john sitter wrote:

> Dear Twainians,
>
>         I'm trying to remember where I read a joke--well, a humorous story,
> anyway--so that I can quote and cite it properly.
>
>         It's a variation on the world-as-vale-of-tears theme, and the general
> situation is that a preacher (rabbi? somebody's grandfather?) is
> declaiming something like so:  "Oh, what a world of woe.  Happiness is
> uncertain, misery certain.  Lucky is he who passes from it quickly.
> Luckiest of all not to be born at all.  But to whom is such good fortune
> granted? --Scarcely one in a thousand."
>
>         A lugubrious enough joke, but, with that careful attempt at accuracy,
> one of my favorite punchlines.  Is it from somewhere in Twain?
>
>                 With thanks for any help,
>                         John Sitter
>

I know it as an old Yiddish/Jewish joke. I'm sure Leo Rosten quotes it somewhere
in Joys of Yiddish.

George Robinson