_A TALE OF A TUB_.
THE learned Æolists maintain the original cause of all things to be wind,
from which principle this whole universe was at first produced, and into
which it must at last be resolved, that the same breath which had kindled
and blew up the flame of Nature should one day blow it out.
“Quod procul à nobis flectat Fortuna gubernans.”
This is what the Adepti understand by their _anima mundi_, that is to
say, the spirit, or breath, or wind of the world; or examine the whole
system by the particulars of Nature, and you will find it not to be
disputed. For whether you please to call the _forma informans_ of man by
the name of _spiritus_, _animus_, _afflatus_, or _anima_, what are all
these but several appellations for wind, which is the ruling element in
every compound, and into which they all resolve upon their corruption.
Further, what is life itself but, as it is commonly called, the breath of
our nostrils, whence it is very justly observed by naturalists that wind
still continues of great emolument in certain mysteries not to be named,
giving occasion for those happy epithets of _turgidus_ and _inflatus_,
applied either to the emittent or recipient organs.
By what I have gathered out of ancient records, I find the compass of
their doctrine took in two-and-thirty points, wherein it would be tedious
to be very particular. However, a few of their most important precepts
deducible from it are by no means to be omitted; among which, the
following maxim was of much weight: That since wind had the master share
as well as operation in every compound, by consequence those beings must
be of chief excellence wherein that primordium appears most prominently
to abound, and therefore man is in highest perfection of all created
things, as having, by the great bounty of philosophers, been endued with
three distinct _animas_ or winds, to which the sage Æolists, with much
liberality, have added a fourth, of equal necessity as well as ornament
with the other three, by this _quartum principium_ taking in the four
corners of the world. Which gave occasion to that renowned cabalist
Bombastus {119a} of placing the body of man in due position to the four
cardinal points.
In consequence of this, their next principle was that man brings with him
into the world a peculiar portion or grain of wind, which may be called a
_quinta essentia_ extracted from the other four. This quintessence is of
catholic use upon all emergencies of life, is improveable into all arts
and sciences, and may be wonderfully refined as well as enlarged by
certain methods in education. This, when blown up to its perfection,
ought not to be covetously boarded up, stifled, or hid under a bushel,
but freely communicated to mankind. Upon these reasons, and others of
equal weight, the wise Æolists affirm the gift of belching to be the
noblest act of a rational creature. To cultivate which art, and render
it more serviceable to mankind, they made use of several methods. At
certain seasons of the year you might behold the priests amongst them in
vast numbers with their mouths gaping wide against a storm. At other
times were to be seen several hundreds linked together in a circular
chain, with every man a pair of bellows applied to his neighbour, by
which they blew up each other to the shape and size of a tun; and for
that reason with great propriety of speech did usually call their bodies
their vessels {119b}. When, by these and the like performances, they
were grown sufficiently replete, they would immediately depart, and
disembogue for the public good a plentiful share of their acquirements
into their disciples’ chaps. For we must here observe that all learning
was esteemed among them to be compounded from the same principle.
Because, first, it is generally affirmed or confessed that learning
puffeth men up; and, secondly, they proved it by the following syllogism:
“Words are but wind, and learning is nothing but words; ergo, learning is
nothing but wind.” For this reason the philosophers among them did in
their schools deliver to their pupils all their doctrines and opinions by
eructation, wherein they had acquired a wonderful eloquence, and of
incredible variety. But the great characteristic by which their chief
sages were best distinguished was a certain position of countenance,
which gave undoubted intelligence to what degree or proportion the spirit
agitated the inward mass. For after certain gripings, the wind and
vapours issuing forth, having first by their turbulence and convulsions
within caused an earthquake in man’s little world, distorted the mouth,
bloated the cheeks, and gave the eyes a terrible kind of relievo. At
which junctures all their belches were received for sacred, the sourer
the better, and swallowed with infinite consolation by their meagre
devotees. And to render these yet more complete, because the breath of
man’s life is in his nostrils, therefore the choicest, most edifying, and
most enlivening belches were very wisely conveyed through that vehicle to
give them a tincture as they passed.
Their gods were the four winds, whom they worshipped as the spirits that
pervade and enliven the universe, and as those from whom alone all
inspiration can properly be said to proceed. However, the chief of
these, to whom they performed the adoration of Latria, was the Almighty
North, an ancient deity, whom the inhabitants of Megalopolis in Greece
had likewise in highest reverence. “Omnium deorum Boream maxime
celebrant.” {120} This god, though endued with ubiquity, was yet
supposed by the profounder Æolists to possess one peculiar habitation, or
(to speak in form) a _cælum empyræum_, wherein he was more intimately
present. This was situated in a certain region well known to the ancient
Greeks, by them called Σχοτία, the Land of Darkness. And although many
controversies have arisen upon that matter, yet so much is undisputed,
that from a region of the like denomination the most refined Æolists have
borrowed their original, from whence in every age the zealous among their
priesthood have brought over their choicest inspiration, fetching it with
their own hands from the fountain-head in certain bladders, and
disploding it among the sectaries in all nations, who did, and do, and
ever will, daily gasp and pant after it.
