We laugh

"We sit by and watch the Barbarian, we tolerate him; in the long stretches of peace we are not afraid.  We are tickled by his irreverence, his comic inversion of our old certitudes and our fixed creeds refreshes us; we laugh.  But as we laugh we are watched by large and awful faces from beyond:  and on these faces there is no smile."

- Hilaire Belloc

HT CERC

2 comments:

Aged parent said...

My favorite Belloc quote, which I've passed along for thirty years.

It gives one goose bumps.

Elizabeth said...

I love Belloc.