“The artistic school of Florence,” said I, “declares what follows:

If the hair of your Hercules were shaved off, there would not remain

skull enough to hold his brains. With regard to his face, it is hard

to distinguish whether it be the face of a man, or that of a creature

something between a lion and an ox; it discovers no attention to what

it is about; and it is so ill set upon the neck, with so little art

and in so ungraceful a manner, that a more shocking piece of work was

never seen. His great brawny shoulders resemble the two pommels of an

ass’s packsaddle. His breasts and their muscles bear no similitude to

those of a man, but seem to have been drawn from a sack of melons.

As he leans directly against the wall, the small of the back has the

appearance of a bag filled with long cucumbers. It is impossible to

conceive in what manner the two legs are fastened to this distorted

figure, for it is hard to distinguish upon which leg he stands, or

upon which he exerts any effort of his strength; nor does he appear to

stand upon both, as he is sometimes represented by those masters of

the art of statuary who know something of their business. It is plain,

too, that the statue inclines more than one-third of a cubit forward;

and this is the greatest and the most insupportable blunder which

pretenders to sculpture can be guilty of. As for the arms, they both

hang down in the most awkward and ungraceful manner imaginable; and so

little art is displayed in them that people would be almost tempted to

think that you had never seen a naked man in your life. The right leg

of Hercules and that of Cacus touch at the middle of their calves, and

if they were to be separated, not one of them only, but both, would

remain without a calf, in the place where they touch. Besides, one of

the feet of the Hercules is quite buried, and the other looks as if it

stood upon hot coals.”--_The Biography._

SPANISH WIT AND HUMOR

The Spanish literature of this time contains little that can be quoted

as humor.

Hurtado de Mendoza, a novelist, historian and poet, and Lope de Vega,

dramatist, are the principal names among the Spanish writers.

About 1600 there flourished a poet named Baltazar del Alcazar, whose

work shows a rather modern type of humor.

_SLEEP_

Sleep is no servant of the will;

It has caprices of its own;

When most pursued, ’tis swiftly gone;

When courted least, it lingers still.

With its vagaries long perplext,

I turned and turned my restless sconce,

Till, one fine night, I thought at once

I’d master it. So hear my text.

When sleep doth tarry, I begin

My long and well-accustomed prayer,

And in a twinkling sleep is there,

Through my bed-curtains peeping in.

When sleep hangs heavy on my eyes,

I think of debts I fain would pay,

And then, as flies night’s shade from day,

Sleep from my heavy eyelids flies.

And, thus controlled, the winged one bends

E’en his fantastic will to me,

And, strange yet true, both I and he

Are friends--the very best of friends.

We are a happy wedded pair,

And I the lord and he the dame;

Our bed, our board, our dreams the same,

And we’re united everywhere.

I’ll tell you where I learned to school

This wayward sleep: a whispered word

From a church-going hag I heard,

And tried it, for I was no fool.

So, from that very hour I knew

That, having ready prayers to pray,

And having many debts to pay,

Will serve for sleep, and waking too.

In 1605 was published the first part of _Don Quixote de la Mancha_

the celebrated satirical work of Miguel de Cervantes.

Of this book Hallam says, “it is the only Spanish book which can be

said to possess a European reputation.”

Its reputation is world wide and fine translations have given us the

spirit of the original.

_HE SECURES SANCHO PANZA AS HIS SQUIRE_

In the meantime, Don Quixote tampered with a laborer, a neighbor of

his and an honest man (if such an epithet can be given to one that is

poor), but shallow-brained; in short, he said so much, used so many

arguments and made so many promises, that the poor fellow resolved to

sally out with him and serve him in the capacity of a squire. Among

other things, Don Quixote told him that he ought to be very glad to

accompany him, for such an adventure might, some time or the other,

occur that by one stroke an island might be won, where he might leave

him governor. With this and other promises, Sancho Panza (for that was

the laborer’s name) left his wife and children and engaged himself as

squire to his neighbor. Don Quixote now set about raising money; and,

by selling one thing, pawning another, and losing by all, he collected

a tolerable sum. He fitted himself likewise with a buckler, which he

borrowed of a friend, and, patching up his broken helmet in the best

manner he could, he acquainted his squire Sancho of the day and hour

he intended to set out, that he might provide himself with what he

thought would be most needful. Above all, he charged him not to forget

a wallet, which Sancho assured him he would not neglect; he said also

that he thought of taking an ass with him, as he had a very good one,

and he was not used to travel much on foot. With regard to the ass,

Don Quixote paused a little, endeavoring to recollect whether any

knight-errant had ever carried a squire mounted on ass-back, but no

instance of the kind occurred to his memory. However, he consented that

he should take his ass, resolving to accommodate him more honorably, at

the earliest opportunity, by dismounting the first discourteous knight

he should meet. He provided himself also with shirts, and other things,

conformably to the advice given him by the innkeeper.

All this being accomplished, Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, without

taking leave, the one of his wife and children, or the other of

his housekeeper and niece, one night sallied out of the village

unperceived; and they travelled so hard that by break of day they

believed themselves secure, even if search were made after them. Sancho

Panza proceeded upon his ass like a patriarch, with his wallet and

leathern bottle, and with a vehement desire to find himself governor

of the island which his master had promised him. Don Quixote happened

to take the same route as on his first expedition, over the plain of

Montiel, which he passed with less inconvenience than before; for it

was early in the morning, and the rays of the sun, darting on them

horizontally, did not annoy them. Sancho Panza now said to his master,

“I beseech your worship, good Sir Knight-errant, not to forget your

promise concerning that same island, for I shall know how to govern

it, be it ever so large.” To which Don Quixote answered: “Thou must

know, friend Sancho Panza, that it was a custom much in use among the

knights-errant of old to make their squires governors of the islands or

kingdoms they conquered; and I am determined that so laudable a custom

shall not be lost through my neglect; on the contrary, I resolve to

outdo them in it, for they, sometimes, and perhaps most times, waited

till their squires were grown old; and when they were worn out in

their service, and had endured many bad days and worse nights, they

conferred on them some title, such as count, or at least marquis, of

some valley or province of more or less account; but if you live and

I live, before six days have passed I may probably win such a kingdom

as may have others depending on it, just fit for thee to be crowned

king of one of them. And do not think this any extraordinary matter,

for things fall out to knights by such unforeseen and unexpected ways,

that I may easily give thee more than I promise.” “So, then,” answered

Sancho Panza, “if I were a king, by some of those miracles your worship

mentions, Joan Gutierrez, my duck, would come to be a queen, and my

children infantas!” “Who doubts it?” answered Don Quixote. “I doubt

it,” replied Sancho Panza; “for I am verily persuaded that, if God

were to rain down kingdoms upon the earth, none of them would set well

upon the head of Mary Gutierrez; for you must know, sir, she is not

worth two farthings for a queen. The title of countess would sit better

upon her, with the help of Heaven and good friends.” “Recommend her

to God, Sancho,” answered Don Quixote, “and He will do what is best

for her; but do thou have a care not to debase thy mind so low as to

content thyself with being less than a viceroy.” “Sir, I will not,”

answered Sancho; “especially having so great a man for my master as

your worship, who will know how to give me whatever is most fitting for

me and what I am best able to bear.”

_OF THE VALOROUS DON QUIXOTE’S SUCCESS IN THE DREADFUL AND

NEVER-BEFORE-IMAGINED ADVENTURE OF THE WINDMILLS_

Engaged in this discourse, they came in sight of thirty or forty

windmills which are in that plain; and as soon as Don Quixote espied

them, he said to his squire, “Fortune disposes our affairs better than

we ourselves could have desired; look yonder, friend Sancho Panza,

where thou mayest discover somewhat more than thirty monstrous giants,

whom I intend to encounter and slay, and with their spoils we will

begin to enrich ourselves; for it is lawful war, and doing God good

service, to remove so wicked a generation from off the face of the

earth.” “What giants?” said Sancho Panza. “Those thou seest yonder,”

answered his master, “with their long arms; for some are wont to have

them almost of the length of two leagues.”

“Look, sir,” answered Sancho, “those which appear yonder are not

giants, but windmills, and what seem to be arms are the sails, which,

whirled about by the wind, make the millstone go.” “It is very

evident,” answered Don Quixote, “that thou art not versed in the

business of adventures. They are giants; and if thou art afraid, get

thee aside and pray, whilst I engage with them in fierce and unequal

combat.” So saying, he clapped spurs to his steed, notwithstanding the

cries his squire sent after him, assuring him that they were certainly

windmills, and not giants. But he was so fully possessed that they were

giants, that he neither heard the outcries of his squire Sancho, nor

yet discerned what they were, though he was very near them, but went

on, crying out aloud, “Fly not, ye cowards and vile caitiffs! for it is

a single knight who assaults you.” The wind now rising a little, the

great sails began to move, upon which Don Quixote called out, “Although

ye should have more arms than the giant Briareus, ye shall pay for it.”

Thus recommending himself devoutly to his lady Dulcinea, beseeching

her to succor him in the present danger, being well covered with his

buckler and setting his lance in the rest he rushed on as fast as

Rozinante could gallop and attacked the first mill before him, when,

running his lance into the sail, the wind whirled it about with so

much violence that it broke the lance to shivers, dragging horse and

rider after it, and tumbling them over and over on the plain in very

evil plight. Sancho Panza hastened to his assistance as fast as the ass

could carry him; and when he came up to his master he found him unable

to stir, so violent was the blow which he and Rozinante had received in

their fall.

“God save me!” quoth Sancho, “did not I warn you to have a care of what

you did, for that they were nothing but windmills? And nobody could

mistake them but one that had the like in his head.”

“Peace, friend Sancho,” answered Don Quixote; “for matters of war

are, of all others, most subject to continual change. Now I verily

believe, and it is most certainly the fact, that the sage Freston, who

stole away my chamber and books, has metamorphosed these giants into

windmills, on purpose to deprive me of the glory of vanquishing them,

so great is the enmity he bears me! But his wicked arts will finally

avail but little against the goodness of my sword.”

“God grant it!” answered Sancho Panza. Then, helping him to rise, he

mounted him again upon his steed, which was almost disjointed.--_Don

Quixote._

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

Though still serious-minded in the main, the world at the beginning of

the Seventeenth century recognized and appreciated humor.

And, growing with what it fed upon the vein of humor became more marked

and more important in literature.

Wherefore our outline must from now on be less comprehensive and more

discriminating.

The field is getting too wide, the harvest too bountiful for gleaning,

even for general reaping; we can now only pluck spears of ripened grain.

An Outline can touch only the high spots, and though many wonderful

flashes of wit and humor occur in the works of the most serious writers

space cannot be given to such, it must be conserved for the definitely

and intentionally humorous writers.

This is greatly to be regretted, for not infrequently the jests of the

serious-minded are more intrinsically witty than those of professed

humorists.

As an example may be mentioned George Herbert, the famous clergyman who

was called Holy George Herbert.

His religious writings are interspersed with flashes of exquisite wit.

“God gave thy soul brave wings; put not those feathers Into a bed to

sleep out all ill weathers,”

is a most graceful bit of word play.

And so with scores, even hundreds of worthy writers, among whose pages

brilliant shafts of wit are found.

Such excursions we have no room for, and must abide by the inexorable

laws of limitation.

Nor can such a matter as the Ballads be touched upon.

The historical ballads of this time were narrative poems of exceeding

great length and usually, of exceeding great dulness. Fun they show,

here and there, but the bulk of them are destitute of mirth-provoking

lines.

Not so the Ballad Literature intended for social diversion and lovers

of ribaldry. These, in large numbers, were put forth, and were oftener

than not, founded on the old Jest Books, the Merry Tales, and even the

Gesta and Fabliaux of earlier days.

Collections of these include the effusions of the balladists from the

short stanzas, mere epigrams, to the intolerably long tales based on

political or religious matters.

Yet it is at this juncture we must mention the name of Thomas Hobbes,

the Malmesbury Philosopher, and a most important figure of the

seventeenth century.

Not because of his own wit or humor, but of his understanding and

valuation of it.

His observations on laughter, hereinbefore referred to, must be quoted

entire.

FROM HUMAN NATURE

_LAUGHTER_

There is a passion that hath no name; but the sign of it is that

distortion of the countenance which we call laughter, which is always

joy: but what joy, what we think, and wherein we triumph when we laugh,

is not hitherto declared by any. That it consisteth in wit, or, as they

call it, in the jest, experience confuteth; for men laugh at mischances

and indecencies, wherein there lieth no wit nor jest at all. And

forasmuch as the same thing is no more ridiculous when it groweth stale

or usual, whatsoever it be that moveth laughter, it must be new and

unexpected. Men laugh often--especially such as are greedy of applause

from everything they do well--at their own actions performed never so

little beyond their own expectations as also at their own jests: and

in this case it is manifest that the passion of laughter proceedeth

from a sudden conception of some ability in himself that laugheth.

Also, men laugh at the infirmities of others by comparison wherewith

their own abilities are set off and illustrated. Also men laugh at

jests the wit whereof always consisteth in the elegant discovering and

conveying to our minds some absurdity of another; and in this case also

the passion of laughter proceedeth from the sudden imagination of our

own odds and eminency; for what is else the recommending of ourselves

to our own good opinion, by comparison with another man’s infirmity or

absurdity? For when a jest is broken upon ourselves, or friends, of

whose dishonour we participate, we never laugh thereat. I may therefore

conclude that the passion of laughter is nothing else but sudden glory

arising from a sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by

comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly; for

men laugh at the follies of themselves past, when they come suddenly

to remembrance, except they bring with them any present dishonour.

