The same thing applies to word-wit. When we hear that “_experience consists simply of experiencing what one wishes he had not experienced_,” we are puzzled, and believe that we have learnt a new truth; it takes some time before we recognize in this disguise the platitude, “adversity is the school of wisdom” (K. Fischer). The excellent wit-activity which seeks to define “experience” by the almost exclusive use of the word “experience” deceives us so completely that we overestimate the content of the sentence. The same thing happens in many similar cases and also in Lichtenberg’s unification-witticism about January (p. 89), which expresses nothing but what we already know, namely, that New Year’s wishes are as seldom realized as other wishes. We find the contrary true of other witticisms, in which obviously what is striking and correct in the thought captivates us, so that we call the saying an excellent witticism, whereas it is only the thought that is brilliant while the wit-activity is often weak. It is especially true of Lichtenberg’s wit that the path of the thought is often of more value than its witty expression, though we unjustly extend the value of the former to the latter. Thus the remark about the “torch of truth” (p. 115) is hardly a witty comparison, but it is so striking that we are inclined to lay stress on the sentence as exceptionally witty. Lichtenberg’s witticisms are above all remarkable for their thought-content and their certainty of hitting the mark. Goethe has rightly remarked about this author that his witty and jocose thoughts positively conceal problems. Or perhaps it may be more correct to say that they touch upon the solutions of problems. When, for example, he presents as a witty thought: “He always read _Agamemnon_ instead of the German word _angenommen_, so thoroughly had he read Homer” (technically this is absurdity plus sound similarity of words). Thus he discovered nothing less than the secret of mistakes in reading.[38] The following joke, whose technique (p. 78) seemed to us quite unsatisfactory, is of a similar nature. “_He was surprised that there were two holes cut in the pelts of cats just where the eyes were located._” The stupidity here exhibited is only seemingly so; in reality this ingenuous remark conceals the great problem of teleology in the structure of animals; it is not at all so self-evident that the eyelid cleft opens just where the cornea is exposed, until the science of evolution explains to us this coincidence. Let us bear in mind that a witty sentence gave us a general impression in which we were unable to distinguish the amount of thought-content from the amount of wit-work; perhaps even a more significant parallel to it will be found later. _Pleasure Results from the Technique_