Gargantua and Pantagruel
astonishment awaked, of which terror and amazement the issue was, that the
very next day subsequent, by a most horrible tempest on the sea, he was
like to have perished and been cast away. Moreover, Turnus being prompted,
instigated, and stirred up by the fantastic vision of an infernal fury to
enter into a bloody war against Aeneas, awaked in a start much troubled and
disquieted in spirit; in sequel whereof, after many notable and famous
routs, defeats, and discomfitures in open field, he came at last to be
killed in a single combat by the said Aeneas. A thousand other instances I
could afford, if it were needful, of this matter. Whilst I relate these
stories of Aeneas, remark the saying of Fabius Pictor, who faithfully
averred that nothing had at any time befallen unto, was done, or
enterprised by him, whereof he preallably had not notice, and beforehand
foreseen it to the full, by sure predictions altogether founded on the
oracles of somnial divination. To this there is no want of pregnant
reasons, no more than of examples. For if repose and rest in sleeping be a
special gift and favour of the gods, as is maintained by the philosophers,
and by the poet attested in these lines,
Then sleep, that heavenly gift, came to refresh
Of human labourers the wearied flesh;
such a gift or benefit can never finish or terminate in wrath and
indignation without portending some unlucky fate and most disastrous
fortune to ensue. Otherwise it were a molestation, and not an ease; a
scourge, and not a gift; at least, (not) proceeding from the gods above,
but from the infernal devils our enemies, according to the common vulgar
saying.
Suppose the lord, father, or master of a family, sitting at a very
sumptuous dinner, furnished with all manner of good cheer, and having at
his entry to the table his appetite sharp set upon his victuals, whereof
there was great plenty, should be seen rise in a start, and on a sudden
fling out of his chair, abandoning his meat, frighted, appalled, and in a
horrid terror, who should not know the cause hereof would wonder, and be
astonished exceedingly. But what? he heard his male servants cry, Fire,
fire, fire, fire! his serving-maids and women yell, Stop thief, stop thief!
and all his children shout as loud as ever they could, Murder, O murder,
murder! Then was it not high time for him to leave his banqueting, for
application of a remedy in haste, and to give speedy order for succouring
of his distressed household? Truly I remember that the Cabalists and
Massorets, interpreters of the sacred Scriptures, in treating how with
verity one might judge of evangelical apparitions (because oftentimes the
angel of Satan is disguised and transfigured into an angel of light), said
that the difference of these two mainly did consist in this: the
favourable and comforting angel useth in his appearing unto man at first to
terrify and hugely affright him, but in the end he bringeth consolation,
leaveth the person who hath seen him joyful, well-pleased, fully content,
and satisfied; on the other side, the angel of perdition, that wicked,
devilish, and malignant spirit, at his appearance unto any person in the
beginning cheereth up the heart of his beholder, but at last forsakes him,
and leaves him troubled, angry, and perplexed.
Chapter 3.XV.
Panurge’s excuse and exposition of the monastic mystery concerning powdered
beef.
The Lord save those who see, and do not hear! quoth Panurge. I see you
well enough, but know not what it is that you have said. The
hunger-starved belly wanteth ears. For lack of victuals, before God, I
roar, bray, yell, and fume as in a furious madness. I have performed too
hard a task to-day, an extraordinary work indeed. He shall be craftier, and
do far greater wonders than ever did Mr. Mush, who shall be able any more
this year to bring me on the stage of preparation for a dreaming verdict.
Fie! not to sup at all, that is the devil. Pox take that fashion! Come,
Friar John, let us go break our fast; for, if I hit on such a round
refection in the morning as will serve thoroughly to fill the mill-hopper
and hogs-hide of my stomach, and furnish it with meat and drink sufficient,
then at a pinch, as in the case of some extreme necessity which presseth, I
could make a shift that day to forbear dining. But not to sup! A plague
rot that base custom, which is an error offensive to Nature! That lady made
the day for exercise, to travel, work, wait on and labour in each his
negotiation and employment; and that we may with the more fervency and
ardour prosecute our business, she sets before us a clear burning candle, to
wit, the sun’s resplendency; and at night, when she begins to take the light
from us, she thereby tacitly implies no less than if she would have spoken
thus unto us: My lads and lasses, all of you are good and honest folks, you
have wrought well to-day, toiled and turmoiled enough,--the night
approacheth,--therefore cast off these moiling cares of yours, desist from
all your swinking painful labours, and set your minds how to refresh your
bodies in the renewing of their vigour with good bread, choice wine, and
store of wholesome meats; then may you take some sport and recreation, and
after that lie down and rest yourselves, that you may strongly, nimbly,
lustily, and with the more alacrity to-morrow attend on your affairs as
formerly.
