Bab Bab 116 · How Panurge consulteth with

Chapter 3.XXIV.

How Panurge consulteth with Epistemon.

Having left the town of Villomere, as they were upon their return towards

Pantagruel, Panurge, in addressing his discourse to Epistemon, spoke thus:

My most ancient friend and gossip, thou seest the perplexity of my

thoughts, and knowest many remedies for the removal thereof; art thou not

able to help and succour me? Epistemon, thereupon taking the speech in

hand, represented unto Panurge how the open voice and common fame of the

whole country did run upon no other discourse but the derision and mockery

of his new disguise; wherefore his counsel unto him was that he would in

the first place be pleased to make use of a little hellebore for the

purging of his brain of that peccant humour which, through that extravagant

and fantastic mummery of his, had furnished the people with a too just

occasion of flouting and gibing, jeering and scoffing him, and that next he

would resume his ordinary fashion of accoutrement, and go apparelled as he

was wont to do. I am, quoth Panurge, my dear gossip Epistemon, of a mind

and resolution to marry, but am afraid of being a cuckold and to be

unfortunate in my wedlock. For this cause have I made a vow to young St.

Francis--who at Plessis-les-Tours is much reverenced of all women,

earnestly cried unto by them, and with great devotion, for he was the first

founder of the confraternity of good men, whom they naturally covet,

affect, and long for--to wear spectacles in my cap, and to carry no

codpiece in my breeches, until the present inquietude and perturbation of

my spirits be fully settled.

Truly, quoth Epistemon, that is a pretty jolly vow of thirteen to a dozen.

It is a shame to you, and I wonder much at it, that you do not return unto

yourself, and recall your senses from this their wild swerving and straying

abroad to that rest and stillness which becomes a virtuous man. This

whimsical conceit of yours brings me to the remembrance of a solemn promise

made by the shag-haired Argives, who, having in their controversy against

the Lacedaemonians for the territory of Thyrea, lost the battle which they

hoped should have decided it for their advantage, vowed to carry never any

hair on their heads till preallably they had recovered the loss of both

their honour and lands. As likewise to the memory of the vow of a pleasant

Spaniard called Michael Doris, who vowed to carry in his hat a piece of the

shin of his leg till he should be revenged of him who had struck it off.

Yet do not I know which of these two deserveth most to wear a green and

yellow hood with a hare’s ears tied to it, either the aforesaid

vainglorious champion, or that Enguerrant, who having forgot the art and

manner of writing histories set down by the Samosatian philosopher, maketh

a most tediously long narrative and relation thereof. For, at the first

reading of such a profuse discourse, one would think it had been broached

for the introducing of a story of great importance and moment concerning

the waging of some formidable war, or the notable change and mutation of

potent states and kingdoms; but, in conclusion, the world laugheth at the

capricious champion, at the Englishman who had affronted him, as also at

their scribbler Enguerrant, more drivelling at the mouth than a mustard

pot. The jest and scorn thereof is not unlike to that of the mountain of

Horace, which by the poet was made to cry out and lament most enormously as

a woman in the pangs and labour of child-birth, at which deplorable and

exorbitant cries and lamentations the whole neighbourhood being assembled

in expectation to see some marvellous monstrous production, could at last

perceive no other but the paltry, ridiculous mouse.

Your mousing, quoth Panurge, will not make me leave my musing why folks

should be so frumpishly disposed, seeing I am certainly persuaded that some

flout who merit to be flouted at; yet, as my vow imports, so will I do. It

is now a long time since, by Jupiter Philos (A mistake of the

translator’s.--M.), we did swear faith and amity to one another. Give me

your advice, billy, and tell me your opinion freely, Should I marry or no?

Truly, quoth Epistemon, the case is hazardous, and the danger so eminently

apparent that I find myself too weak and insufficient to give you a

punctual and peremptory resolution therein; and if ever it was true that

judgment is difficult in matters of the medicinal art, what was said by

Hippocrates of Lango, it is certainly so in this case. True it is that in

my brain there are some rolling fancies, by means whereof somewhat may be

pitched upon of a seeming efficacy to the disentangling your mind of those

dubious apprehensions wherewith it is perplexed; but they do not thoroughly

satisfy me. Some of the Platonic sect affirm that whosoever is able to see

his proper genius may know his own destiny. I understand not their

doctrine, nor do I think that you adhere to them; there is a palpable

abuse. I have seen the experience of it in a very curious gentleman of the

country of Estangourre. This is one of the points. There is yet another

not much better. If there were any authority now in the oracles of Jupiter

Ammon; of Apollo in Lebadia, Delphos, Delos, Cyrra, Patara, Tegyres,

Preneste, Lycia, Colophon, or in the Castalian Fountain; near Antiochia in

Syria, between the Branchidians; of Bacchus in Dodona; of Mercury in

Phares, near Patras; of Apis in Egypt; of Serapis in Canope; of Faunus in

Menalia, and Albunea near Tivoli; of Tiresias in Orchomenus; of Mopsus in

Cilicia; of Orpheus in Lesbos, and of Trophonius in Leucadia; I would in

that case advise you, and possibly not, to go thither for their judgment

concerning the design and enterprise you have in hand. But you know that

they are all of them become as dumb as so many fishes since the advent of

that Saviour King whose coming to this world hath made all oracles and

prophecies to cease; as the approach of the sun’s radiant beams expelleth

goblins, bugbears, hobthrushes, broams, screech-owl-mates, night-walking

spirits, and tenebrions. These now are gone; but although they were as yet

in continuance and in the same power, rule, and request that formerly they

were, yet would not I counsel you to be too credulous in putting any trust

in their responses. Too many folks have been deceived thereby. It stands

furthermore upon record how Agrippina did charge the fair Lollia with the

crime of having interrogated the oracle of Apollo Clarius, to understand if

she should be at any time married to the Emperor Claudius; for which cause

she was first banished, and thereafter put to a shameful and ignominious

death.

But, saith Panurge, let us do better. The Ogygian Islands are not far

distant from the haven of Sammalo. Let us, after that we shall have spoken

to our king, make a voyage thither. In one of these four isles, to wit,

that which hath its primest aspect towards the sun setting, it is reported,

and I have read in good antique and authentic authors, that there reside

many soothsayers, fortune-tellers, vaticinators, prophets, and diviners of

things to come; that Saturn inhabiteth that place, bound with fair chains

of gold and within the concavity of a golden rock, being nourished with

divine ambrosia and nectar, which are daily in great store and abundance

transmitted to him from the heavens, by I do not well know what kind of

fowls,--it may be that they are the same ravens which in the deserts are

said to have fed St. Paul, the first hermit,--he very clearly foretelleth

unto everyone who is desirous to be certified of the condition of his lot

what his destiny will be, and what future chance the Fates have ordained

for him; for the Parcae, or Weird Sisters, do not twist, spin, or draw out

a thread, nor yet doth Jupiter perpend, project, or deliberate anything

which the good old celestial father knoweth not to the full, even whilst he

is asleep. This will be a very summary abbreviation of our labour, if we

but hearken unto him a little upon the serious debate and canvassing of

this my perplexity. That is, answered Epistemon, a gullery too evident, a

plain abuse and fib too fabulous. I will not go, not I; I will not go.