Bab Bab 144 · How a certain kind of Pantag

Chapter 3.LII.

How a certain kind of Pantagruelion is of that nature that the fire is not

able to consume it.

I have already related to you great and admirable things; but, if you might

be induced to adventure upon the hazard of believing some other divinity of

this sacred Pantagruelion, I very willingly would tell it you. Believe it,

if you will, or otherwise, believe it not, I care not which of them you do,

they are both alike to me. It shall be sufficient for my purpose to have

told you the truth, and the truth I will tell you. But to enter in

thereat, because it is of a knaggy, difficult, and rugged access, this is

the question which I ask of you. If I had put within this bottle two

pints, the one of wine and the other of water, thoroughly and exactly

mingled together, how would you unmix them? After what manner would you go

about to sever them, and separate the one liquor from the other, in such

sort that you render me the water apart, free from the wine, and the wine

also pure, without the intermixture of one drop of water, and both of them

in the same measure, quantity, and taste that I had embottled them? Or, to

state the question otherwise. If your carmen and mariners, entrusted for

the provision of your houses with the bringing of a certain considerable

number of tuns, puncheons, pipes, barrels, and hogsheads of Graves wine, or

of the wine of Orleans, Beaune, and Mireveaux, should drink out the half,

and afterwards with water fill up the other empty halves of the vessels as

full as before, as the Limosins use to do in their carriages by wains and

carts of the wines of Argenton and Sangaultier; after that, how would you

part the water from the wine, and purify them both in such a case? I

understand you well enough. Your meaning is, that I must do it with an ivy

funnel. That is written, it is true, and the verity thereof explored by a

thousand experiments; you have learned to do this feat before, I see it.

But those that have never known it, nor at any time have seen the like,

would hardly believe that it were possible. Let us nevertheless proceed.

But put the case, we were now living in the age of Sylla, Marius, Caesar,

and other such Roman emperors, or that we were in the time of our ancient

Druids, whose custom was to burn and calcine the dead bodies of their

parents and lords, and that you had a mind to drink the ashes or cinders of

your wives or fathers in the infused liquor of some good white-wine, as

Artemisia drunk the dust and ashes of her husband Mausolus; or otherwise,

that you did determine to have them reserved in some fine urn or reliquary

pot; how would you save the ashes apart, and separate them from those other

cinders and ashes into which the fuel of the funeral and bustuary fire hath

been converted? Answer, if you can. By my figgins, I believe it will

trouble you so to do.

Well, I will despatch, and tell you that, if you take of this celestial

Pantagruelion so much as is needful to cover the body of the defunct, and

after that you shall have enwrapped and bound therein as hard and closely

as you can the corpse of the said deceased persons, and sewed up the

folding-sheet with thread of the same stuff, throw it into the fire, how

great or ardent soever it be it matters not a straw, the fire through this

Pantagruelion will burn the body and reduce to ashes the bones thereof, and

the Pantagruelion shall be not only not consumed nor burnt, but also shall

neither lose one atom of the ashes enclosed within it, nor receive one atom

of the huge bustuary heap of ashes resulting from the blazing conflagration

of things combustible laid round about it, but shall at last, when taken

out of the fire, be fairer, whiter, and much cleaner than when you did put

it in at first. Therefore it is called Asbeston, which is as much to say

as incombustible. Great plenty is to be found thereof in Carpasia, as

likewise in the climate Dia Sienes, at very easy rates. O how rare and

admirable a thing it is, that the fire which devoureth, consumeth, and

destroyeth all such things else, should cleanse, purge, and whiten this

sole Pantagruelion Carpasian Asbeston! If you mistrust the verity of this

relation, and demand for further confirmation of my assertion a visible

sign, as the Jews and such incredulous infidels use to do, take a fresh

egg, and orbicularly, or rather ovally, enfold it within this divine

Pantagruelion. When it is so wrapped up, put it in the hot embers of a

fire, how great or ardent soever it be, and having left it there as long as

you will, you shall at last, at your taking it out of the fire, find the

egg roasted hard, and as it were burnt, without any alteration, change,

mutation, or so much as a calefaction of the sacred Pantagruelion. For

less than a million of pounds sterling, modified, taken down, and

amoderated to the twelfth part of one fourpence halfpenny farthing, you are

able to put it to a trial and make proof thereof.

