The quotation about a world that lets us laugh at it may be mine: I don’t remember where it is, but I am willing in any case to subscribe to the sentiment.

As to the medal and other honours, thank you for your flattering intention, but my one desire is to escape unobserved, as far as my old person is concerned. If people will crown my ideas in their own minds, that is a sufficient bond.

<3 Santayana