[94]
It is a
pleasant form of jest to reproach a person with less
than would be possible, as Afer did when, in answer
to a candidate who said, “I have always shown my
respect for your family,” he replied, although he might
easily have denied the statement, “You are right, it
is quite true.” Sometimes it may be a good joke to
speak of oneself, while one may often raise a laugh
by reproaching a person to his face with things that
it would have been merely bad-mannered to bring
up against him behind his back.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1921.
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