Do not think to overmatch me here, by paragoning with it in the way of a

more eminent comparison the Salamander. That is a fib; for, albeit a

little ordinary fire, such as is used in dining-rooms and chambers,

gladden, cheer up, exhilarate, and quicken it, yet may I warrantably enough

assure that in the flaming fire of a furnace it will, like any other

animated creature, be quickly suffocated, choked, consumed, and destroyed.

We have seen the experiment thereof, and Galen many ages ago hath clearly

demonstrated and confirmed it, Lib. 3, De temperamentis, and Dioscorides

maintaineth the same doctrine, Lib. 2. Do not here instance in competition

with this sacred herb the feather alum or the wooden tower of Pyraeus,

which Lucius Sylla was never able to get burnt; for that Archelaus,

governor of the town for Mithridates, King of Pontus, had plastered it all

over on the outside with the said alum. Nor would I have you to compare

therewith the herb which Alexander Cornelius called Eonem, and said that it

had some resemblance with that oak which bears the mistletoe, and that it

could neither be consumed nor receive any manner of prejudice by fire nor

by water, no more than the mistletoe, of which was built, said he, the so

renowned ship Argos. Search where you please for those that will believe

it. I in that point desire to be excused. Neither would I wish you to

parallel therewith--although I cannot deny but that it is of a very

marvellous nature--that sort of tree which groweth alongst the mountains of

Brianson and Ambrun, which produceth out of his root the good agaric. From

its body it yieldeth unto us a so excellent rosin, that Galen hath been

bold to equal it to the turpentine. Upon the delicate leaves thereof it

retaineth for our use that sweet heavenly honey which is called the manna,

and, although it be of a gummy, oily, fat, and greasy substance, it is,

notwithstanding, unconsumable by any fire. It is in Greek and Latin called

Larix. The Alpinese name is Melze. The Antenorides and Venetians term it

Larege; which gave occasion to that castle in Piedmont to receive the

denomination of Larignum, by putting Julius Caesar to a stand at his return

from amongst the Gauls.

Julius Caesar commanded all the yeomen, boors, hinds, and other inhabitants

in, near unto, and about the Alps and Piedmont, to bring all manner of

victuals and provision for an army to those places which on the military

road he had appointed to receive them for the use of his marching soldiery.

To which ordinance all of them were obedient, save only those as were

within the garrison of Larignum, who, trusting in the natural strength of

the place, would not pay their contribution. The emperor, purposing to

chastise them for their refusal, caused his whole army to march straight

towards that castle, before the gate whereof was erected a tower built of

huge big spars and rafters of the larch-tree, fast bound together with pins

and pegs of the same wood, and interchangeably laid on one another, after

the fashion of a pile or stack of timber, set up in the fabric thereof to

such an apt and convenient height that from the parapet above the

portcullis they thought with stones and levers to beat off and drive away

such as should approach thereto.

When Caesar had understood that the chief defence of those within the

castle did consist in stones and clubs, and that it was not an easy matter

to sling, hurl, dart, throw, or cast them so far as to hinder the

approaches, he forthwith commanded his men to throw great store of bavins,

faggots, and fascines round about the castle, and when they had made the

heap of a competent height, to put them all in a fair fire; which was

thereupon incontinently done. The fire put amidst the faggots was so great

and so high that it covered the whole castle, that they might well imagine

the tower would thereby be altogether burnt to dust, and demolished.