It is no wonder, therefore, that men take heinously to be laughed at

or derided--that is, triumphed over. Laughing without offence must be

at absurdities and infirmities abstracted from persons, and when all

the company may laugh together; for laughing to one’s self putteth all

the rest into jealousy and examination of themselves. Besides, it is

vain-glory, and an argument of little worth, to think the infirmity of

another sufficient matter for his triumph.

* * * * *

Robert Herrick, among the most exquisite of lyric poets, was a

classical scholar, addicted to Martial. His works, neglected for long

years, came into their own about a century ago, and his spontaneous

gayety and tenderness is not frequently equalled.

The temptation is to quote his lyrics, but his whimsical humor is more

clearly shown in his waggish lines.

_THE KISS--A DIALOGUE_

1. Among thy fancies, tell me this:

What is the thing we call a kisse?

2. I shall resolve ye, what it is.

It is a creature born and bred

Between the lips, (all cherrie red,)

By love and warme desires fed;

_Chorus._--And makes more soft the bridal bed.

2. It is an active flame, that flies

First to the babies of the eyes, pupils

And charms them there with lullabies;

_Chorus._--And stils the bride too, when she cries.

2. Then to the chin, the cheek, the eare

It frisks and flyes; now here, now there;

’Tis now farre off, and then ’tis nere;

_Chorus._--And here, and there, and every where.

1. Has it a speaking virtue?--2. Yes.

1. How speaks it, say?--2. Do you but this,

Part your joyn’d lips, then speaks your kisse;

_Chorus._--And this loves sweetest language is.

1. Has it a body?--2. Ay, and wings,

With thousand rare encolourings;

And as it flies, it gently sings,

_Chorus._--Love honie yeelds, but never stings.

_A TERNARY OF LITTLES, UPON A PIPKIN OF JELLY SENT TO A LADY_

A little saint best fits a little shrine,

A little prop best fits a little vine;

As my small cruse best fits my little wine.

A little seed best fits a little soil,

A little trade best fits a little toil;

As my small jar best fits my little oil.

A little bin best fits a little bread,

A little garland fits a little head;

As my small stuff best fits my little shed.

A little hearth best fits a little fire,

A little chapel fits a little choir;

As my small bell best fits my little spire.

A little stream best fits a little boat,

A little lead best fits a little float;

As my small pipe best fits my little note.

A little meat best fits a little belly,

As sweetly, lady, give me leave to tell ye,

This little pipkin fits this little jelly.

Thomas Carew, Edmund Waller, Sir John Suckling and Richard Lovelace

all followed more or less in Herrick’s footsteps, and though each

possessed what is called a pretty wit, they were not primarily humorous

writers.

A few poems are given, perhaps of more lyric than witty value.

RICHARD LOVELACE

_SONG_

Why should you swear I am forsworn,

Since thine I vowed to be?

Lady, it is already morn,

And ’twas last night I swore to thee

That fond impossibility.

Have I not loved thee much and long,

A tedious twelve hours’ space?

I must all other beauties wrong,

And rob thee of a new embrace,

Could I still dote upon thy face.

Not but all joy in thy brown hair

By others may be found;

But I must search the black and fair,

Like skilful mineralists that sound

For treasure in unploughed-up ground.

Then, if when I have loved my round,

Thou prov’st the pleasant she;

With spoils of meaner beauties crowned

I laden will return to thee,

Even sated with variety.

SIR JOHN SUCKLING

_THE CONSTANT LOVER_

Out upon it! I have loved

Three whole days together,

And am like to love three more,

If it prove fair weather.

Time shall moult away his wings

Ere he shall discover

In the whole wide world again

Such a constant lover.

But the spite on ’tis, no praise

Is due at all to me:

Love with me had made no stays,

Had it any been but she.

Had it any been but she,

And that very face,

There had been at least ere this

A dozen dozen in her place.

_THE REMONSTRANCE_

Why so pale and wan, fond lover?

Prithee, why so pale?

Will, when looking well can’t move her,

Looking ill prevail?

Prithee, why so pale?

Why so dull and mute, young sinner?

Prithee, why so mute?

Will, when speaking well can’t win her,

Saying nothing do’t?

Prithee, why so mute?

Quite, quit, for shame! this will not move,

This cannot take her;

If of herself she will not love,

Nothing can make her:

The devil take her!

John Milton, second only to Shakespeare in all literature, is not

usually looked upon as a humorist.

A wise commentator (of more wisdom than wit), has said, of Milton, “Few

great poets are so utterly without humor; alone among the greatest

poets he has not sung of love.”

We take objection to both these statements, though with the second we

are not now concerned.

But surely no humorless pen could have indited _L’Allegro_, and as

to less subtle humor, we give in evidence the well known Epitaph on the

Carrier.

_FROM L’ALLEGRO_

But come, thou goddess fair and free,

In heaven yclep’d Euphrosyne,

And by men, heart-easing Mirth;

Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,

With two sister Graces more,

To ivy-crowned Bacchus bore:

Or whether (as some sages sing)

The frolic wind that breathes the spring,

Zephyr, with Aurora, playing,

As he met her once a-Maying!

There on beds of violets blue,

And fresh-blown roses wash’d in dew,

Fill’d her with thee, a daughter fair,

So buxom, blithe, and debonair.

Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee

Jest, and youthful jollity,

Quips, and cranks, and wanton wiles,

Nods, and becks, and wreathed smiles,

Such as hang on Hebe’s cheek,

And love to live in dimple sleek;

Sport that wrinkled Care derides,

And Laughter holding both his sides

Come, and trip it, as you go,

On the light fantastic toe;

And in thy right hand lead with thee

The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty;

And if I give thee honor due,

Mirth, admit me of thy crew,

To live with her, and live with thee,

In unreproved pleasures free:

* * * * *

Then to the spicy nut-brown ale,

With stories told of many a feat,

How faery Mab the junkets ate;

She was pinch’d, and pulled, she said;

And he, by friar’s lantern led,

Tells how the drudging goblin sweat

To earn his cream-bowl duly set,

When in one night, ere glimpses of morn,

His shadowy flail had thresh’d the corn,

That ten day-laborers could not end;

Then lies him down, the lubber fiend,

And, stretched out all the chimney’s length,

Basks at the fire his hairy strength;

And, crop-full, out of doors he flings,

Ere the first cock his matin rings.

Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,

By whispering winds soon lull’d asleep.

Tower’d cities please us then,

And the busy hum of men.

Where throngs of knights and barons bold,

In weeds of peace, high triumphs hold,

With store of ladies, whose bright eyes

Rain influence, and judge and prize

Of wit or arms, while both contend

To win her grace, whom all commend.

There let Hymen oft appear

In saffron robes, with taper clear,

And pomp, and feast, and revelry,

With mask and antique pageantry;

Such sights as youthful poets dream

On summer eves by haunted stream.

Then to the well-trod stage anon,

If Jonson’s learned sock be on,

Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy’s child,

Warble his native wood-notes wild.

And ever, against eating cares,

Lap me in soft Lydian airs,

Married to immortal verse;

Such as the melting soul may pierce,

In notes with many a winding bout

Of linked sweetness long drawn out,

With wanton heed and giddy cunning,

The melting voice through mazes running,

Untwisting all the chains that tie

The hidden soul of harmony;

That Orpheus’ self may heave his head

From golden slumber on a bed

Of heap’d Elysian flowers, and hear

Such strains as would have won the ear

Of Pluto, to have quite set free

His half-regain’d Eurydice.

These delights if thou canst give,

Mirth, with thee I mean to live.

_EPITAPH FOR AN OLD UNIVERSITY CARRIER_

Here lieth one who did most truly prove

That he could never die while he could move;

So hung his destiny, never to rot

While he might still jog on and keep his trot;

Made of sphere-metal, never to decay

Until his revolution was at stay.

Time numbers motion, yet (without a crime

’Gainst old truth) motion number’d out his time,

And, like an engine moved with wheel and weight,

His principles being ceased, he ended straight.

Rest, that gives all men life, gave him his death,

And too much breathing put him out of breath.

Nor were it contradiction to affirm,

Too long vacation hastened on his term.

Merely to drive away the time, he sicken’d,

Fainted, died, nor would with ale be quicken’d.

“Nay,” quoth he, on his swooning bed outstretch’d,

“If I mayn’t carry, sure I’ll ne’er be fetch’d,

But vow, though the cross doctors all stood hearers,

For one carrier put down to make six bearers.”

Ease was his chief disease; and, to judge right,

He died for heaviness that his cart went light.

His leisure told him that his time was come,

And lack of load made his life burdensome,

That even to his last breath (there be that say’t),

As he were press’d to death, he cried, “More weight!”

But had his doings lasted as they were,

He had been an immortal carrier.

Obedient to the moon, he spent his date

In course reciprocal, and had his fate

Link’d to the mutual flowing of the seas,

Yet (strange to think) his _wain_ was his _increase_.

His letters are deliver’d all and gone;

Only remains this superscription.

Samuel Butler, a brilliant and satiric wit, wrote _Hudibras_, the

immortal Cavalier burlesque of the views and manners of the English

Puritans. In some degree imitated from _Don Quixote_ as to plan,

this burlesque is so full of shrewd wit and felicitous drollery as to

hold a unique place in literature.

Like all such long works, it is difficult to quote from, but some

passages are given, as well as some of Butler’s clever epigrams.

_THE RELIGION OF HUDIBRAS_

For his religion it was fit

To match his learning and his wit:

Twas Presbyterian true blue;

For he was of that stubborn crew

Of errant saints, whom all men grant

To be the true Church militant;

Such as do build their faith upon

The holy text of pike and gun;

Decide all controversies by

Infallible artillery,

And prove their doctrine orthodox,

By apostolic blows and knocks;

Call fire, and sword, and desolation,

A godly, thorough reformation.

Which always must be carried on,

And still be doing, never done;

As if religion were intended

From nothing else but to be mended;

A sect whose chief devotion lies

In odd perverse antipathies;

In falling out with that or this,

And finding somewhat still amiss;

More peevish, cross, and splenetic,

Than dog distract or monkey sick;

That with more care keep holy-day

The wrong, than others the right way;

Compound for sins they are inclin’d to,

By damning those they have no mind to;

Still so perverse and opposite,

As if they worshipped God for spite;

The self-same thing they will abhor

One way, and long another for;

Free-will they one way disavow,

Another, nothing else allow;

All piety consists therein

In them, in other men all sin;

Rather than fail, they will defy

That which they love most tenderly;

Quarrel with minc’d pies, and disparage

Their best and dearest friend, plum porridge;

Fat pig and goose itself oppose,

And blaspheme custard through the nose.

_SAINTSHIP VERSUS CONSCIENCE_

“Why didst thou choose that cursed sin,

Hypocrisy, to set up in?”

“Because it is the thriving’st calling,

The only saints’ bell that rings all in;

In which all churches are concern’d,

And is the easiest to be learn’d.”

* * * * *

Quoth he, “I am resolv’d to be

Thy scholar in this mystery;”

“And therefore first desire to know

Some principles on which you go.”

“What makes a knave a child of God,

And one of us?” “A livelihood.”

“What renders beating out of brains,

And murder, godliness?” “Great gains.”

“What’s tender conscience?” “’Tis a botch

That will not bear the gentlest touch;

But, breaking out, despatches more

Than th’ epidemical’st plague-sore.”

“What makes y’ incroach upon our trade,

And damn all others?” “To be paid.”

“What’s orthodox and true believing

Against a conscience?” “A good living.”

“What makes rebelling against kings

A good old cause?” “Administ’rings.”

“What makes all doctrines plain and clear?”

“About two hundred pounds a-year.”

“And that which was proved true before,

Prove false again?” “Two hundred more.”

“What makes the breaking of all oaths

A holy duty?” “Food and clothes.”

“What laws and freedom, persecution?”

“Being out of power, and contribution.”

“What makes a church a den of thieves?”

“A dean and chapter, and white sleeves.”

“And what would serve, if those were gone,

To make it orthodox?” “Our own.”

“What makes morality a crime,

The most notorious of the time--

Morality, which both the saints

And wicked too cry out against?”

“’Cause grace and virtue are within

Prohibited degrees of kin;

And therefore no true saint allows

They shall be suffered to espouse.”

_DESCRIPTION OF HOLLAND_

A country that draws fifty foot of water,

In which men live as in the hold of Nature,

And when the sea does in upon them break,

And drowns a province, does but spring a leak;

That always ply the pump, and never think

They can be safe but at the rate they stink;

They live as if they had been run aground,

And, when they die, are cast away and drowned;

That dwell in ships, like swarms of rats, and prey

Upon the goods all nations’ fleets convey;

And when their merchants are blown up and crackt,

Whole towns are cast away in storms, and wreckt;

That feed, like cannibals, on other fishes,

And serve their cousin-germans up in dishes:

A land that rides at anchor, and is moored,

In which they do not live, but go aboard.

