RABELAIS
[Sidenote: The anonymity, or at least impersonality, of authorship up to
this point.]
Although--as it is hoped the foregoing chapters may have shown--the
amount of energy and of talent, thrown into the department of French
fiction, had from almost the earliest times been remarkably great;
although French, if not France, had been the mother of almost all
literatures in things fictitious, it can hardly be said that any writer
of undeniable genius, entitling him to the first class in the Art of
Letters, had shown himself therein. A hundred _chansons de geste_ and as
many romances _d'aventures_ had displayed dispersed talent of a very
high kind, and in the best of them, as the present writer has tried to
point out, a very "extensive assortment" of the various attractions of
the novel had from time to time made its appearance. But this again had
been done "dispersedly," as the Shakespearean stage-direction has it.
The story is sometimes well told, but the telling is constantly
interrupted; the great art of novel-conversation is, as yet, almost
unborn; the descriptions, though sometimes very striking, as in the case
of those given from _Partenopeus_--the fatal revelation of Melior's
charms and the galloping of the maddened palfrey along the seashore,
with the dark monster-haunted wood behind and the bright moonlit sea and
galley in front--are more often stock and lifeless; while, above all,
the characters are rarely more than sketched, if even that. The one
exception--the great Arthurian history, as liberated from its
Graal-legend swaddling clothes, and its kite-and-crow battles with
Saxons and rival knights, but retaining the mystical motive of the
Graal-search itself and the adventures of Lancelot and other knights;
combining all this into a single story, and storing it with incident for
a time, and bringing it to a full and final tragic close by the loves of
Lancelot himself and Guinevere--this great achievement, it has been
frankly confessed, is so much muddled and distracted with episode which
becomes positive digression, that some have even dismissed its
pretensions to be a whole. Even those who reject this dismissal are not
at one as to any single author of the conception, still less of the
execution. The present writer has stated his humble, but ever more and
more firm conviction that Chrestien did not do it and could not have
done it; others of more note, perhaps of closer acquaintance with MS.
sources, but also perhaps not uniting knowledge of the subject with more
experience in general literary criticism and in special study of the
Novel, will not allow Mapes to have done it.
The _Roman de la Rose_, beautiful as is its earlier part and ingenious
as is (sometimes) its later, is, as a _story_, of the thinnest kind. The
_Roman de Renart_ is a vast collection of small stories of a special
class, and the _Fabliaux_ are almost a vaster collection (if you do not
exclude the "waterings out" of _Renart_) of kinds more general. There is
abundance of amusement and some charm; but nowhere are we much beyond
very simple forms of fiction itself. None of the writers of _nouvelles_,
except Antoine de la Salle, can be said to be a known personality.
[Sidenote: Rabelais unquestionably the first very great known writer.]
There has always been a good deal of controversy about Rabelais, not all
of which perhaps can we escape, though it certainly will not be invited,
and we have no very extensive knowledge of his life. But we have some:
and that, as a man of genius, he is superior to any single person named
and known in earlier French literature, can hardly be contested by any
one who is neither a silly paradoxer nor a mere dullard, nor affected by
some extra-literary prejudice--religious, moral, or whatever it may be.
But perhaps not every one who would admit the greatness of Master
Francis as a man of letters, his possession not merely of consummate
wit, but of that precious thing, so much rarer in French, actual humour;
his wonderful influence on the future word-book and phrase-book of his
own language, nay, not every one who would go almost the whole length of
the most uncompromising Pantagruelist, and would allow him profound
wisdom, high aspirations for humanity, something of a complete
world-philosophy--would at once admit him as a very great novelist. For
my own part I have no hesitation in doing so, and to make the admission
good must be the object of this chapter.
[Sidenote: But the first great novelist?]