Nevertheless, contrary to all their hopes and expectations, when the flame

ceased, and that the faggots were quite burnt and consumed, the tower

appeared as whole, sound, and entire as ever. Caesar, after a serious

consideration had thereof, commanded a compass to be taken without the

distance of a stone cast from the castle round about it there, with ditches

and entrenchments to form a blockade; which when the Larignans understood,

they rendered themselves upon terms. And then by a relation from them it

was that Caesar learned the admirable nature and virtue of this wood, which

of itself produceth neither fire, flame, nor coal, and would, therefore, in

regard of that rare quality of incombustibility, have been admitted into

this rank and degree of a true Pantagruelional plant; and that so much the

rather, for that Pantagruel directed that all the gates, doors, angiports,

windows, gutters, fretticed and embowed ceilings, cans, (cants?) and other

whatsoever wooden furniture in the abbey of Theleme, should be all

materiated of this kind of timber. He likewise caused to cover therewith

the sterns, stems, cook-rooms or laps, hatches, decks, courses, bends, and

walls of his carricks, ships, galleons, galleys, brigantines, foists,

frigates, crears, barques, floats, pinks, pinnaces, hoys, ketches, capers,

and other vessels of his Thalassian arsenal; were it not that the wood or

timber of the larch-tree, being put within a large and ample furnace full

of huge vehemently flaming fire proceeding from the fuel of other sorts and

kinds of wood, cometh at last to be corrupted, consumed, dissipated, and

destroyed, as are stones in a lime-kiln. But this Pantagruelion Asbeston

is rather by the fire renewed and cleansed than by the flames thereof

consumed or changed. Therefore,

Arabians, Indians, Sabaeans,

Sing not, in hymns and Io Paeans,

Your incense, myrrh, or ebony.

Come here, a nobler plant to see,

And carry home, at any rate,

Some seed, that you may propagate.

If in your soil it takes, to heaven

A thousand thousand thanks be given;

And say with France, it goodly goes,

Where the Pantagruelion grows.

END OF BOOK III

BOOK IV.

THE FOURTH BOOK

The Translator’s Preface.

Reader,--I don’t know what kind of a preface I must write to find thee

courteous, an epithet too often bestowed without a cause. The author of

this work has been as sparing of what we call good nature, as most readers

are nowadays. So I am afraid his translator and commentator is not to

expect much more than has been showed them. What’s worse, there are but

two sorts of taking prefaces, as there are but two kinds of prologues to

plays; for Mr. Bays was doubtless in the right when he said that if thunder

and lightning could not fright an audience into complaisance, the sight of

the poet with a rope about his neck might work them into pity. Some,

indeed, have bullied many of you into applause, and railed at your faults

that you might think them without any; and others, more safely, have spoken

kindly of you, that you might think, or at least speak, as favourably of

them, and be flattered into patience. Now, I fancy, there’s nothing less

difficult to attempt than the first method; for, in this blessed age, ‘tis

as easy to find a bully without courage, as a whore without beauty, or a

writer without wit; though those qualifications are so necessary in their

respective professions. The mischief is, that you seldom allow any to rail

besides yourselves, and cannot bear a pride which shocks your own. As for

wheedling you into a liking of a work, I must confess it seems the safest

way; but though flattery pleases you well when it is particular, you hate

it, as little concerning you, when it is general. Then we knights of the

quill are a stiff-necked generation, who as seldom care to seem to doubt

the worth of our writings, and their being liked, as we love to flatter

more than one at a time; and had rather draw our pens, and stand up for the

beauty of our works (as some arrant fools use to do for that of their

mistresses) to the last drop of our ink. And truly this submission, which

sometimes wheedles you into pity, as seldom decoys you into love, as the

awkward cringing of an antiquated fop, as moneyless as he is ugly, affects

an experienced fair one. Now we as little value your pity as a lover his

mistress’s, well satisfied that it is only a less uncivil way of dismissing

us. But what if neither of these two ways will work upon you, of which

doleful truth some of our playwrights stand so many living monuments? Why,

then, truly I think on no other way at present but blending the two into

one; and, from this marriage of huffing and cringing, there will result a

new kind of careless medley, which, perhaps, will work upon both sorts of

readers, those who are to be hectored, and those whom we must creep to. At

least, it is like to please by its novelty; and it will not be the first

monster that has pleased you when regular nature could not do it.