_POETS_

It is not poetry that makes men poor;

For few do write that were not so before;

And those that have writ best, had they been rich,

Had ne’er been clapp’d with a poetic itch;

Had loved their ease too well to take the pains

To undergo that drudgery of brains;

But, being for all other trades unfit,

Only t’ avoid being idle, set up wit.

_PUFFING_

They that do write in authors’ praises,

And freely give their friends their voices,

Are not confined to what is true;

That’s not to give, but pay a due:

For praise, that’s due, does give no more

To worth, than what it had before;

But to commend, without desert,

Requires a mastery of art,

That sets a gloss on what’s amiss,

And writes what should be, not what is.

Samuel Pepys, whose literary work is in Diary form, is no doubt one of

the world’s greatest egoists. But the spontaneity and naturalness of

the account of his daily doings, as told by himself, have a charm all

their own and a unique and inimitable humor.

_EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY_

Rose early, and put six spoons and a porringer of silver in my pocket

to give away to-day. To dinner at Sir William Batten’s; and then, after

a walk in the fine gardens, we went to Mrs. Browne’s, where Sir W. Pen

and I were godfathers, and Mrs. Jordan and Shipman godmothers to her

boy. And there, before and after the christening, we were with the

woman above in her chamber; but whether we carried ourselves well or

ill, I know not; but I was directed by young Mrs. Batten. One passage

of a lady that ate wafers with her dog did a little displease me. I did

give the midwife 10_s._ and the nurse 5_s._ and the maid of

the house 2_s._ But for as much I expected to give the name to the

child, but did not (it being called John), I forbore then to give my

plate.

_December 26th, 1662._--Up, my wife to the making of Christmas

pies all day, doeing now pretty well again, and I abroad to several

places about some businesses, among others bought a bake-pan in Newgate

Market, and sent it home, it cost me 16_s._ So to Dr Williams,

but he is out of town, then to the Wardrobe. Hither come Mr Battersby;

and we falling into discourse of a new book of drollery in use, called

Hudibras, I would needs go find it out, and met with it at the Temple:

cost me 2_s._ 6_d._ But when I come to read it, it is so

silly an abuse of the Presbyter Knight going to the warrs, that I am

ashamed of it; and by and by meeting at Mr Townsend’s at dinner, I sold

it to him for 18_d._ ...

_February 6th._-- ... Thence to Lincoln’s Inn Fields; and it being

too soon to go to dinner, I walked up and down, and looked upon the

outside of the new theatre now a-building in Covent Garden, which will

be very fine. And so to a bookseller’s in the Strand, and there bought

Hudibras again, it being certainly some ill-humour to be so against

that which all the world cries up to be the example of wit; for which

I am resolved once more to read him, and see whether I can find it or

no....

_November 28th._-- ... And thence abroad to Paul’s Churchyard, and

there looked upon the second part of Hudibras, which I buy not, but

borrow to read, to see if it be as good as the first, which the world

cry so mightily up, though it hath not a good liking in me, though I

had tried by twice or three times reading to bring myself to think it

witty. Back again and home to my office....

_May 11th, 1667._--And so away with my wife, whose being dressed

this day in fair hair did make me so mad, that I spoke not one word to

her, though I was ready to burst with anger.... After that ... Creed

and I into the Park, and walked, a most pleasant evening, and so took

coach, and took up my wife, and in my way home discovered my trouble

to my wife for her white locks [false hair], swearing by God several

times, which I pray God forgive me for, and bending my fist, that I

would not endure it. She, poor wretch, was surprized with it, and made

me no answer all the way home; but there we parted, and I to the office

late, and then home, and without supper to bed, vexed.

_12th_ (Lord’s Day).--Up and to my chamber, to settle some

accounts there, and by and by down comes my wife to me in her

night-gown, and we begun calmly, that, upon having money to lace her

gown for second mourning, she would promise to wear white locks no more

in my sight, which I, like a severe fool, thinking not enough, began to

except against, and made her fly out to very high terms and cry, and

in her heat told me of keeping company with Mrs Knipp, saying, that

if I would promise never to see her more--of whom she hath more reason

to suspect than I had heretofore of Pembleton--she would never wear

white locks more. This vexed me, but I restrained myself from saying

anything, but do think never to see this woman--at least, to have her

here more; but by and by I did give her money to buy lace, and she

promised to wear no more white locks while I lived, and so all very

good friends as ever, and I to my business, and she to dress herself.

_August 18th_ (Lord’s Day).--Up, and being ready, walked up and

down to Cree Church, to see it how it is: but I find no alteration

there, as they say there was, for my Lord Mayor and Aldermen to come

to sermon, as they do every Sunday, as they did formerly to Paul’s....

There dined with me Mr Turner and his daughter Betty. Betty is grown

a fine young lady as to carriage and discourse. I and my wife are

mightily pleased with her. We had a good haunch of venison, powdered

and boiled, and a good dinner and merry.... I walked towards Whitehall,

but, being wearied, turned into St Dunstan’s Church, where I heard an

able sermon of the minister of the place; and stood by a pretty, modest

maid, whom I did labour to take by the hand ...; but she would not,

but got further and further from me; and, at last, I could perceive

her to take pins out of her pocket to prick me if I should touch her

again--which seeing, I did forbear, and was glad I did spy her design.

And then I fell to gaze upon another pretty maid, in a pew close to

me, and she on me; and I did go about to take her by the hand, which

she suffered a little, and then withdrew. So the sermon ended, and the

church broke up.

* * * * *

John Dryden, famous alike for his verse, prose and drama, shows his wit

in biting, stinging satire.

Equally caustic are his epigrams, save one--the immortal lines on

Milton.

_ON SHADWELL_

All human things are subject to decay,

And, when Fate summons, monarchs must obey.

This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young

Was called to empire, and had governed long.

In prose and verse was owned, without dispute,

Through all the realms of Nonsense absolute.

This aged prince, now flourishing in peace,

And blest with issue of a large increase,

Worn out with business, did at length debate

To settle the succession of the state;

And pondering which of all his sons was fit

To reign, and wage immortal war with Wit,

Cried: “’Tis resolved; for Nature pleads that he

Should only rule who most resembles me.

Shadwell alone my perfect image bears,

Mature in dulness from his tender years;

Shadwell alone of all my sons is he

Who stands confirmed in full stupidity.

The rest to some faint meaning make pretence,

But Shadwell never deviates into sense.

Some beams of wit on other souls may fall,

Strike through, and make a lucid interval,

But Shadwell’s genuine night admits no ray;

His rising fogs prevail upon the day.

Besides, his goodly fabric fills the eye,

And seems designed for thoughtless majesty--

Thoughtless as monarch oaks that shade the plain,

And, spread in solemn state, supinely reign.”

_ON THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM_

Some of their chiefs were princes of the land:

In the first rank of these did Zimri stand,

A man so various, that he seemed to be

Not one, but all mankind’s epitome:

Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,

Was everything by starts, and nothing long,

But, in the course of one revolving moon,

Was chemist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon,

Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking,

Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.

Blest madman, who could every hour employ

With something new to wish or to enjoy,

Railing, and praising, were his usual themes;

And both, to show his judgment, in extremes:

So over-violent, or over-civil,

That every man with him was god or devil.

In squandering wealth was his peculiar art;

Nothing went unrewarded but desert.

Beggared by fools, whom still he found too late,

He had his jest and they had his estate.

He laughed himself from court, then sought relief

By forming parties, but could ne’er be chief;

For spite of him, the weight of business fell

On Absalom and wise Achitophel.

Thus, wicked but in will, of means bereft,

He left not faction, but of that was left.

_MILTON COMPARED WITH HOMER AND VIRGIL_

Under a Picture of Milton in the 4th Edition of _Paradise Lost_.

Three Poets, in three distant ages born,

Greece, Italy, and England did adorn.

The first, in loftiness of thought surpass’d

The next, in majesty; in both the last.

The force of nature could no further go;

To make a third, she join’d the former two.

The original of these fine lines was probably a Latin distich written

by Selvaggi at Rome, which has been thus translated:

Greece boasts her Homer, Rome her Virgil’s name,

But England’s Milton vies with both in fame.

Cowper’s lines on Milton may be compared with Dryden’s:

Ages elapsed ere Homer’s lamp appear’d,

And ages ere the Mantuan Swan was heard

To carry Nature lengths unknown before,

To give a Milton birth, ask’d ages more.

Thus Genius rose and set at order’d times,

And shot a day-spring into distant climes,

Ennobling every region that he chose;

He sunk in Greece, in Italy he rose;

And, tedious years of gothic darkness pass’d,

Emerged all splendour in our isle at last,

Thus lovely halcyons dive into the main,

Then show far off their shining plumes again.

In Bishop Gibson’s edition of Camden’s _Britannia_, there is a

very free translation of some old monkish verses on S. Oswald by Basil

Kennet, brother of Bishop White Kennet. The last line, to which there

is nothing corresponding in the Latin, seems to have been copied from

the last line of Dryden’s epigram:

_Cæsar_ and _Hercules_ applaud thy fame,

And _Alexander_ owns thy greater name,

Tho’ one himself, one foes, and one the world o’ercame:

Great conquests all! but bounteous Heav’n in thee,

To make a greater, join’d the former three.

The comedies of William Congreve, brilliantly witty though they are,

offer no suitable passages to quote.

Likewise the works of Daniel Defoe, who, beside the story of

_Robinson Crusoe_, wrote satirical humor.

_FROM ROBINSON CRUSOE_

_Friday’s Conflict with the Bear_

But never was a fight managed so hardily, and in such a surprising

manner, as that between Friday and the bear, which gave us all--though

at first we were surprised and afraid for him--the greatest diversion

imaginable.

My man Friday had delivered our guide, and when we came up to him

he was helping him off from his horse, for the man was both hurt and

frightened, and indeed the last more than the first, when on a sudden

we espied the bear come out of the wood, and a vast, monstrous one it

was, the biggest by far that ever I saw. We were all a little surprised

when we saw him; but when Friday saw him, it was easy to see joy and

courage in the fellow’s countenance. “Oh, oh, oh!” says Friday three

times, pointing to him; “oh, master! you give me te leave, me shakee te

hand with him; me makee you good laugh.”

I was surprised to see the fellow so pleased. “You fool!” said I, “he

will eat you up.” “Eatee me up! eatee me up!” says Friday twice over

again; “me eatee him up; me makee you good laugh; you all stay here,

me show you good laugh.” So down he sits, and gets his boots off in a

moment, and puts on a pair of pumps (as we call the flat shoes they

wear, and which he had in his pocket), gives my other servant his

horse, and with his gun away he flew, swift like the wind.

The bear was walking softly on, and offered to meddle with nobody,

till Friday, coming pretty near, calls to him as if the bear could

understand him, “Hark ye, hark ye,” says Friday, “me speakee with you.”

We followed at a distance, for now, being come down to the Gascony

side of the mountains, we were entered a vast, great forest, where

the country was plain and pretty open, though it had many trees in it

scattered here and there. Friday, who had, as we say, the heels of the

bear, came up with him quickly, and took up a great stone and threw it

at him, and hit him just on the head, but did him no more harm than if

he had thrown it against a wall; but it answered Friday’s end, for the

rogue was so void of fear that he did it purely to make the bear follow

him and show us some laugh, as he called it. As soon as the bear felt

the stone, and saw him, he turns about and comes after him, taking very

long strides, and shuffling on at a strange rate, so as would have put

a horse to a middling gallop. Away runs Friday, and takes his course

as if he ran toward us for help; so we all resolved to fire at once

upon the bear, and deliver my man; though I was angry at him heartily

for bringing the bear back upon us, when he was going about his own

business another way; and especially I was angry that he had turned

the bear upon us and then run away; and I called out, “You dog!” said

I, “is this your making us laugh? Come away, and take your horse, that

we may shoot the creature.” He heard me, and cried out, “No shoot! no

shoot! stand still, you get much laugh.” And as the nimble creature

ran two feet for the beast’s one, he turned on a sudden on one side of

us, and seeing a great oak-tree fit for his purpose, he beckoned us to

follow; and doubling his pace, he got nimbly up the tree, laying his

gun down upon the ground, at about five or six yards from the bottom of

the tree.

The bear soon came to the tree, and we followed at a distance. The

first thing he did, he stopped at the gun, smelled at it, but let it

lie, and up he scrambles into the tree, climbing like a cat, though so

monstrous heavy. I was amazed at the folly, as I thought it, of my man,

and could not for my life see anything to laugh at yet, till, seeing

the bear get up the tree, we all rode near to him.

When we came to the tree, there was Friday got out to the small end of

a large limb of the tree, and the bear got about half-way to him. As

soon as the bear got out to that part where the limb of the tree was

weaker, “Ha!” says he to us, “now you see me teachee the bear dance”;

so he began jumping and shaking the bough, at which the bear began to

totter, but stood still, and began to look behind him, to see how he

should get back; then, indeed, we did laugh heartily. But Friday had

not done with him by a great deal. When seeing him stand still, he

called out to him again, as if he had supposed the bear could speak

English, “What, you no come farther? Pray you come farther.” So he

left jumping and shaking the bough; and the bear, just as if he had

understood what he had said, did come a little farther. Then he began

jumping again, and the bear stopped again. We thought now was a good

time to knock him on the head, and called to Friday to stand still, and

we would shoot the bear; but he cried out earnestly, “Oh, pray! oh,

pray! no shoot! me shoot by-and-then.” He would have said by-and-by.

