_Discovery of Truth not allied to the ludicrous._--It is for a similar reason that the discovery of any new and important truth in science, however strange and unexpected, never awakens the feeling of the ludicrous. Its importance carries it over into a higher sphere of thought and feeling. Kepler's law of planetary motion must have been at first a strange and wonderful announcement; the chemical identity of charcoal and the diamond presents, in a new and strange relation, objects apparently most unlike and incongruous; yet, in all probability, neither the astronomer, nor the chemist, who made and announced these discoveries, were regarded by the men of the time as having done any thing peculiarly witty. We look at the importance of the results in such cases, and whatever of oddity or incongruity there may be in the ideas or objects thus related, fails to impress the mind in the presence of graver emotions. _Various Forms of the ludicrous._--The incongruity that awakens the feeling of the ludicrous may present itself in many diverse forms. It may relate to _objects_, or to _ideas_. In either case, the grouping or bringing together of the incongruous elements may be _accidental_, or it may be _intentional_. If accidental, it passes for a blunder; if intentional, it takes the name of wit. _Accidental and intentional grouping of Objects incongruous._--Of the _accidental_ grouping of _objects_ that are incongruous, we have an instance in the case already supposed, of the well dressed and dignified gentleman unexpectedly prostrate in the mud. If in place of the dignified gentleman we have the dandy, or the Broadway exquisite, fresh from the toilet, the incongruity is so much the greater, and so much the greater our mirth. Let the hero of the scene, for instance, be such a one as Hotspur so contemptuously describes as coming to parley with him after battle:-- "When I was dry with rage and extreme toil, Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword, Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dressed, Fresh as a bridegroom; and his chin, new-reaped, Showed like a stubble-land at harvest home. He was perfumed like a milliner; And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held A pouncet box, which ever and anon He gave his nose, and took't away again;" --imagine such a character, with all his finery, floundering in the mud, and the ludicrousness of the scene would be such as to set at naught all attempts at gravity, even on the part of those who seldom smile. When the incongruous objects are purposely brought into relation for the sake of exciting mirth, the wit may be _at the expense of others_, in which case we have either the practical joke, or simple buffoonery, imitating the peculiarities and incongruities of others; or the joker may play off his wit _at his own expense_, and act the clown or the fool for the amusement of observers.