If uncommon worth, lively wit, and deep learning, wove into wholesome

satire, a bold, good, and vast design admirably pursued, truth set out in

its true light, and a method how to arrive to its oracle, can recommend a

work, I am sure this has enough to please any reasonable man. The three

books published some time since, which are in a manner an entire work, were

kindly received; yet, in the French, they come far short of these two,

which are also entire pieces; for the satire is all general here, much more

obvious, and consequently more entertaining. Even my long explanatory

preface was not thought improper. Though I was so far from being allowed

time to make it methodical, that at first only a few pages were intended;

yet as fast as they were printed I wrote on, till it proved at last like

one of those towns built little at first, then enlarged, where you see

promiscuously an odd variety of all sorts of irregular buildings. I hope

the remarks I give now will not please less; for, as I have translated the

work which they explain, I had more time to make them, though as little to

write them. It would be needless to give here a large account of my

performance; for, after all, you readers care no more for this or that

apology, or pretence of Mr. Translator, if the version does not please you,

than we do for a blundering cook’s excuse after he has spoiled a good dish

in the dressing. Nor can the first pretend to much praise, besides that of

giving his author’s sense in its full extent, and copying his style, if it

is to be copied; since he has no share in the invention or disposition of

what he translates. Yet there was no small difficulty in doing Rabelais

justice in that double respect; the obsolete words and turns of phrase, and

dark subjects, often as darkly treated, make the sense hard to be

understood even by a Frenchman, and it cannot be easy to give it the free

easy air of an original; for even what seems most common talk in one

language, is what is often the most difficult to be made so in another; and

Horace’s thoughts of comedy may be well applied to this:

Creditur, ex medio quia res arcessit, habere

Sudoris minimum; sed habet commoedia tantum

Plus oneris, quanto veniae minus.

Far be it from me, for all this, to value myself upon hitting the words of

cant in which my drolling author is so luxuriant; for though such words

have stood me in good stead, I scarce can forbear thinking myself unhappy

in having insensibly hoarded up so much gibberish and Billingsgate trash in

my memory; nor could I forbear asking of myself, as an Italian cardinal

said on another account, D’onde hai tu pigliato tante coglionerie? Where

the devil didst thou rake up all these fripperies?

It was not less difficult to come up to the author’s sublime expressions.

Nor would I have attempted such a task, but that I was ambitious of giving

a view of the most valuable work of the greatest genius of his age, to the

Mecaenas and best genius of this. For I am not overfond of so ungrateful a

task as translating, and would rejoice to see less versions and more

originals; so the latter were not as bad as many of the first are, through

want of encouragement. Some indeed have deservedly gained esteem by

translating; yet not many condescend to translate, but such as cannot

invent; though to do the first well requires often as much genius as to do

the latter.

I wish, reader, thou mayest be as willing to do my author justice, as I

have strove to do him right. Yet, if thou art a brother of the quill, it

is ten to one thou art too much in love with thy own dear productions to

admire those of one of thy trade. However, I know three or four who have

not such a mighty opinion of themselves; but I’ll not name them, lest I

should be obliged to place myself among them. If thou art one of those

who, though they never write, criticise everyone that does; avaunt!--Thou

art a professed enemy of mankind and of thyself, who wilt never be pleased

nor let anybody be so, and knowest no better way to fame than by striving

to lessen that of others; though wouldst thou write thou mightst be soon

known, even by the butterwomen, and fly through the world in bandboxes. If

thou art of the dissembling tribe, it is thy office to rail at those books

which thou huggest in a corner. If thou art one of those eavesdroppers,

who would have their moroseness be counted gravity, thou wilt condemn a

mirth which thou art past relishing; and I know no other way to quit the

score than by writing (as like enough I may) something as dull, or duller

than thyself, if possible. If thou art one of those critics in dressing,

those extempores of fortune, who, having lost a relation and got an estate,

in an instant set up for wit and every extravagance, thou’lt either praise

or discommend this book, according to the dictates of some less foolish

than thyself, perhaps of one of those who, being lodged at the sign of the

box and dice, will know better things than to recommend to thee a work

which bids thee beware of his tricks. This book might teach thee to leave

thy follies; but some will say it does not signify much to some fools

whether they are so or not; for when was there a fool that thought himself

one? If thou art one of those who would put themselves upon us for learned

men in Greek and Hebrew, yet are mere blockheads in English, and patch

together old pieces of the ancients to get themselves clothes out of them,

thou art too severely mauled in this work to like it. Who then will? some

will cry. Nay, besides these, many societies that make a great figure in

the world are reflected on in this book; which caused Rabelais to study to

be dark, and even bedaub it with many loose expressions, that he might not

be thought to have any other design than to droll; in a manner bewraying

his