However, to shorten the story, Friday danced so much, and the bear

stood so ticklish, that we had laughing enough indeed, but still could

not imagine what the fellow would do; for first we thought he depended

upon shaking the bear off; and we found the bear was too cunning for

that too; for he would not go out far enough to be thrown down, but

clung fast with his great broad claws and feet, so that we could not

imagine what would be the end of it, and what the jest would be at

last. But Friday put us out of doubt quickly; for, seeing the bear

cling fast to the bough, and that he would not be persuaded to come any

farther, “Well, well,” says Friday, “you no come farther, me go; you no

come to me, me come to you.” And upon this he went out to the smaller

end of the bough, where it would bend with his weight, and gently let

himself down by it, sliding down the bough till he came near enough

to jump down on his feet, and away he ran to his gun, took it up, and

stood still. “Well,” said I to him, “Friday, what will you do now? Why

don’t you shoot him?” “No shoot,” says Friday, “no yet; me shoot now,

me no kill; me stay, give you one more laugh.” And, indeed, so he did,

as you will see presently. For when the bear saw his enemy gone, he

came back from the bough where he stood, but did it very cautiously,

looking behind him every step, and coming backward till he got into

the body of the tree. Then, with the same hinder end foremost, he came

down the tree, grasping it with his claws, and moving one foot at a

time, very leisurely. At this juncture, and just before he could set

his hind feet upon the ground, Friday stepped up close to him, clapped

the muzzle of his piece into his ear, and shot him dead as a stone.

Then the rogue turned about to see if we did not laugh; and when he saw

we were pleased by our looks, he began to laugh very loud. “So we kill

bear in my country,” says Friday. “So you kill them?” says I; “why, you

have no guns.” “No,” says he, “no gun, but shoot great much long arrow.”

* * * * *

Matthew Prior was called by Thackeray the most charmingly humorous of

the English poets, and Cowper speaks of Prior’s charming ease.

_AN EPITAPH_

Interred beneath this marble stone

Lie sauntering Jack and idle Joan.

While rolling threescore years and one

Did round this globe their courses run.

If human things went ill or well,

If changing empires rose or fell,

The morning past, the evening came,

And found this couple just the same.

They walked and ate, good folks. What then?

Why, then they walked and ate again;

They soundly slept the night away;

They did just nothing all the day,

Nor sister either had, nor brother;

They seemed just tallied for each other.

Their moral and economy

Most perfectly they made agree;

Each virtue kept its proper bound,

Nor trespassed on the other’s ground.

Nor fame nor censure they regarded;

They neither punished nor rewarded.

He cared not what the footman did;

Her maids she neither praised nor chid;

So every servant took his course,

And, bad at first, they all grew worse;

Slothful disorder filled his stable.

And sluttish plenty decked her table.

Their beer was strong, their wine was port;

Their meal was large, their grace was short.

They gave the poor the remnant meat,

Just when it grew not fit to eat.

They paid the church and parish rate,

And took, but read not, the receipt:

For which they claimed their Sunday’s due

Of slumbering in an upper pew.

No man’s defects sought they to know,

So never made themselves a foe.

No man’s good deeds did they commend,

So never raised themselves a friend.

Nor cherished they relations poor,

That might decrease their present store;

Nor barn nor house did they repair,

That might oblige their future heir.

They neither added nor confounded;

They neither wanted nor abounded.

Nor tear nor smile did they employ

At news of grief or public joy

When bells were rung and bonfires made,

If asked, they ne’er denied their aid;

Their jug was to the ringers carried,

Whoever either died or married

Their billet at the fire was found,

Whoever was deposed or crowned.

Nor good, nor bad, nor fools, nor wise;

They would not learn, nor could advise;

Without love, hatred, joy, or fear,

They led--a kind of--as it were;

Nor wished, nor cared, nor laughed, nor cried.

And so they lived, and so they died.

_A SIMILE_

Dear Thomas, didst thou never pop

Thy head into a tin-man’s shop?

There, Thomas, didst thou never see

(’Tis but by way of simile)

A squirrel spend his little rage,

In jumping round a rolling cage?

The cage, as either side turned up,

Striking a ring of bells a-top?--

Mov’d in the orb, pleas’d with the chimes,

The foolish creature thinks he climbs:

But here or there, turn wood or wire,

He never gets two inches higher.

So fares it with those merry blades,

That frisk it under Pindus’ shades.

In noble songs, and lofty odes,

They tread on stars, and talk with gods;

Still dancing in an airy round,

Still pleased with their own verses’ sound;

Brought back, how fast soe’er they go,

Always aspiring, always low.

_PHILLIS’ AGE_

How old may Phillis be, you ask,

Whose beauty thus all hearts engages?

To answer is no easy task:

For she has really two ages.

Stiff in brocade, and pinch’d in stays,

Her patches, paint and jewels on;

All day let envy view her face,

And Phillis is but twenty-one.

Paint, patches, jewels laid aside,

At night astronomers agree,

The evening has the day belied;

And Phillis is some forty-three.

Prior delighted in epigrams on ladies who wore false hair and teeth,

and who attempted to retain the beauty of youth by means of paint and

dye. They are generally imitated from Martial.

_A REASONABLE AFFLICTION_

In a dark corner of the house

Poor Helen sits, and sobs, and cries;

She will not see her loving spouse,

Nor her more dear picquet allies:

Unless she find her eye-brows,

She’ll e’en weep out her eyes.

FRENCH HUMOR

The first French humorist of note in the seventeenth century was Cyrano

de Bergerac. His History of the Moon and History of the Sun are of the

nature of _Gulliver’s Travels_.

_THE SOUL OF THE CABBAGE_

We laid ourselves along upon very soft quilts, covered with large

carpets; and a young man that waited on us, taking the oldest of our

philosophers led him into a little parlor apart, where my Spirit called

to him to come back to us as soon as he had supped.

This humor of eating separately gave me the curiosity of asking the

cause of it. “He’ll not relish,” said he, “the steam of meat, nor yet

of herbs, unless they die of themselves, because he thinks they are

sensible of pain.” “I wonder not so much,” replied I, “that he abstains

from flesh, and all things that have had a sensitive life. For in our

world the Pythagoreans, and even some holy Anchorites, have followed

that rule; but not to dare, for instance, cut a cabbage, for fear of

hurting it--that seems to me altogether ridiculous.” “And for my part,”

answered my Spirit, “I find a great deal of reason in his opinion.

“For, tell me is not that cabbage you speak of a being existent in

Nature as well as you? Is not she the common mother of you both? Yet

the opinion that Nature is kinder to mankind than to cabbage-kind,

tickles and makes us laugh. But, seeing she is incapable of passion,

she can neither love nor hate anything; and were she susceptible of

love, she would rather bestow her affection upon this cabbage, which

you grant cannot offend her, than upon that man who would destroy her

if it lay in his power.

“And, moreover, man cannot be born innocent, being a part of the

first offender. But we know very well that the first cabbage did not

offend its Creator. If it be said that we are made after the image

of the Supreme Being, and the cabbage is not--grant that to be true;

yet by polluting our soul, wherein we resembled Him, we have effaced

that likeness, seeing nothing is more contrary to God than sin. If,

then, our soul be no longer His image, we resemble Him no more in our

feet, hands, mouth, forehead, and ears, than a cabbage in its leaves,

flowers, stalk, pith, and head--do not you really think that if this

poor plant could speak when one cuts it, it would not say, ‘Dear

brother man, what have I done to thee that deserves death? I never

grow but in gardens, and am never to be found in desert places, where

I might live in security; I disdain all other company but thine, and

scarcely am I sowed in thy garden when, to show thee my good-will, I

blossom, stretch out my arms to thee, offer thee my children in grain;

and, as a requital for my civility, thou causest my head to be chopped

off.’ Thus would a cabbage discourse if it could speak.

“To massacre a man is not so great sin as to cut and kill a cabbage,

because one day the man will rise again, but the cabbage has no other

life to hope for. By putting to death a cabbage, you annihilate it;

but in killing a man, you make him only change his habitation. Nay,

I’ll go farther with you still: since God doth equally cherish all His

works, and hath equally, divided the benefits betwixt us and plants, it

is but just we should have an equal esteem for them as for ourselves.

It is true we were born first, but in the family of God there is no

birthright. If, then, the cabbage share not with us in the inheritance

of immortality, without doubt that want was made up by some other

advantage, that may make amends for the shortness of its being--maybe

by an universal intellect, or a perfect knowledge of all things in

their causes. And it is for that reason that the wise Mover of all

things hath not shaped for it organs like ours, which are proper only

for simple reasoning, not only weak, but often fallacious too; but

others, more ingeniously framed, stronger, and more numerous, which

serve to conduct its speculative exercises. You’ll ask me, perhaps,

whenever any cabbage imparted those lofty conceptions to us? But tell

me, again, who ever discovered to us certain beings, which we allow

to be above us, to whom we bear no analogy nor proportion, and whose

existence it is as hard for us to comprehend as the understanding and

ways whereby a cabbage expresses itself to its like, though not to us,

because our senses are too dull to penetrate so far?

“Moses, the greatest of philosophers, who drew the knowledge of nature

from the fountain-head, Nature herself, hinted this truth to us when

he spoke of the Tree of Knowledge; and without doubt he intended to

intimate to us under that figure that plants, in exclusion of mankind,

possess perfect philosophy. Remember, then, oh, thou proudest of

animals, that though a cabbage which thou cuttest sayeth not a word,

yet it pays in thinking. But the poor vegetable has no fit organs to

howl as you do, nor yet to frisk about and weep. Yet it hath those

that are proper to complain of the wrong you do it, and to draw a

judgment from Heaven upon you for the injustice. But if you still

demand of me how I come to know that cabbages and coleworts conceive

such pretty thoughts, then will I ask you, how come you to know that

they do not; and how that some among them, when they shut up at

night, may not compliment one another as you do, saying, ‘Good-night,

Master _Cole-Curled-Pate_! Your most humble servant, good Master

_Cabbage-Round-Head_!’”

* * * * *

Marc-Antoine Gerard, sieur de Saint Amant, was one of the brightest and

best of the French early poets.

We give a specimen of his lighter verse. The following is “An Address

to Bacchus:”

In idle rhymes we waste our days,

With yawning fits for all our praise,

While Bacchus, god of mirth and wine,

Invites us to a life divine.

Apollo, prince of bards and prigs,

May scrape his fiddle to the pigs;

And for the Muses, old maids all,

Why let them twang their lyres, and squall

Their hymns and odes on classic themes,

Neglected by their sacred streams.

As for the true poetic fire,

What is it but a mad desire?

While Pegasus himself, at best,

Only a horse must be confess’d;

And he must be an ass indeed,

Who would bestride the winged steed.

Bacchus, thou who watchest o’er

All feasts of ours, whom I adore

With each new draught of rosy wine

That makes my red face like to thine--

By thy ivied coronet,

By this glass with rubies set,

By thy thyrsus--fear of earth--

By thine everlasting mirth,

By the honor of the feast,

By thy triumphs, greatest, least,

By thy blows, not struck, but drunk,

With king and bishop, priest and monk,

By the jesting, keen and sharp,

By the violin and harp,

By the bells, which are but flasks,

By our sighs which are but masks

Of mirth and sacred mystery,

By thy panthers fierce to see,

By this place so fair and sweet,

By the he-goat at thy feet,

By Ariadne, buxom lass,

By Silenus on his ass,

By this sausage, by this stoup,

By this rich and thirsty soup,

By this pipe from which I wave

All the incense thou dost crave,

By this ham, well spiced, long hung,

By this salt and wood-smoked tongue,

Receive us in the happy band

Of those who worship glass in hand.

And, to prove thyself divine,

Leave us never without wine.

Molière (the stage name of Jean Baptiste Poquelin), the greatest comic

dramatist of France, wrote thirty or more plays. Though difficult to

quote significant passages, two are here given:

_FROM “THE LEARNED WOMEN”_

_Trissotin._ Your verses have beauties unequaled by any others.

_Vadius._ Venus and the graces reign in all yours.

_Trissotin._ You have an easy style, and a fine choice of words.

_Vadius._ In all your writings one finds _ithos_ and _pathos_.

_Trissotin._ We have seen some eclogues of your composition which

surpass in sweetness those of Theocritus and Vergil.

_Vadius._ Your odes have a noble, gallant, and tender manner,

which leaves Horace far behind.

_Trissotin._ Is there anything more lovely than your canzonets?

_Vadius._ Is there anything equal to the sonnets you write?

_Trissotin._ Is there anything more charming than your little

rondeaus?

_Vadius._ Anything so full of wit as your madrigals?

_Trissotin._ If France could appreciate your value----

_Vadius._ If the age could render justice to a lofty genius----

_Trissotin._ You would ride in the streets in a gilt coach.

_Vadius._ We should see the public erect statues to you. Hem--It

is a ballad; and I wish you frankly to----

_Trissotin._ Have you heard a certain little sonnet upon the

Princess Urania’s fever?

_Vadius._ Yes; I heard it read yesterday.

_Trissotin._ Do you know the author of it?

_Vadius._ No, I do not; but I know very well that, to tell him the

truth, his sonnet is good for nothing.

_Trissotin._ Yet a great many people think it admirable.

