The humorous writer professes to awaken and direct your love, your pity, your kindness; your scorn of untruth, pretension, imposture; your tenderness for the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the unhappy. -- Thackeray
though posing at first only as the puppet who waded knee-deep in comic vice, punch has worked as a teacher as well as a jester -- a leader, and a preacher of kindness. nor was it simple humour that was punch's profession at the beginning; he always had a more serious and, so to say, a worthier object in view.-- The History of Punch, by M. H. Spielmann (Cassell and Company, 1895).
founded in 1841, Punch was initially titled The London Charivari, for the satirical french humor magazine Le Charivari. punch brought the modern use of the word "cartoon" to refer to a comic drawing.