Now their mysteries and rites were performed in this manner. It is well
known among the learned that the virtuosos of former ages had a
contrivance for carrying and preserving winds in casks or barrels, which
was of great assistance upon long sea-voyages, and the loss of so useful
an art at present is very much to be lamented, though, I know not how,
with great negligence omitted by Pancirollus. It was an invention
ascribed to Æolus himself, from whom this sect is denominated, and who,
in honour of their founder’s memory, have to this day preserved great
numbers of those barrels, whereof they fix one in each of their temples,
first beating out the top. Into this barrel upon solemn days the priest
enters, where, having before duly prepared himself by the methods already
described, a secret funnel is also conveyed to the bottom of the barrel,
which admits new supplies of inspiration from a northern chink or cranny.
Whereupon you behold him swell immediately to the shape and size of his
vessel. In this posture he disembogues whole tempests upon his auditory,
as the spirit from beneath gives him utterance, which issuing _ex adytis_
and _penetralibus_, is not performed without much pain and griping. And
the wind in breaking forth deals with his face as it does with that of
the sea, first blackening, then wrinkling, and at last bursting it into a
foam. It is in this guise the sacred Æolist delivers his oracular
belches to his panting disciples, of whom some are greedily gaping after
the sanctified breath, others are all the while hymning out the praises
of the winds, and gently wafted to and fro by their own humming, do thus
represent the soft breezes of their deities appeased.
It is from this custom of the priests that some authors maintain these
Æolists to have been very ancient in the world, because the delivery of
their mysteries, which I have just now mentioned, appears exactly the
same with that of other ancient oracles, whose inspirations were owing to
certain subterraneous effluviums of wind delivered with the same pain to
the priest, and much about the same influence on the people. It is true
indeed that these were frequently managed and directed by female
officers, whose organs were understood to be better disposed for the
admission of those oracular gusts, as entering and passing up through a
receptacle of greater capacity, and causing also a pruriency by the way,
such as with due management has been refined from carnal into a spiritual
ecstasy. And to strengthen this profound conjecture, it is further
insisted that this custom of female priests is kept up still in certain
refined colleges of our modern Æolists {122}, who are agreed to receive
their inspiration, derived through the receptacle aforesaid, like their
ancestors the Sybils.
And whereas the mind of man, when he gives the spur and bridle to his
thoughts, does never stop, but naturally sallies out into both extremes
of high and low, of good and evil, his first flight of fancy commonly
transports him to ideas of what is most perfect, finished, and exalted,
till, having soared out of his own reach and sight, not well perceiving
how near the frontiers of height and depth border upon each other, with
the same course and wing he falls down plump into the lowest bottom of
things, like one who travels the east into the west, or like a straight
line drawn by its own length into a circle. Whether a tincture of malice
in our natures makes us fond of furnishing every bright idea with its
reverse, or whether reason, reflecting upon the sum of things, can, like
the sun, serve only to enlighten one half of the globe, leaving the other
half by necessity under shade and darkness, or whether fancy, flying up
to the imagination of what is highest and best, becomes over-short, and
spent, and weary, and suddenly falls, like a dead bird of paradise, to
the ground; or whether, after all these metaphysical conjectures, I have
not entirely missed the true reason; the proposition, however, which has
stood me in so much circumstance is altogether true, that as the most
uncivilised parts of mankind have some way or other climbed up into the
conception of a God or Supreme Power, so they have seldom forgot to
provide their fears with certain ghastly notions, which, instead of
better, have served them pretty tolerably for a devil. And this
proceeding seems to be natural enough, for it is with men whose
imaginations are lifted up very high after the same rate as with those
whose bodies are so, that as they are delighted with the advantage of a
nearer contemplation upwards, so they are equally terrified with the
dismal prospect of the precipice below. Thus in the choice of a devil it
has been the usual method of mankind to single out some being, either in
act or in vision, which was in most antipathy to the god they had framed.
Thus also the sect of the Æolists possessed themselves with a dread and
horror and hatred of two malignant natures, betwixt whom and the deities
they adored perpetual enmity was established. The first of these was the
chameleon, sworn foe to inspiration, who in scorn devoured large
influences of their god, without refunding the smallest blast by
eructation. The other was a huge terrible monster called Moulinavent,
who with four strong arms waged eternal battle with all their divinities,
dexterously turning to avoid their blows and repay them with interest.
{123}
Thus furnished, and set out with gods as well as devils, was the renowned
sect of Æolists, which makes at this day so illustrious a figure in the
world, and whereof that polite nation of Laplanders are beyond all doubt
a most authentic branch, of whom I therefore cannot without injustice
here omit to make honourable mention, since they appear to be so closely
allied in point of interest as well as inclinations with their brother
Æolists among us, as not only to buy their winds by wholesale from the
same merchants, but also to retail them after the same rate and method,
and to customers much alike.
Now whether the system here delivered was wholly compiled by Jack, or, as
some writers believe, rather copied from the original at Delphos, with
certain additions and emendations suited to times and circumstances, I
shall not absolutely determine. This I may affirm, that Jack gave it at
least a new turn, and formed it into the same dress and model as it lies
deduced by me.
I have long sought after this opportunity of doing justice to a society
of men for whom I have a peculiar honour, and whose opinions as well as
practices have been extremely misrepresented and traduced by the malice
or ignorance of their adversaries. For I think it one of the greatest
and best of human actions to remove prejudices and place things in their
truest and fairest light, which I therefore boldly undertake, without any
regards of my own beside the conscience, the honour, and the thanks.