_Vadius._ It does not prevent it from being wretched; and if you

had read it you would think like me.

_Trissotin._ I know that I should differ from you altogether, and

that few people are able to write such a sonnet.

_Vadius._ Heaven forbid that I should ever write one so bad!

_Trissotin._ I maintain that a better one cannot be made, and my

reason is that I am the author of it.

_Vadius._ You?

_Trissotin._ Myself.

_Vadius._ I cannot understand how the thing could have happened.

_Trissotin._ It is unfortunate that I had not the power of

pleasing you.

_Vadius._ My mind must have wandered during the reading, or else

the reader spoiled the sonnet; but let us leave that subject, and come

to my ballad.

_Trissotin._ The ballad is, to my mind, an insipid thing; it is no

longer the fashion, and savors of ancient times.

_Vadius._ Yet a ballad has charms for many people.

_Trissotin._ It does not prevent me from thinking it unpleasant.

_Vadius._ That does not make it worse.

_Trissotin._ It has wonderful attractions for pedants.

_Vadius._ Yet we see that it does not please you.

_Trissotin._ You stupidly impose your qualities on others.

_Vadius._ You very impertinently cast yours upon me.

_Trissotin._ Go, you little dunce, you pitiful quill-driver!

_Vadius._ Go, you penny-a-liner, you disgrace to the profession!

_Trissotin._ Go, you book-manufacturer, you impudent plagiarist!

_Vadius._ Go, you pedantic snob!

_Philosopher._ Ah! gentlemen, what are you about?

_Trissotin_ (_to_ VADIUS). Go, go, and make restitution to the Greeks

and Romans for all your shameful thefts!

_Vadius._ Go, and do penance on Parnassus for having murdered

Horace in your verses!

_Trissotin._ Remember your book, and the little stir it made.

_Vadius._ And you, remember your bookseller, reduced to the workhouse.

_Trissotin._ My fame is established; in vain would you endeavor to

shake it.

_Vadius._ Yes, yes; I’ll send you to the author of the _Satires_.

_Trissotin._ I, too, will send you to him.

_Vadius._ I have the satisfaction of having been honorably treated

by him; he gives me a passing thrust, and includes me among several

authors well known at court. But you he never leaves in peace; in all

his verses he attacks you.

_Trissotin._ By that we see the honorable rank I hold. He leaves

you in the crowd, and esteems one blow enough to crush you. He has

never done you the honor of repeating his attacks, whereas he assails

me separately, as a noble adversary against whom all his efforts are

necessary. His blows, repeated against me on all occasions, show that

he never thinks himself victorious.

_Vadius._ My pen will teach you what soft of man I am!

_Trissotin._ And mine will make you know your master!

_Vadius._ I defy you in verse, prose, Greek, and Latin!

_Trissotin._ Very well, we shall meet again at the bookseller’s!

_FROM “THE GENTLEMAN CIT”_

_Professor of Philosophy._ I will thoroughly explain all these

curiosities to you.

_M. Jourdain._ Pray do. And now I want to entrust you with a great

secret. I am in love with a lady of quality, and I should be glad if

you would help me to write something to her in a short letter which I

mean to drop at her feet.

_Professor of Philosophy._ Very well.

_M. Jourdain._ That will be gallant, will it not?

_Professor of Philosophy._ Undoubtedly. Is it verse you wish to

write to her?

_M. Jourdain._ Oh, no, not verse.

_Professor of Philosophy._ You only wish for prose?

_M. Jourdain._ No, I wish neither verse nor prose.

_Professor of Philosophy._ It must be one or the other.

_M. Jourdain._ Why?

_Professor of Philosophy._ Because, sir, there is nothing by which

we can express ourselves except prose or verse.

_M. Jourdain._ There is nothing but prose or verse?

_Professor of Philosophy._ No, sir. Whatever is not prose is

verse, and whatever is not verse is prose.

_M. Jourdain._ And when we speak, what is that, then?

_Professor of Philosophy._ Prose.

_M. Jourdain._ What! when I say, “Nicole, bring me my slippers,

and give me my night-cap,” is that prose?

_Professor of Philosophy._ Yes, sir.

_M. Jourdain._ Upon my word, I have been talking prose these forty

years without being aware of it! I am under the greatest obligation to

you for informing me. Well, then, I wish to write to her in a letter,

_Fair marchioness, your beautiful eyes make me die of love!_ but I

would have this worded in a genteel manner, and turned prettily.

_Professor of Philosophy._ Say that the fire of her eyes has

reduced your heart to ashes; that you suffer day and night for her

tortures----

_M. Jourdain._ No, no, no; I don’t want any of that. I simply wish

to say what I tell you: _Fair marchioness, your beautiful eyes make

me die of love_.

_Professor of Philosophy._ Still, you might amplify the thing a

little?

_M. Jourdain._ No, I tell you, I will have nothing but those very

words in the letter; but they must be put in a fashionable way, and

arranged as they should be. Pray explain a little, so that I may see

the different ways in which they can be put.

_Professor of Philosophy._ They may be put, first of all, as

you have said, _Fair marchioness, your beautiful eyes make me die

of love_; or else, _Of love die make me, fair marchioness, your

beautiful eyes_; or, _Your beautiful eyes of love make me, fair

marchioness, die_; or, _Die of love your beautiful eyes, fair

marchioness, make me_; or else, _Me make your beautiful eyes die,

fair marchioness, of love_.

_M. Jourdain._ But of all these ways, which is the best?

_Professor of Philosophy._ The one you said--_Fair marchioness,

your beautiful eyes make me die of love_.

_M. Jourdain._ Yet I have never studied, and I did all that right

off at the first shot. I thank you with all my heart, and I beg you to

come early again to-morrow morning.

_Professor of Philosophy._--I shall not fail you.

* * * * *

Paul Scarron, described as a “pure bird of pleasure,” wrote plays,

novels, epigrams, letters, and best known of all, a classic burlesque

called _Virgile Travesti_.

Quotations cannot be made from his longer works, but two poems are

given.

_FAREWELL TO CHLORIS_

Adieu, fair Chloris, adieu:

’Tis time that I speak,

After many and many a week,

(’Tis not thus that at Paris we woo)

You pay me for all with a smile

And cheat me the while,

Speak now. Let me go.

Close your doors, or open them wide,

Matters not, so that I am outside;

Devil take me, if ever I show

Love or pity for you and your pride.

To laugh in my face,

It is all that she grants me

Of pity and grace:

Can it mean that she wants me?

This for five or six months is my pay.

Now hear my command,

Shut your doors, keep them tight night and day,

With a porter at hand

To keep every one in;

Well, I know my own mind.

The devil himself, if once you begin

To go out, couldn’t keep me behind.

The following is better known. It is his description of Paris:

Houses in labyrinthine maze:

The streets with mud bespattered all;

Palace and prison, churches, quays,

Here stately shop, there shabby stall.

Passengers black, red, gray, and white,

The pursed-up prude, the light coquette;

Murder and treason dark as night;

With clerks, their hands with inkstains wet;

A gold-laced coat without a sou,

And trembling at a bailiff’s sight;

A braggart shivering with fear;

Pages and lackeys, thieves of night;

And ’mid the tumult, noise, and stink of it,

There’s Paris--Pray, what do you think of it?

François de la Rochefoucauld, famous French moralist, is best known

through the wit and wisdom of his Maxims.

* * * * *

A woman is faithful to her first lover a long time--unless she happens

to take a second.

* * * * *

He who is pleased with nobody is much more unhappy than he with whom

nobody is pleased.

* * * * *

We all have sufficient fortitude to bear the misfortunes of our friends.

* * * * *

Had we no faults of our own, we should notice them with less pleasure

in others.

* * * * *

We promise according to our hopes, and perform according to our fears.

* * * * *

Old men are fond of giving good advice to console themselves for their

impotence to give bad examples.

* * * * *

We often do good in order that we may do evil with impunity.

If we resist our passions it is more from their weakness than from our

strength.

* * * * *

We should have very little pleasure if we did not sometimes flatter

ourselves.

* * * * *

It is easier to be wise for others than for ourselves.

* * * * *

Men would not live long in society if they were not dupes to each other.

* * * * *

Virtue would not travel so far if vanity did not keep her company.

* * * * *

Hypocrisy is the homage which vice renders to virtue.

* * * * *

In the adversity of our best friends we often find something which does

not displease us.

* * * * *

Gravity is a mystery of the face, invented to conceal the defects of

the mind.

* * * * *

Affected simplicity is refined imposture.

* * * * *

We often pardon those who weary us, but never those whom we weary.

* * * * *

Blaise Pascal, celebrated geometrician and writer, left a series of

delightful satires upon the Jesuits.

_FROM LES PROVINCIALES_

_ON MENTAL RESERVATIONS_

“I proceed to the facilities we have invented for the avoidance of

sin in the conversation and intrigues of the world. One of the most

embarrassing things to provide against is _lying_, when it is

the object to excite confidence in any false representation. In this

case, our doctrine of _equivocals_ is of admirable service, by

which, says Sanchez, ‘it is lawful to use ambiguous terms to give the

impression a different sense from that which you understand yourself.’”

“This I am well aware of, father.” “We have,” continued he, “published

it so frequently, that in fact every body is acquainted with it; but

pray, do you know what is to be done when no equivocal terms can be

found?” “No, father.” “Ha, I thought this would be new to you: it is

the doctrine of _mental reservations_. Sanchez states it in the

same place: ‘A person may take an oath that he has not done such a

thing, though in fact he has, by saying to himself, it was not done

on a certain specified day or before he was born, or by concealing

any other similar circumstance which gives another meaning to the

statement. This is in numberless instances extremely convenient, and

is always justifiable when it is necessary to your welfare, honor, or

property.’”

“But, father, is not this adding perjury to lying?” “No; Sanchez and

Filiutius show the contrary: ‘It is the _intention_ which stamps

the quality of the action’; and the latter furnishes another and surer

method of avoiding lying. After saying in an audible voice, _I swear

that I did not do this_, you may add inwardly, _to-day_; or

after affirming aloud, _I swear_ you may repeat in a whisper, _I

say_; and then resuming the former tone--_I did not do it_.

Now this you must admit is telling the truth.” “I own it is,” said I;

“but it is telling truth in a whisper, and a lie in an audible voice;

besides, I apprehend that very few people have sufficient presence of

mind to avail themselves of this deception.” “Our fathers,” answered

the Jesuit, “have in the same place given directions for those who do

not know how to manage these niceties, so that they may be indemnified

against the sin of lying, while plainly declaring they have not done

what in reality they have, provided ‘that, in general, they intended to

give the same sense to their assertion which a skilful man would have

contrived to do.’”

“Now confess,” he asked, “have not you sometimes been embarrassed

through an ignorance of this doctrine?” “Certainly.” “And will you

not admit, too, that it would often be very convenient to violate

your word with a good conscience?” “Surely, one of the most convenient

things in the world!” “Then, sir, listen to Escobar; he gives this

general rule: ‘Promises are not obligatory when a man has no intention

of being bound to fulfil them; and it seldom happens that he has such

an intention, unless he confirms it by an oath or bond, so that when

he merely says _I will do it_, it is to be understood _if he do

not change his mind_; for he did not intend by what he promised to

deprive himself of his liberty.’ He furnishes some other rules which

you may read for yourself, and concludes thus: ‘Everything is taken

from Molina and our other authors--_omnia ex Molina et aliis’_; it

is, consequently, indisputable.”

“Father,” exclaimed I, “I never knew before that the direction of the

intention could nullify the obligation of a promise.” “Now, then,”

said he, “you perceive this very much facilitates the intercourse of

mankind.”

Jean de la Fontaine, the universally known French Fabulist, was a

prolific writer, but his wit shows at its best in his _Fables_.

_THE COUNCIL HELD BY THE RATS_

Old Rodilard, a certain cat,

Such havoc of the rats had made,

’Twas difficult to find a rat

With nature’s debt unpaid.

The few that did remain,

To leave their holes afraid.

From usual food abstain,

Not eating half their fill.

And wonder no one will,

That one, who made on rats his revel,

With rats passed not for cat, but devil.

Now, on a day, this dread rat-eater,

Who had a wife, went out to meet her;

And while he held his caterwauling,

The unkilled rats, their chapter calling,

Discussed the point, in grave debate,

How they might shun impending fate.

Their dean, a prudent rat,

Thought best, and better soon than late,

To bell the fatal cat;

That, when he took his hunting-round,

The rats, well cautioned by the sound,

Might hide in safety under ground;

Indeed, he knew no other means.

And all the rest

At once confessed

Their minds were with the dean’s.

No better plan, they all believed,

Could possibly have been conceived;

No doubt, the thing would work right well,

If any one would hang the bell.

But, one by one, said every rat,

“I’m not so big a fool as that.”

The plan knocked up in this respect,

The council closed without effect.

And many a council I have seen,

Or reverend chapter with its dean,

That, thus resolving wisely,

Fell through like this precisely.

To argue or refute,

Wise counsellors abound;

The man to execute

Is harder to be found.

_THE COCK AND THE FOX_

Upon a tree there mounted guard

A veteran cock, adroit and cunning;

When to the roots a fox up running

Spoke thus, in tones of kind regard:

“Our quarrel, brother, is at an end;

Henceforth I hope to live your friend;

For peace now reigns

Throughout the animal domains.

