194. How play and jokes go bad
194. HOW PLAY AND JOKES GO BAD
If play, games, jokes, and mirth are in themselves good, how can they go bad?
Nevertheless . . . the pleasure in question should not be sought in indecent or injurious deeds or words. Wherefore Tully says that one kind of joke is discourteous, insolent, scandalous, obscene . . . just as we do not allow children to enjoy absolute freedom in their games but only that which is consistent with good behavior, so our own fun should reflect something of an upright mind. . .
There may be excess in play through lack of due circumstances, for instance when people make use of fun at undue times or places or out of keeping with the matter at hand. . . (II-II, 167,3).
Now these things are directed according to the rule of reason, and a habit that operates according to reason is virtue. Therefore there can be a virtue about games. The Philosopher gives it the name of wittiness, and a man is said to be pleasant through having a happy turn of mind, whereby he gives his words and deeds a cheerful turn. . . . Hence Tully says: It is indeed lawful to make use of play and fun, but in the same way as we have recourse to sleep and other kinds of rest, and only when we have done our duty by serious matters. . . (II-II, 168,2).
Mirth is useful for the sake of the rest and pleasures it affords . . . since in human life pleasure and rest are not . . . for their own sake but for the sake of operation (action, living). . . . Hence the Philosopher says: a little sweetness suffices to season life just as a little salt suffices for our meal (II-II, 168,4).
Once again, as with curiosity, St. Thomas lists some of the many ways this intrinsic good can be perverted:
(1) Indecency (jokes that provoke lust or manifest scorn).
(2) Personal injury.
(3) Discourtesy (a vice almost completely forgotten in our barbarian, vulgar culture).
(4) Insolence (sneering).
(5) Scandal (leading others into sin).
(6) Obscenity (it exists, and we still know it even though we rarely admit it).
(7) Excess (“all play and no work”).
(8) Impropriety of time (playing when we should be serious or working).
Tully’s point that St. Thomas quotes, about playing after we’ve done our serious duty rather than before it, is a very practical one: it makes our play more free and our work less hurried.
The last paragraph is true but only half the truth. Rest exists for work, yes, but work also exists for rest, as war exists for peace. Or perhaps we should say that work exists for the sake of leisure. Leisure is not merely rest or lack of work but non-pragmatic activity, what we usually call “culture.” (See Josef Pieper’s classic Leisure, the Basis of Culture.) Prayer, for instance, is not work. This fact is reflected in the “and” that separates the two in the famous Benedictine summary of monastic life: “pray and work” (ora et labora).