Falconers, in like manner, when they have fed their hawks, will not suffer
them to fly on a full gorge, but let them on a perch abide a little, that
they may rouse, bait, tower, and soar the better. That good pope who was
the first institutor of fasting understood this well enough; for he
ordained that our fast should reach but to the hour of noon; all the
remainder of that day was at our disposure, freely to eat and feed at any
time thereof. In ancient times there were but few that dined, as you would
say, some church men, monks and canons; for they have little other
occupation. Each day is a festival unto them, who diligently heed the
claustral proverb, De missa ad mensam. They do not use to linger and defer
their sitting down and placing of themselves at table, only so long as they
have a mind in waiting for the coming of the abbot; so they fell to without
ceremony, terms, or conditions; and everybody supped, unless it were some
vain, conceited, dreaming dotard. Hence was a supper called coena, which
showeth that it is common to all sorts of people. Thou knowest it well,
Friar John. Come, let us go, my dear friend, in the name of all the devils
of the infernal regions, let us go. The gnawings of my stomach in this
rage of hunger are so tearing, that they make it bark like a mastiff. Let
us throw some bread and beef into his throat to pacify him, as once the
sibyl did to Cerberus. Thou likest best monastical brewis, the prime, the
flower of the pot. I am for the solid, principal verb that comes after
--the good brown loaf, always accompanied with a round slice of the
nine-lecture-powdered labourer. I know thy meaning, answered Friar John;
this metaphor is extracted out of the claustral kettle. The labourer is the
ox that hath wrought and done the labour; after the fashion of nine
lectures, that is to say, most exquisitely well and thoroughly boiled.
These holy religious fathers, by a certain cabalistic institution of the
ancients, not written, but carefully by tradition conveyed from hand to
hand, rising betimes to go to morning prayers, were wont to flourish that
their matutinal devotion with some certain notable preambles before their
entry into the church, viz., they dunged in the dungeries, pissed in the
pisseries, spit in the spitteries, melodiously coughed in the cougheries,
and doted in their dotaries, that to the divine service they might not bring
anything that was unclean or foul. These things thus done, they very
zealously made their repair to the Holy Chapel, for so was in their canting
language termed the convent kitchen, where they with no small earnestness
had care that the beef-pot should be put on the crook for the breakfast of
the religious brothers of our Lord and Saviour; and the fire they would
kindle under the pot themselves. Now, the matins consisting of nine
lessons, (it) it was so incumbent on them, that must have risen the rather
for the more expedite despatching of them all. The sooner that they rose,
the sharper was their appetite and the barkings of their stomachs, and the
gnawings increased in the like proportion, and consequently made these godly
men thrice more a-hungered and athirst than when their matins were hemmed
over only with three lessons. The more betimes they rose, by the said
cabal, the sooner was the beef-pot put on; the longer that the beef was on
the fire, the better it was boiled; the more it boiled, it was the tenderer;
the tenderer that it was, the less it troubled the teeth, delighted more the
palate, less charged the stomach, and nourished our good religious men the
more substantially; which is the only end and prime intention of the first
founders, as appears by this, that they eat not to live, but live to eat,
and in this world have nothing but their life. Let us go, Panurge.
Now have I understood thee, quoth Panurge, my plushcod friar, my caballine
and claustral ballock. I freely quit the costs, interest, and charges,
seeing you have so egregiously commented upon the most especial chapter of
the culinary and monastic cabal. Come along, my Carpalin, and you, Friar
John, my leather-dresser. Good morrow to you all, my good lords; I have
dreamed too much to have so little. Let us go. Panurge had no sooner done
speaking than Epistemon with a loud voice said these words: It is a very
ordinary and common thing amongst men to conceive, foresee, know, and
presage the misfortune, bad luck, or disaster of another; but to have the
understanding, providence, knowledge, and prediction of a man’s own mishap
is very scarce and rare to be found anywhere. This is exceeding
judiciously and prudently deciphered by Aesop in his Apologues, who there
affirmeth that every man in the world carrieth about his neck a wallet, in
the fore-bag whereof were contained the faults and mischances of others
always exposed to his view and knowledge; and in the other scrip thereof,
which hangs behind, are kept the bearer’s proper transgressions and
inauspicious adventures, at no time seen by him, nor thought upon, unless
he be a person that hath a favourable aspect from the heavens.
Chapter 3.XVI.
How Pantagruel adviseth Panurge to consult with the Sibyl of Panzoust.
A little while thereafter Pantagruel sent for Panurge and said unto him,
The affection which I bear you being now inveterate and settled in my mind
by a long continuance of time, prompteth me to the serious consideration of
your welfare and profit; in order whereto, remark what I have thought
thereon. It hath been told me that at Panzoust, near Crouly, dwelleth a
very famous sibyl, who is endowed with the skill of foretelling all things
to come. Take Epistemon in your company, repair towards her, and hear what
she will say unto you. She is possibly, quoth Epistemon, some Canidia,
Sagana, or Pythonissa, either whereof with us is vulgarly called a witch,
--I being the more easily induced to give credit to the truth of this
character of her, that the place of her abode is vilely stained with the
abominable repute of abounding more with sorcerers and witches than ever
did the plains of Thessaly. I should not, to my thinking, go thither
willingly, for that it seems to me a thing unwarrantable, and altogether
forbidden in the law of Moses. We are not Jews, quoth Pantagruel, nor is
it a matter judiciously confessed by her, nor authentically proved by