I bear the news. Come down, I pray,

And give me the embrace fraternal:

And please, my brother, don’t delay:

So much the tidings do concern all,

That I must spread them far to-day.

Now you and yours can take your walks

Without a fear or thought of hawks;

And should you clash with them or others,

In us you’ll find the best of brothers--

For which you may, this joyful night,

Your merry bonfires light.

But, first, let’s seal the bliss

With one fraternal kiss.”

“Good friend,” the cock replied, “upon my word,

A better thing I never heard;

And doubly I rejoice

To hear it from your voice:

And, really, there must be something in it,

For yonder come two greyhounds, which I flatter

Myself, are couriers on this very matter;

They come so fast, they’ll be here in a minute,

I’ll down, and all of us will seal the blessing

With general kissing and caressing.”

“Adieu,” said the fox; “my errand’s pressing,

I’ll hurry on my way,

And we’ll rejoice some other day.”

So off the fellow scampered, quick and light,

To gain the fox-holes of the neighboring height--

Less happy in his stratagem than flight.

The cock laughed sweetly in his sleeve--

’Tis doubly sweet deceiver to deceive.

_THE CROW AND THE FOX_

A master crow, perched on a tree one day

Was holding in his beak a cheese--

A master fox, by the odor drawn that way,

Spake unto him in words like these:

“O, good morning, my Lord Crow!

How well you look, how handsome you do grow!

’Pon my honor, if your note

Bears a resemblance to your coat,

You are the phœnix of the dwellers in these woods.”

At these words does the crow exceedingly rejoice;

And, to display his beauteous voice,

He opens a wide beak, lets fall his stolen goods.

The fox seized on’t, and said, “My good Monsieur,

Learn that every flatterer

Lives at the expense of him who hears him out.

This lesson is well worth a cheese, no doubt.”

The crow, ashamed, and much in pain,

Swore, but a little late, they’d not catch him so again.

Nicolas Boileau-Despreaux, commonly called Boileau, was a famous critic

and poet. His _Art Poétique_ had a decided influence on later

French verse.

His wit was keen and his satire sharp.

_TO PERRAULT_

How comes it, Perrault, I would gladly know,

That authors of two thousand years ago,

Whom in their native dress all times revere,

In your translations should so flat appear?

’Tis you divest them of their own sublime,

By your vile crudities and odious rime.

They’re thine when suffering thy wretched phrase,

And then no wonder if they meet no praise.

_ON COTIN_

Of all the pens which my poor rimes molest,

Cotin’s is sharpest, and succeeds the best.

Others outrageous scold and rail downright,

With hearty rancor, and true Christian spite.

But he, a readier method does design,

Writes scoundrel verses, and then says they’re mine.

Alan René Le Sage, novelist and dramatist, is best known for his

celebrated work, _Gil Blas_. He also wrote many farce-operettas,

which offer no opportunity for quotation.

Jean de la Bruyère, is best known for his work called _The

Characters_, an imitation of Theophrastus.

_IPHIS_

Iphis at church sees a new-fashioned shoe; he looks upon his own and

blushes, and can no longer believe himself dressed. He came to prayers

only to show himself, and now he hides himself. The foot keeps him in

his room the rest of the day. He has a soft hand, with which he gives

you a gentle pat. He is sure to laugh often to show his white teeth.

He strains his mouth to a perpetual smile. He looks upon his legs, he

views himself in the glass, and nobody can have so good an opinion of

another as he has of himself. He has acquired a delicate and clear

voice, and has a happy manner in talking. He has a turn of the head, a

sweetness in his glance that he never fails to make use of. His gait is

slow, and the prettiest he is able to contrive. He sometimes employs a

little rouge, but seldom; he will not make a habit of it. It is true

that he wears breeches and a hat, has neither earrings nor necklace,

therefore I have not put him in the chapter on woman.

_THOUGHTS_

The pleasure of criticizing robs us of the pleasure of unconscious

delight.

* * * * *

The most accomplished work of the age would fail under the hands

of censors and critics, if the author would listen to all their

objections, and allow each one to throw out the passage that had

pleased him least.

* * * * *

This good we get from the perfidiousness of woman, that it cures us of

jealousy.

* * * * *

There are but two ways of rising in the world--by your own industry, or

by the weakness of others.

If life is miserable, it is painful to live; if happy, it is terrible

to die; both come to the same thing.

* * * * *

There is nothing men are so anxious to preserve, or so careless about,

as life.

* * * * *

We are afraid of old age, and afraid not to attain it.

* * * * *

If some men died, and others did not, death would indeed be a terrible

affliction.

* * * * *

There are but three events that happen to men--birth, life, and death.

They know nothing of their birth, suffer when they die, and forget to

live.

* * * * *

Gilles Ménage, a French philologist, is now best known as the Author

of _Ménagiana_, one of the most excellent and original of the

celebrated Ana of France. The following poem bears a remarkable

resemblance to Goldsmith’s _Madame Blaize_, and it is quite

possible that the latter may have been suggested by it.

La Gallisse now I wish to touch;

Droll air! if I can strike it,

I’m sure the song will please you much;

That is, if you should like it.

La Gallisse was indeed, I grant,

Not used to any dainty

When he was born--but could not want,

As long as he had plenty.

Instructed with the greatest care,

He always was well bred,

And never used a hat to wear,

But when ’twas on his head.

His temper was exceeding good,

Just of his father’s fashion;

And never quarrels broil’d his blood,

Except when in a passion.

His mind was on devotion bent;

He kept with care each high day,

And Holy Thursday always spent,

The day before Good Friday.

He liked good claret very well,

I just presume to think it;

For ere its flavour he could tell,

He thought it best to drink it.

Than doctors more he loved the cook,

Though food would make him gross;

And never any physic took,

But when he took a dose.

O happy, happy is the swain

The ladies so adore;

For many followed in his train,

Whene’er he walk’d before.

Bright as the sun his flowing hair

In golden ringlets shone;

And no one could with him compare,

If he had been alone.

His talents I can not rehearse,

But every one allows,

That whatsoe’er he wrote in verse,

No one could call it prose.

He argued with precision nice,

The learnèd all declare;

And it was his decision wise,

No horse could be a mare.

His powerful logic would surprise,

Amuse, and much delight:

He proved that dimness of the eyes

Was hurtful to the sight.

They liked him much--so it appears

Most plainly--who preferr’d him;

And those did never want their ears,

Who any time had heard him.

He was not always right, ’tis true,

And then he must be wrong;

But none had found it out, he knew,

If he had held his tongue.

Whene’er a tender tear he shed,

’Twas certain that he wept;

And he would lay awake in bed,

Unless, indeed, he slept.

In tilting everybody knew

His very high renown;

Yet no opponents he o’erthrew,

But those that he knock’d down.

At last they smote him in the head--

What hero e’er fought all?

And when they saw that he was dead,

They knew the wound was mortal.

And when at last he lost his breath,

It closed his every strife;

For that sad day that seal’d his death,

Deprived him of his life.

Italy and Spain offer us little of seventeenth century humor. Their

comedies are long and verbose, and rather dull. Also, there are few

satisfactory translations.

The Italian, Francesca Redi, gives us a rollicking song of a

Bacchanalian order.

_DIATRIBE AGAINST WATER_

He who drinks water,

I wish to observe,

Gets nothing from me;

He may eat it and starve.

Whether it’s well, or whether it’s fountain,

Or whether it comes foaming white from the mountain,

I cannot admire it,

Nor ever desire it.

’Tis a fool, and a madman, an impudent wretch,

Who now will live in a nasty ditch,

And then grows proud, and full of his whims,

Comes playing the devil, and cursing his brims,

And swells, and tumbles, and bothers his margins,

And ruins the flowers, although they be virgins.

Wharves and piers, were it not for him,

Would last forever,

If they’re built clever;

But no, it’s all one with him--sink or swim.

Let the people yclept Mameluke

Praise the Nile without any rebuke;

Let the Spaniards praise the Tagus;

I cannot like either, even for negus.

If any follower of mine

Dares so far to forget his wine

As to drink a drop of water,

Here’s the hand to devote him to slaughter.

Let your meager doctorlings

Gather herbs and such like things,

Fellows who with streams and stills

Think to cure all sorts of ills;

I’ve no faith in their washery,

Nor think it worth a glance of my eye.

Yes, I laugh at them, for that matter,

To think how they, with their heaps of water,

Petrify their skulls profound,

And make ’em all so thick and so round,

That Viviana, with all his mathematics,

Would fail to square the circle of their attics.

Away with all water wherever I come;

I forbid it ye, gentlemen, all and some.

Lemonade water,

Jessamine water,

Our tavern knows none of ’em--

Water’s a hum!

Jessamine makes a pretty crown,

But as a drink ’twill never go down.

All your hydromels and flips

Come not near these prudent lips.

All your sippings and sherbets,

And a thousand such pretty sweets,

Let your mincing ladies take ’em,

And fops whose little fingers ache ’em.

Wine, wine is your only drink!

Grief never dares to look at the brink.

Six times a year to be mad with wine,

I hold it no shame, but a very good sign.

I, for my part, take my can,

Solely to act like a gentleman,

And, acting so, I care not, I,

For all the hail and snow in the sky.

I never go poking,

And cowering and cloaking,

And wrapping myself from head to foot,

As some people do, with their wigs to boot--

For example, like dry and shivering Redi,

Who looks just like a peruk’d old lady.

From the Spanish poet, José Morell we include two quotations.

_ADVICE TO AN INNKEEPER_

“‘Mingle the sweet and useful,’ says a sage,

Whose name, perchance, is lost in history’s page,

But whose advice withal is good and wise.

It caught a tavern-keeper’s busy eyes,

And he exclaimed, ‘Delightful! That’s for me!’

I see the sense, I read the mystery;

This is its meaning, I can well divine:

‘Mix useful water with your luscious wine.’”

_TO A POET_

“You say your verses are of gold.

And how, my friend? I’d fain inquire.

But, no--I see the truth you’ve told:

They must be purified by fire.”

GERMAN HUMOR

Germany in the seventeenth century wakes up to a dim and dawning

humorous sense, but gives little definite expression to it, unless we

except Abraham á Sancta Clara, an Augustinian monk and satirical writer

of repute.

_THE DONKEY’S VOICE_

A certain singer was most vain of his voice, thinking it so enchanting

it might allure the very dolphins, or if not them, the pike, from out

of the deep. But it is an old custom of the Lord to punish the vain

ones of the earth, who like nothing better than praise. So the Lord

made this man sing false at Holy Mass, and the whole congregation was

utterly displeased. Close by the altar there was kneeling an old woman,

who wept bitterly during the Mass. The conceited songster, thinking

that the old woman had been moved to those tears by the sweetness of

his voice, after Mass approached the dame, asking her, in the presence

of the congregation, why she had wept so sadly. His mouth watered

for the expected praise, when, “Sir,” said the woman, “while you were

singing I remembered my donkey; I lost him, poor soul three days ago,

and his voice was very natural, like yours. Oh, heavenly Father, if I

could only find that good and useful beast!”

--_Judas, the Arch-Rogue._

_A BURDENSOME WIFE_

A man set sail from Venice for Ancona, with his wife, both being minded

to offer their devotions at the shrine of Santa Maria di Loreto. But

during the voyage there arose such a great storm that all thought the

ship in extreme peril of sinking. The owner of the ship therefore

gave his command that each traveler should forthwith throw his most

burdensome possessions into the sea, so that the vessel might be made

lighter. Some rolled casks of wine overboard, and others bales of

cloth; the man from Venice, who did not desire to be found tarrying

behind the rest, seized his wife, exclaiming, “Forgive me, Ursula

mine, but this day you must drink to my health in salt water!” and

would throw her into the sea. The frightened wife making a commotion

with her screams, others ran up, and scolded the husband, asking him

the cause of his action. “The owner of the ship,” said he, “urgently

commanded that we all should throw overboard our heaviest burdens. Now,

throughout my whole life nothing has ever been so burdensome to me

as this woman; hence I was gladly willing to make her over to Father

Neptune.”

--_Hie! Fie!_

_ST. ANTHONY’S SERMON TO THE FISHES_

Saint Anthony at church

Was left in the lurch,

So he went to the ditches

And preached to the fishes.

They wriggled their tails,

In the sun glanced their scales.

The carps with their spawn,

Are all thither drawn;

Have opened their jaws,

Eager for each clause.

No sermon beside

Had the carps so edified.

Sharp-snouted pikes,

Who keep fighting like tikes,

Now swam up harmonious

To hear Saint Antonius.

No sermon beside

Had the pikes so edified.

And that very odd fish,

Who loves fast-days, the cod-fish,--

The stock-fish, I mean,--

At the sermon was seen.

No sermon beside

Had the cods so edified.

Good eels and sturgeon,

Which aldermen gorge on,

Went out of their way

To hear preaching that day.

No sermon beside

Had the eels so edified.

Crabs and turtles also,

Who always move low,

Make haste from the bottom

As if the devil had got ’em.

No sermon beside

The crabs so edified.

Fish great and fish small,

Lord, lackeys, and all,

Each looked at the preacher

Like a reasonable creature,

At God’s word,

They Anthony heard.

The sermon now ended,

Each turned and descended;

The pikes went on stealing,

The eels went on eeling.

Much delighted were they,

But preferred the old way.

