--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 9 number: 10 published: 1906-08 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "Laughter Aids Digestion," *Improvement Era* 9, no. 10 (August 1906): 752.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0910unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera0910unse start_page: 752 end_page: 752 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1906-08) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0910unse publication_year: 1906 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1906, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # Laughter Aids Digestion LAUGHTER AIDS DIGESTION. I have visited in homes where the members of the family would come to breakfast with long faces, stretching, gaping, discontented, surly and cross. Everybody seemed tired or disgusted or had some tale of woe or trouble to tell. When conversation took the place of the gloomy silence, it was depressing. Nobody made an effort to say anything pleasant; no one tried to be cheerful or to look agreeable. If the meal hour were more generally looked forward to as a joyful occasion,—as the best kind of mental recreation,—as a chance for the brightest conversation, for humor, and for mental exercise and refreshening, there would be much more happiness and much less crime and misery in the world. There is no medicine for the stomach and liver like laughter at meals.—Success.