ABSTRACT
Mr. Nicolson quotes with approval Dr. Sully’s view that the sense of humour is found only in races of Teutonic stock. Humour to Mr. Nicolson is essentially a method of self-defence, a device for taking the sting out of life. ‘One cannot have a sense of humour unless one be without conscience or responsibility,’ Mr. Nicolson quotes from Goethe, adding, however, that the examples of Lincoln and Winston Churchill show that humour does not always have a debilitating effect upon character. That humour, like any other faculty, can be exploited for personal ends is no reflection on it. It is not humour which has a debilitating effect upon character, but lack of character which has a debilitating effect upon humour.