The crabs are back-sliders,

The stock-fish thick-siders,

The carps are sharp-set,

All the sermon forget.

Much delighted were they,

But preferred the old way.

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

Jonathan Swift, the famous author of _Gulliver’s Travels_, wrote

voluminously. His wit was rather heavy, his satire stinging.

It is unsatisfactory to quote from his longer works, but examples of

his lighter vein are offered.

_AGAINST ABOLISHING CHRISTIANITY_

Another advantage proposed by the abolishing of Christianity is the

clear gain of one day in seven, which is now entirely lost, and

consequently the kingdom one-seventh less considerable in trade,

business, and pleasure; besides the loss to the public of so many

stately structures now in the hands of the clergy, which might

be converted into play-houses, exchanges, market-houses, common

dormitories, and other public edifices.

I hope I shall be forgiven a hard word if I call this a perfect cavil.

I readily own there hath been an old custom, time out of mind, for

people to assemble in the churches every Sunday, and that shops are

still frequently shut, in order, as it is conceived, to preserve the

memory of that ancient practice; but how this can prove a hindrance to

business or pleasure is hard to imagine. What if the men of pleasure

are forced, one day in the week, to game at home instead of the

chocolate-house? Are not the taverns and coffee-houses open? Can there

be a more convenient season for taking a dose of physic? Is not that

the chief day for traders to sum up the accounts of the week, and for

lawyers to prepare their briefs? But I would fain know how it can be

pretended that the churches are misapplied? Where are more appointments

and rendezvouses of gallantry? Where more care to appear in the

foremost box, with greater advantage of dress? Where more meetings for

business? Where more bargains driven of all sorts? And where so many

conveniences or incitements to sleep?...

It may perhaps admit a controversy, whether the banishing all notions

of religion whatsoever would be inconvenient for the vulgar. Not that

I am in the least of opinion, with those who hold religion to have

been the invention of politicians, to keep the lower part of the world

in awe by the fear of invisible powers, unless mankind were then very

different from what it is now; for I look upon the mass or body of

our people here in England to be as Freethinkers--that is to say, as

staunch unbelievers--as any of the highest rank. But I conceive some

scattered notions about a superior Power to be of singular use for the

common people, as furnishing excellent materials to keep children quiet

when they grow peevish, and providing topics of amusement in a tedious

winter night.

_THE FURNITURE OF A WOMAN’S MIND_

A set of phrases learned by rote;

A passion for a scarlet coat;

When at a play, to laugh or cry,

Yet cannot tell the reason why;

Never to hold her tongue a minute,

While all she prates has nothing in it;

Whole hours can with a coxcomb sit,

And take his nonsense all for wit.

Her learning mounts to read a song,

But half the words pronouncing wrong;

Has every repartee in store

She spoke ten thousand times before;

Can ready compliments supply

On all occasions, cut and dry;

Such hatred to a parson’s gown,

The sight would put her in a swoon;

For conversation well endued,

She calls it witty to be rude;

And, placing raillery in railing,

Will tell aloud your greatest failing;

Nor make a scruple to expose

Your bandy leg or crooked nose;

Can at her morning tea run o’er

The scandal of the day before;

Improving hourly in her skill,

To cheat and wrangle at quadrille.

In choosing lace, a critic nice,

Knows to a groat the lowest price;

Can in her female clubs dispute

What linen best the silk will suit,

What colours each complexion match,

And where with art to place a patch.

If chance a mouse creeps in her sight,

Can finely counterfeit a fright;

So sweetly screams, if it comes near her,

She ravishes all hearts to hear her.

Can dexterously her husband tease,

By taking fits whene’er she please;

By frequent practice learns the trick

At proper season to be sick;

Thinks nothing gives one airs so pretty,

At once creating love and pity.

If Molly happens to be careless,

And but neglects to warm her hair-lace,

She gets a cold as sure as death,

And vows she scarce can fetch her breath;

Admires how modest woman can

Be so robustious, like a man.

In party, furious to her power,

A bitter Whig, or Tory sour,

Her arguments directly tend

Against the side she would defend;

Will prove herself a Tory plain,

From principles the Whigs maintain,

And, to defend the Whiggish cause,

Her topics from the Tories draws.

_SUNT QUI SERVARI NOLUNT_

As Thomas was cudgell’d one day by his wife,

He took to the street, and he fled for his life.

Tom’s three dearest friends came by in the squabble

And sav’d him at once from the shrew and the rabble;

Then ventur’d to give him some sober advice--

But Tom is a person of honour so nice,

Too wise to take counsel, too proud to take warning,

That he sent to all three a challenge next morning.

Three duels he fought, thrice ventur’d his life,

Went home--and was cudgell’d again by his wife.

_ON HIS OWN DEAFNESS_

Deaf, giddy, helpless, left alone,

To all my friends a burden grown;

No more I hear my church’s bell,

Than if it rang out for my knell;

At thunder now no more I start,

Than at the rumbling of a cart;

And what’s incredible, alack!

No more I hear a woman’s clack.

_TO MRS. HOUGHTON OF BORMOUNT, UPON PRAISING HER HUSBAND

TO DR. SWIFT_

You always are making a god of your spouse;

But this neither reason nor conscience allows:

Perhaps you will say, ’tis in gratitude due,

And you adore him, because he adores you.

Your argument’s weak, and so you will find;

For you, by this rule, must adore all mankind.

Alexander Pope, a true poet and humorist, sometimes dropped into sheer

nonsense, and often into satirical epigrammatic writing.

For some inexplicable reason, certain commentators have denied any

sense of humor to Pope, but the following extracts refute this:

_LINES BY A PERSON OF QUALITY_

Fluttering spread thy purple pinions,

Gentle Cupid, o’er my heart,

I a slave in thy dominions,

Nature must give way to art.

Mild Arcadians, ever blooming,

Nightly nodding o’er your flocks,

See my weary days consuming,

All beneath yon flowery rocks.

Thus the Cyprian goddess weeping,

Mourned Adonis, darling youth:

Him the boar, in silence creeping,

Gored with unrelenting tooth.

Cynthia, tune harmonious numbers;

Fair Discretion, tune the lyre;

Soothe my ever-waking slumbers;

Bright Apollo, lend thy choir.

Gloomy Pluto, king of terrors,

Armed in adamantine chains,

Lead me to the crystal mirrors,

Watering soft Elysian plains.

Mournful Cypress, verdant willow,

Gilding my Aurelia’s brows,

Morpheus, hovering o’er my pillow,

Hear me pay my dying vows.

Melancholy, smooth Mæaunder,

Swiftly purling in a round,

On thy margin lovers wander

With thy flowery chaplets crowned.

Thus when Philomela, drooping,

Softly seeks her silent mate,

So the bird of Juno stooping;

Melody resigns to fate.

_WORMS_

To the Ingenious Mr. Moore, inventor of the celebrated worm powder.

How much, egregious Moore? are we,

Deceived by shows and forms?

Whate’er we think, whate’er we see,

All human race are worms.

Man is a very worm by birth,

Proud reptile, vile and vain,

Awhile he crawls upon the earth,

Then shrinks to earth again.

That woman is a worm, we find,

E’er since our grannum’s evil;

She first conversed with her own kind,

That ancient worm, the Devil.

The fops are painted butterflies,

That flutter for a day;

First from a worm they took their rise,

Then in a worm decay.

The flatterer an ear-wig grows,

Some worms suit all conditions;

Misers are muck-worms; silk-worms, beaus,

And death-watches, physicians.

That statesmen have a worm, is seen

By all their winding play;

Their conscience is a worm within,

That gnaws them night and day.

Ah, Moore! thy skill were well employ’d,

And greater gain would rise

If thou couldst make the courtier void

That worm that never dies.

Thou only canst our fate adjourn

Some few short years, no more;

E’en Button’s wits to worms shall turn,

Who maggots were before.

_EPIGRAM ON MRS. TOFTS_

(_A celebrated Opera Singer._)

So bright is thy beauty, so charming thy song,

As had drawn both the beasts and their Orpheus along;

But such is thy avarice, and such is thy pride,

That the beasts must have starved and the poet have died.

Joseph Addison, whose literary work had a decided influence on English

letters and manners, contributed much to _The Tatler_ and _The

Spectator_, from which the following extract is taken.

_THE WILL OF A VIRTUOSO_

I, Nicholas Gimcrack, being in sound health of mind, but in great

weakness of body, do, by this my last will and testament, bestow my

worldly goods and chattels in manner following:

_Imprimis._--To my dear wife,

One box of butterflies,

One drawer of shells,

A female skeleton,

A dried cockatrice.

_Item._--To my daughter Elizabeth,

My receipt for preserving dead caterpillars,

As also my preparations of winter Maydew and embryo-pickle.

_Item._--To my little daughter Fanny,

Three crocodile’s eggs,

And upon the birth of her first child, if she marries with her

mother’s consent,

The nest of a humming-bird.

_Item._--To my eldest brother, as an acknowledgment for the lands

he has vested in my son Charles, I bequeath

My last year’s collection of grasshoppers.

_Item._--To his daughter Susanna, being his only child, I bequeath

my English weeds pasted on royal paper,

With my large folio of Indian cabbage.

Having fully provided for my nephew Isaac, by making over to him

some years since,

A horned scarabæus,

The skin of a rattlesnake, and

The mummy of an Egyptian king,

I make no further provision for him in this my will.

My eldest son, John, having spoke disrespectfully of his little sister,

whom I keep by me in spirits of wine, and in many other instances

behaved himself undutifully toward me, I do disinherit, and wholly cut

off from any part of this my personal estate, by giving him a single

cockle-shell.

To my second son, Charles, I give and bequeath all my flowers, plants,

minerals, mosses, shells, pebbles, fossils, beetles, butterflies,

caterpillars, grasshoppers, and vermin, not above specified; as also

all my monsters, both wet and dry; making the said Charles whole and

sole executor of this my last will and testament: he paying, or causing

to be paid, the aforesaid legacies within the space of six months after

my decease. And I do hereby revoke all other wills whatsoever by me

formerly made.

* * * * *

John Philips, who was a devoted student and admirer of Milton, wrote a

poem in which he parodied Milton’s style, and which Addison called the

finest burlesque in the English language.

_THE SPLENDID SHILLING_

“Sing, heavenly Muse.

Things unattempted yet in prose or rhyme”;

A shilling, breeches, and chimeras dire.

Happy the man, who, void of acres and strife,

In silken or in leathern purse retains

A Splendid Shilling: he nor hears with pain

New oysters cried, nor sighs for cheerful ale;

But with his friends, when nightly mists arise,

To Juniper’s Magpie, or Town Hall repairs;

Where, mindful of the nymph, whose wanton eye

Transfixed his soul, and kindled amorous flames,

Chloe or Phyllis, he each circling glass

Wisheth her health and joy and equal love.

Meanwhile he smokes, and laughs at merry tale,

Or pun ambiguous or conundrum quaint.

But I, whom griping penury surrounds,

And hunger, sure attendant upon want,

With scanty offals, and small acid tiff

(Wretched repast!) my meagre corpse sustain:

Then solitary walk, or doze at home

In garret vile, and with a warming puff

Regale chilled fingers; or from tube as black

As winter-chimney or well-polished jet,

Exhale mundungus, ill-perfuming scent.

Not blacker tube, nor of a shorter size,

Smokes Cambro-Briton (versed in pedigree,

Sprung from Cadwallador and Arthur, kings

Full famous in romantic tale) when he

O’er many a craggy hill and barren cliff,

Upon a cargo of famed Cestrian cheese,

High overshadowing rides, with a design

To wend his wares at the Arvonian mart,

Or Maridunum, or the ancient town

Ycleped Brechinia, or where Vaga’s stream

Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil!

Whence flow nectareous wines, that well may vie

With Massic, Setin, or renowned Falern.

Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow,

With looks demure, and silent pace, a Dun,

Horrible monster! hated by gods and men,

To my aerial citadel ascends.

With vocal heel thrice thundering at my gate,

With hideous accent thrice he calls; I know

The voice ill-boding, and the solemn sound,

What should I do? or whither turn? Amazed,

Confounded, to the dark recess I fly

Of wood-hole; straight my bristling hairs erect

Through sudden fear; a chilly sweat bedews

My shuddering limbs, and (wonderful to tell!)

My tongue forgets her faculty of speech;

So horrible he seems! His faded brow

Intrenched with many a frown, and conic beard,

And spreading band, admired by modern saints,

Disastrous acts forebode; in his right hand

Long scrolls of paper solemnly he waves,

With characters and figures dire inscribed,

Grievous to mortal eyes, (ye gods, avert

Such plagues from righteous men!) Behind him stalks

Another monster, not unlike itself,

Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar called

A Catchpole, whose polluted hands the gods

With force incredible, and magic charms,

First have endued: if he his ample palm

Should haply on ill-fated shoulder lay

Of debtor, straight his body to the touch

Obsequious (as whilom knights were wont)

To some enchanted castle is conveyed,

Where gates impregnable, and coercive chains,

In durance strict detain him, till, in form

Of money, Pallas sets the captive free.