It may almost be said that his very excellence in this way has "stood in
its own light." The readableness of Rabelais is extraordinary. The
present writer, after for years making of him almost an Addison
according to Johnson's prescription, fell, by mere accident and
occupation with other matters, into a way of _not_ reading him, except
for purposes of mere literary reference, during a long time. On three
different occasions more recently, one ten or a dozen years ago, one six
or seven, and the third for the purposes of this very book, he put
himself again under the Master, and read him right through. It is
difficult to imagine a severer test, and I am bound to confess (though I
am not bound to specify) that in some, though not many, instances I have
found famous and once favourite classics fail to stand it. Not so Master
Francis. I do not think that I ever read him with greater interest than
at this last time. Indeed I doubt whether I have ever felt the
_catholicon_--the pervading virtue of his book--quite so strongly as I
have in the days preceding that on which I write these words.
[Sidenote: Some objections considered.]
Of course Momus may find handles--he generally can. "You are suffering
from morbid senile relapse into puerile enjoyment of indecency," he or
Mrs. Momus (whom later ages have called Grundy) may be kind enough to
say. "You were a member of the Rabelais Club of pleasant memory, and
think it necessary to live up to your earlier profession." "You have
said this in print before [I have not exactly done so] and are bound to
stick to it," etc. etc. etc., down to that final, "You are a bad critic,
and it doesn't matter what you say," which certainly, in a sense, does
leave nothing to be replied. But whether this is because the accused is
guilty, or because the Court does not call upon him, is a question which
one may leave to others.
Laying it down, then, as a point of fact that Rabelais _has_ this
curious "holding" quality, whence does he get it? As everybody ought to
know, many good people, admitting the fact, have, as he would himself
have said, gone about with lanterns to seek for out-of-the-way reasons
and qualities; while some people, not so good, but also accepting the
fact in a way, have grasped at the above-mentioned indecency itself for
an explanation. This trick requires little effort to kick it into its
native gutter. The greater proportion of the "_Indexable_" part of
Rabelais is mere nastiness, which is only attractive to a very small
minority of persons at any age, while to expert readers it is but a
time-deodorised dunghill by the roadside, not beautiful, but negligible.
Of the other part of this kind--the "naughty" part which is not nasty
and may be somewhat nice--there is, when you come to consider it
dispassionately, not really so very much, and it is seldom used in a
seductive fashion. It may tickle, but it does not excite; may create
laughter, but never passion or even desire. Therefore it cannot be this
which "holds" any reader but a mere novice or a glutton for garbage.
Less easily dismissible, but, it will seem, not less inadequate is the
alleged "key"-interest of the book. Of course there are some people, and
more than a person who wishes to think nobly of humanity might desire to
find, who seem never to be tired of identifying Grandgousier, Gargantua,
and Pantagruel himself with French kings to whom they bear not the
slightest resemblance; of obliging us English by supposing us to be the
Macreons (who seem to have been very respectable people, but who inhabit
an island singularly unlike England in or anywhere near the time of
Rabelais), and so on. But to a much larger number of persons--and one
dares say to all true Pantagruelists--these interpretations are either
things that the Master himself would have delighted to satirise, and
would have satirised unsurpassably, or, at best, mere superfluities and
supererogations. At any rate there is no possibility of finding in them
the magic spell--the "Fastrada's ring," which binds youth and age alike
to the unique "Alcofribas Nasier."
One must, it is supposed, increase the dose of respect (though
some people, in some cases, find it hard) when considering a further
quality or property--the Riddle-attraction of Rabelais. This
riddle-attraction--or attractions, for it might be better spoken of in a
very large plural--is of course quite undeniable in itself. There are as
many second intentions in the ordinary sense, apparently obvious in
_Gargantua_ and _Pantagruel_, as there can have been in the scholastic
among the dietary of La Quinte, or of any possible Chimaera buzzing at
greatest intensity in the extremest vacuum. On the other hand, some of
us are haunted by the consideration, "Was there ever any human being
more likely than Francois Rabelais to echo (with the slightest change)
the words ascribed to Divinity in that famous piece which is taken, on
good external and ultra-internal evidence, to be Swift's?
_I_ to such block-heads set my wit!
_I_ [_pose_] such fools! Go, go--you're bit."
And there is not wanting, amongst us sceptics, a further section who are
quite certain that a not inconsiderable proportion of the book is not
allegory at all, but sheer "bamming," while others again would transfer
the hackneyed death-bed saying from author to book, and say that the
whole Chronicle is "a great perhaps."
