a sense of humor wouldn't still be here. 26 more quotes from Harry S. Truman

Wit is the lowest form of humor. 43 quotes from Alexander Pope

When you say a friend has a sense of humor do you mean that he makes you laugh, or that he can make you laugh? 7 sayings from Max Frisch

A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on the road. 58 quotes from Henry Ward Beecher

I think I have always had a little humor. 53 thoughts from Marilyn Monroe

A sense of humor is a major defense against minor troubles. 21 wisdom & wit from Mignon McLaughlin

Humor is merely tragedy standing on its head with its pants torn. 3 thoughts from Irvin S. Cobb

Putting a little time aside for clean fun and good humor is very necessary to relieve the tensions of our time. 5 sayings from Hattie McDaniel

Nothing in man is more serious than his sense of humor it is the sign that he wants all the truth. 2 wisdom & wit from Mark Van Doren

Analyzing humor is like dissecting a frog. Few people are interested and the frog dies of it. 19 more sayings from E. B. White

A humorist is a person who feels bad, but who feels good about it. 3 quotes from Don Herold

Whatever else an American believes or disbelieves about himself, he is absolutely sure he has a sense of humor. 19 more sayings from E. B. White

Good humor is one of the best articles of dress one can wear in society. 8 views from William Makepeace Thackeray

Probably it is impossible for humor to be ever a revolutionary weapon. Candide can do little more than generate irony. 6 wisdom & wit from Lionel Trilling

The love of truth lies at the root of much humor. 3 thoughts from Robertson Davies

Married people should not be quick to hear what is said by either when in ill humor. 22 more views from Samuel Richardson

From sixteen to twenty, all women, kept in humor by their hopes and by their attractions, appear to be good-natured. 22 other views from Samuel Richardson

The sense of humor has other things to do than to make itself conspicuous in the act of laughter. 3 quotes from Alice Meynell

There seems to be no lengths to which humorless people will not go to analyze humor. It seems to worry them. 10 quotes from Robert Benchley

If this humor be the safety of our race, then it is due largely to the infusion into the American people of the Irish brain. 4 quotes from William Howard Taft

Stand-up comics reflect less of a visual humor and more of a commentary. 2 thoughts from Shel Silverstein

Comedy, we may say, is society protecting itself - with a smile. 9 wisdom & wit from J. B. Priestley

Cynicism is humor in ill health. 19 other quotes from H. G. Wells

The first glass is for myself, the second for my friends, the third for good humor, and the forth for my enemies. 6 views from William Temple

People of humor are always in some degree people of genius. 24 wisdom & wit from Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The first ingredient in conversation is truth, the next good sense, the third good humor, and the fourth wit. 6 more quotes from William Temple

No mind is thoroughly well organized that is deficient in a sense of humor. 24 views from Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Alimony is like buying hay for a dead horse. 29 sayings from Groucho Marx

Men live by intervals of reason under the sovereignty of humor and passion. 8 sayings from Thomas Browne

If I had no sense of humor, I would long ago have committed suicide. 100 other quotes from Mahatma Gandhi

This I conceive to be the chemical function of humor: to change the character of our thought. 4 other wisdom & wit from Lin Yutang

Humor is reason gone mad. 29 thoughts from Groucho Marx

A joke is a very serious thing. 74 wisdom & wit from Winston Churchill

Everything human is pathetic. The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow. There is no humor in heaven. 98 more sayings from Mark Twain

Humor is mankind's greatest blessing. 98 other quotes from Mark Twain

We do not take humor seriously enough. 2 views from Konrad Lorenz

Humor must not professedly teach and it must not professedly preach, but it must do both if it would live forever. 98 quotes from Mark Twain

Men are happy to be laughed at for their humor, but not for their folly. 19 other quotes from Jonathan Swift

Next to power without honor, the most dangerous thing in the world is power without humor. 2 more sayings from Eric Sevareid

The secret source of humor is not joy but sorrow there is no humor in Heaven. 98 more quotes from Mark Twain