Beware, ye debtors! when ye walk, beware,

Be circumspect; oft with insidious ken

The caitiff eyes your steps aloof, and oft

Lies perdue in a nook or gloomy cave,

Prompt to enchant some inadvertent wretch

With his unhallowed touch. So (poets sing)

Grimalkin to domestic vermin sworn

An everlasting foe, with watchful eye

Lies nightly brooding o’er a chinky gap,

Portending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice

Sure ruin. So her disembowelled web

Arachne, in a hall or kitchen, spreads

Obvious to vagrant flies; she secret stands

Within her woven cell; the humming prey,

Regardless of their fate, rush on the toils

Inextricable, nor will aught avail

Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue.

The wasp insidious, and the buzzing drone,

And butterfly proud of expanded wings

Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares,

Useless resistance make; with eager strides,

She towering flies to her expected spoils:

Then with envenomed jaws the vital blood

Drinks of reluctant foes, and to her cave

Their bulky carcasses triumphant drags.

So pass my days. But when nocturnal shades

This world envelop, and the inclement air

Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts

With pleasant wines and crackling blaze of wood,

Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light

Of make-weight candle, nor the joyous talk

Of loving friend, delights; distressed, forlorn,

Amidst the horrors of the tedious night,

Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts

My anxious mind; or sometimes mournful verse

Indite, and sing of groves and myrtle shades,

Or desperate lady near a purling stream,

Or lover pendent on a willow-tree.

Meanwhile I labor with eternal drought,

And restless wish, and rave; my parchèd throat

Finds no relief, nor heavy eyes repose:

But if a slumber haply does invade

My weary limbs, my fancy, still awake,

Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream,

Tipples imaginary pots of ale;

In vain;--awake I find the settled thirst

Still gnawing, and the pleasant phantom curse.

Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debarred,

Nor taste the fruits that the sun’s genial rays

Mature, john-apple, nor the downy peach,

Nor walnut in rough-furrowed coat secure,

Nor medlar fruit delicious in decay;

Afflictions great! yet greater still remain.

My galligaskins, that have long withstood

The winter’s fury and encroaching frosts,

By time subdued, (what will not time subdue!)

An horrid chasm disclose with orifice

Wide, discontinuous; at which the winds

Eurus and Auster and the dreadful force

Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronian waves,

Tumultuous enter with dire chilling blasts,

Portending agues. Thus a well-fraught ship,

Long sails secure, or through the Ægean deep,

Or the Ionian, till cruising near

The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush

On Scylla or Charybdis (dangerous rocks)

She strikes rebounding; whence the shattered oak,

So fierce a shock unable to withstand,

Admits the sea. In at the gaping side

The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage,

Resistless, overwhelming; horrors seize

The mariners; Death in their eyes appears,

They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear, they pray:

(Vain efforts!) still the battering waves rush in,

Implacable, till, deluged by the foam,

The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss.

John Arbuthnot, celebrated both as a physician and a man of letters,

leaves us this bit of nonsense.

JOHN ARBUTHNOT

_A DISSERTATION ON DUMPLINGS_

The dumpling is, indeed, an ancient institution and of foreign origin;

but, alas! what were those dumplings? Nothing but a few lentils sodden

together, moistened and cemented with a little seethed fat, not much

unlike our grit or oatmeal pudding; yet were they of such esteem among

the ancient Romans, that a statue was erected to Fulvius Agricola, the

first inventor of these lentil dumplings. How unlike the gratitude

shown by the public to our modern projectors!

The Romans, though our conquerors, found themselves much outdone in

dumplings by our forefathers, the Roman dumplings being no more to

compare to those made by the Britons than a stone-dumpling is to a

marrow-pudding; though, indeed, the British dumpling at that time was

little better than what we call a stone-dumpling, nothing else but

flour and water. But every generation growing wiser and wiser, the

project was improved, and dumpling grew to be pudding. One projector

found milk better than water; another introduced butter; some added

marrow, others plums; and some found out the use of sugar; so that, to

speak truth, we know not where to fix the genealogy or chronology of

any of these pudding projectors; to the reproach of our historians,

who ate so much pudding, yet have been so ungrateful to the first

professors of this most noble science as not to find them a place in

history....

The invention of eggs was merely accidental, two or three of which

having casually rolled from a shelf into the pudding which a goodwife

was making, she found herself under the necessity either of throwing

away her pudding or letting the eggs remain. But concluding, from the

innocent quality of the eggs, that they would do no hurt, if they did

no good, she wisely jumbled them all together, after having carefully

picked out the shells. The consequence is easily imagined: the pudding

became a pudding of puddings, and the use of eggs from thence took its

date. The woman was sent for to Court to make puddings for King John,

who then swayed the scepter, and gained such favour that she was the

making of the whole family.

I cannot conclude this paragraph without owning I received this

important part of the history of pudding from Mr. Lawrence, of

Wilson-Green, the greatest antiquary of the present age....

From that time the English became so famous for puddings, that they are

called pudding-eaters all over the world to this day.

At her demise, the woman’s son was taken into favour, and made the

King’s chief cook; and so great was his fame for puddings, that he was

called Jack Pudding all over the kingdom, though, indeed, his real name

was John Brand, as by the records of the kitchen you will find. This

Jack Pudding became yet a greater favourite than his mother, insomuch

that he had the King’s ear as well as his mouth at command, for the

King, you must know, was a mighty lover of pudding. It is needless to

enumerate the many sorts of pudding he made. He made every pudding

except quaking pudding, which was solely invented by our friends of the

_Bull and Mouth_.

* * * * *

Lord Chesterfield, best known for his _Letters to his Son_, showed

clever wit in his ideas and Phraseology.

Men who converse only with women are frivolous, effeminate puppies, and

those who never converse with them are bears.

* * * * *

The desire of being pleased is universal. The desire of pleasing should

be so too. Misers are not so much blamed for being misers as envied for

being rich.

* * * * *

Dissimulation to a certain degree is as necessary in business as

clothes are in the common intercourse of life; and a man would be as

imprudent who should exhibit his inside naked, as he would be indecent

if he produced his outside so.

* * * * *

Hymen comes whenever he is called, but Love only when he pleases.

* * * * *

An abject flatterer has a worse opinion of others, and, if possible, of

himself, than he ought to have.

* * * * *

A woman will be implicitly governed by the man whom she is in love

with, but will not be directed by the man whom she esteems the most.

The former is the result of passion, which is her character; the latter

must be the effect of reasoning, which is by no means of the feminine

gender.

* * * * *

The best moral virtues are those of which the vulgar are, perhaps, the

best judges.

* * * * *

A fool never has thought, a madman has lost it; and an absent man is

for the time without it.

* * * * *

Advice is seldom welcome; and those who want it the most always like it

the least.

* * * * *

Of the writers who come next, chronologically, Fielding, Sterne,

Garrick, Smollett, Foote, and others of lesser degree, we can quote no

extracts, owing to the continuous character of their work.

At this time, humor was broad and wit coarse, yet the plays and novels

of the period have lasted and retained their reputation.

Which brings us to Samuel Johnson.

Doctor Johnson’s wit was ponderous, but as his is one of the greatest

names in Eighteenth Century literature, we give a bit from _The

Idler_ which is not entirely inappropriate to the present day.

_ON LYING NEWS-WRITERS_

No species of literary men has lately been so much multiplied as the

writers of news. Not many years ago the nation was content with one

gazette; but now we have not only in the metropolis papers for every

morning and every evening, but almost every large town has its weekly

historian, who regularly circulates his periodical intelligence, and

fills the villages of his district with conjectures on the events of

war, and with debates on the true interest of Europe.

To write news in its perfection requires such a combination of

qualities, that a man completely fitted for the task is not always to

be found. In Sir Henry Wotton’s jocular definition, “An ambassador is

said to be a man of virtue sent abroad to tell lies for the advantage

of his country; a news-writer is a man without virtue, who writes lies

at home for his own profit.” To these compositions is required neither

genius nor knowledge, neither industry nor sprightliness; but contempt

of shame and indifference to truth are absolutely necessary. He who

by a long familiarity with infamy has obtained these qualities, may

confidently tell to-day what he intends to contradict to-morrow; he may

affirm fearlessly what he knows that he shall be obliged to recant, and

may write letters from Amsterdam or Dresden to himself.

In a time of war the nation is always of one mind, eager to hear

something good of themselves and ill of the enemy. At this time the

task of news-writers is easy; they have nothing to do but to tell that

a battle is expected, and afterward that a battle has been fought, in

which we and our friends, whether conquering or conquered, did all, and

our enemies did nothing.

Scarcely anything awakens attention like a tale of cruelty. The writer

of news never fails in the intermission of action to tell how the

enemies murdered children and ravished virgins; and, if the scene of

action be somewhat distant, scalps half the inhabitants of a province.

Among the calamities of war may be justly numbered the diminution

of the love of truth, by the falsehoods which interest dictates and

credulity encourages. A peace will equally leave the warrior and

relater of wars destitute of employment; and I know not whether more

is to be dreaded from the streets filled with soldiers accustomed to

plunder, or from garrets filled with scribblers accustomed to lie.

* * * * *

Also, lapsing into sheer nonsense verse, Doctor Johnson has left for

our delectation these delightful rhymes.

As with my hat upon my head

I walked along the Strand,

I there did meet another man

With his hat in his hand.

The tender infant, meek and mild,

Fell down upon the stone;

The nurse took up the squealing child,

But still the child squealed on.

If a man who turnips cries,

Cry not when his father dies,

’Tis a proof that he would rather

Have a turnip than a father.

Oliver Goldsmith, humorous writer of plays and novels, left many world

famous books.

His rhymes are often of the nonsense variety, and, as was common in his

day, abounded in puns, or punning ideas.

_AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG_

Good people all, of every sort,

Give ear unto my song;

And if you find it wondrous short

It cannot hold you long.

In Islington there was a man

Of whom the world might say

That still a godly race he ran

Whene’er he went to pray.

A kind and gentle heart he had,

To comfort friends and foes;

The naked every day he clad,

When he put on his clothes.

And in that town a dog was found,

As many dogs there be,

Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,

And curs of low degree.

This dog and man at first were friends,

But when a pique began,

The dog, to gain his private ends,

Went mad, and bit the man.

Around from all the neighbouring streets

The wondering neighbours ran,

And swore the dog had lost his wits

To bite so good a man.

The wound it seemed both sore and sad

To every Christian eye;

And while they swore the dog was mad,

They swore the man would die.

But soon a wonder came to light,

That show’d the rogues they lied:

The man recover’d of the bite,

The dog it was that died.

_AN ELEGY_

ON THE GLORY OF HER SEX, MRS. MARY BLAIZE

Good people all, with one accord,

Lament for Madam Blaize,

Who never wanted a good word--

From those who spoke her praise.

The needy seldom pass’d her door,

And always found her kind:

She freely lent to all the poor--

Who left a pledge behind.

She strove the neighborhood to please

With manners wondrous winning;

And never follow’d wicked ways--

Unless when she was sinning.

At church, in silks and satins new,

With hoop of monstrous size,

She never slumber’d in her pew--

But when she shut her eyes.

Her love was sought, I do aver,

By twenty beaux and more;

The King himself has follow’d her--

When she has walk’d before.

But now, her wealth and finery fled,

Her hangers-on cut short all;

The doctors found, when she was dead--

Her last disorder mortal.

Let us lament, in sorrow sore,

For Kent Street well may say,

That had she lived a twelvemonth more

She had not died to-day.

_PARSON GRAY_

A quiet home had Parson Gray,

Secluded in a vale;

His daughters all were feminine,

And all his sons were male.

How faithfully did Parson Gray

The bread of life dispense--

Well “posted” in theology,

And post and rail his fence.

’Gainst all the vices of the age

He manfully did battle;

His chickens were a biped breed,

And quadruped his cattle.

No clock more punctually went,

He ne’er delayed a minute--

Nor ever empty was his purse,

When he had money in it.

His piety was ne’er denied;

His truths hit saint and sinner;

At morn he always breakfasted;

He always dined at dinner.

He ne’er by any luck was grieved,

By any care perplexed--

No filcher he, though when he preached,

He always “took” a text.

As faithful characters he drew

As mortal ever saw;

But, ah! poor parson, when he died,

His breath he could not draw.

William Cowper for the most part writes with a gentle, genial spirit, a

love of nature and a joy in the domestic relations

His muse, when humorous, is also a bit stilted.

_A FAITHFUL PICTURE OF ORDINARY SOCIETY_

The circle formed, we sit in silent state,

Like figures drawn upon a dial-plate.

“Yes, ma’am” and “No, ma’am” uttered softly, show

Every five minutes how the minutes go.

Each individual, suffering a constraint--

Poetry may, but colours cannot, paint--

As if in close committee on the sky,

Reports it hot or cold, or wet or dry,

And finds a changing clime a happy source

Of wise reflection and well-timed discourse.

We next inquire, but softly and by stealth,

Like conservators of the public health,

Of epidemic throats, if such there are

Of coughs and rheums, and phthisic and catarrh.

That theme exhausted, a wide chasm ensues,

Filled up at last with interesting news:

Who danced with whom, and who are like to wed;

And who is hanged, and who is brought to bed,

But fear to call a more important cause,

As if ’twere treason against English laws.

The visit paid, with ecstasy we come,

As from a seven years’ transportation, home

And there resume an unembarrassed brow,

Recovering what we lost we know not how,

The faculties that seemed reduced to naught,

Expression, and the privilege of thought.

_THE COLUBRIAD_