[Sidenote: And dismissed as affecting the general attraction of the
book.]
These things--or at least elaborate discussions of them--lie somewhat,
though not so far as may at first seem, outside our proper business. It
must, however, once more be evident, from the facts and very nature of
the case, that the puzzles, the riddles, the allegories cannot
constitute the main and, so to speak, "universal" part of the attraction
of the book. They may be a seasoning to some, a solid cut-and-come-again
to others, but certainly not to the majority. Even in _Gulliver_--the
Great Book's almost, perhaps quite, as great descendant--these
attractions, though more universal in appeal and less evasively
presented, certainly do not hold any such position. The fact is that
both Rabelais and Swift were consummate tellers of a story, and
(especially if you take the _Polite Conversation_ into Swift's claim)
consummate originators of the Novel or larger story, with more than
"incidental" attraction itself. But we are not now busied with Swift.
[Sidenote: Which lies, largely if not wholly, in its story-interest.]
Not much serious objection will probably be taken to the place allotted
to Master Francis as a tale-teller pure and simple, although it cannot
be said that all his innumerable critics and commentators have laid
sufficient stress on this. From the uncomfortable birth of Gargantua to
the triumphant recessional scene from the Oracle of the Bottle, proofs
are to be found in every book, every chapter almost, and indeed almost
every page; and a little more detail may be given on this head later.
But the presentation of Rabelais as a novelist-before-novels may cause
more demur, and even suggest the presence of the now hopelessly
discredited thing--paradox itself. Of course, if anybody requires
regular plot as a necessary constituent, only paradox could contend for
that. It _has_ been contended--and rightly enough--that in the general
scheme and the two (or if you take in Grandgousier, three) generations
of histories of the good giants, Rabelais is doing nothing more than
parody--is, indeed, doing little more than simply follow the traditions
of Romance--Amiles and Jourdains, Guy and Rembrun, and many others. But
some of us regard plot as at best a full-dress garment, at the absence
of which the good-natured God or Muse of fiction is quite willing to
wink. Character, if seldom elaborately presented, except in the case of
Panurge, is showered, in scraps and sketches, all over the book, and
description and dialogue abound.
[Sidenote: Contrast of the _Moyen de Parvenir_.]
But it is not on such beggarly special pleading as this that the claim
shall be founded. It must rest on the unceasing, or practically
unceasing, impetus of story-interest which carries the reader through. A
remarkably useful contrast-parallel in this respect, may be found in
that strange book, the _Moyen de Parvenir_. I am of those who think that
it had something to do with Rabelais, that there is some of his stuff in
it, even that he may have actually planned something like it. But the
"make-up" is not more inferior in merit to that of _Gargantua_ and
_Pantagruel_ than it is different in kind. The _Moyen de Parvenir_ is
full of separate stories of the _fabliau_ kind, often amusing and well
told, though exceedingly gross as a rule. These stories are "set" in a
framework of promiscuous conversation, in which a large number of great
real persons, ancient and modern, and a smaller one of invented
characters, or rather names, take part. Most of this, though not quite
all, is mere _fatrasie_, if not even mere jargon: and though there are
glimmerings of something more than sense, they are, with evident
deliberation, enveloped in clouds of nonsense. The thing is not a whole
at all, and the stories have as little to do with each other or with any
general drift as if they were professedly--what they are practically--a
bundle of _fabliaux_ or _nouvelles_. As always happens in such
cases--and as the author, whether he was Beroalde or another, whether or
not he worked on a canvas greater than he could fill, or tried to patch
together things too good for him, no doubt intended--attempts have been
made to interpret the puzzle here also; but they are quite obviously
vain.
[Sidenote: A general theme possible.]
[Sidenote: A reference--to be taken up later--to the last Book.]
Such a sentence, however, cannot be pronounced in any such degree or
measure on the similar attempts in the case of _Gargantua_ and
_Pantagruel_; for a reason which some readers may find unexpected. The
unbroken vigour--unbroken even by the obstacles which it throws in its
own way, like the Catalogue of the Library of Saint-Victor and the
burlesque lists of adjectives, etc., which fill up whole chapters--with
which the story or string of stories is carried on, may naturally
suggest that there _is_ a story or at least a theme. It is a sort of
quaint alteration or catachresis of _Possunt quia posse videntur_. There
must be a general theme, because the writer is so obviously able to
handle any theme he chooses. It may be wiser--it certainly seems so to
the present writer--to disbelieve in anything but occasional
sallies--episodes, as it were, or even digressions--of political,
religious, moral, social and other satire. It is, on the other hand, a
most important thing to admit the undoubted presence--now and then, and
not unfrequently--of a deliberate dropping of the satiric and burlesque
mask. This supplies the presentation of the serious, kindly, and human
personality of the three princes (Grandgousier, Gargantua, and
Pantagruel); this the schemes of education (giving so large a proportion
of the small bulk of _not_-nonsense written on that matter). Above all,
this permits, to one taste at least, the exquisite last Book,
presentation of La Quinte and the fresh roses in her hand, the
originality of which, not only in the whole book in one sense, but in
the particular Book in the other, is, to that taste, and such
argumentative powers as accompany it, an almost absolute proof of that
Book's genuineness. For if it had been by another who, _un_like
Rabelais, had a special tendency towards such graceful imagination, he
could hardly have refrained from showing this elsewhere in this long
book.[90]
[Sidenote: Running survey of the whole.]
But however this may be, it is certain that a critical reader,
especially when he has reason to be startled by the external, if not
actually extrinsic, oddities of and excesses of the book, will be
justified in allowing--it may almost be said that he is likely to
allow--the extraordinary volume of concatenated fictitious interest in
the whole book or books. The usual and obvious "catenations" are indeed
almost ostentatiously wanting. The absence of any real plot has been
sufficiently commented on, with the temptations conferred by it to
substitute a fancied unity of purpose. The birth, and what we may call
the two educations, of Gargantua; the repetition, with sufficient
differences, of the same plan in the opening of _Pantagruel_; the
appearance of Panurge and the campaign against the Dipsodes; the great
marriage debate; and the voyage to the Oracle of the Bottle, are
connected merely in "chronicle" fashion. The character-links are hardly
stronger, for though Friar John does play a more or less important part
from almost the beginning to quite the end, Panurge, the most important
and remarkable single figure, does not appear for a considerable time,
and the rest are shadows. The scene is only in one or two chapters
nominally placed in Nowhere; but as a whole it is Nowhere Else, or
rather a bewildering mixture of topical assignments in a very small part
of France, and allegorical or fantastic descriptions of a multitude of
Utopias. And yet, once more, it _is_ a whole story. As you read it you
almost forget what lies behind, you quite forget the breaches of
continuity, and press on to what is before, almost as eagerly, if not
quite in the same fashion, as if the incidents and the figures were not
less exciting than those of _Vingt Ans Apres_. Let us hope it may not be
excessive to expend a few pages on a sketch of this strange story that
is no story, with, it may be, some fragments of translation or
paraphrase (for, as even his greatest translator, Urquhart, found, a
certain amount of his own _Fay ce que voudras_ is necessary with
Rabelais) here and there.
[Sidenote: _Gargantua._]
Master Francis does not exactly plunge into the middle of things; but he
spends comparatively little time on the preliminaries of the ironical
Prologue to the "very illustrious drinkers," on the traditionally
necessary but equally ironical genealogy of the hero, on the elaborate
verse _amphigouri_ of the _Fanfreluches Antidotees_, and on the mock
scientific discussion of extraordinarily prolonged periods of pregnancy.
Without these, however, he will not come to the stupendous banquet of
tripe (properly washed down, and followed by pleasant revel on the
"echoing green") which determined the advent of Gargantua into the
world, which enabled Grandgousier, more fortunate than his son on a
future occasion, to display his amiability as a husband and a father
unchecked by any great sorrow, and which was, as it were, crowned and
sealed by that son's first utterance--no miserable and ordinary infant's
wail, but the stentorian barytone "_A boire!_" which rings through the
book till it passes in the sharper, but not less delectable treble of
"_Trinq!_" And then comes a brief piece, not narrative, but as
characteristic perhaps of what we may call the ironical _moral_ of the
narrative as any--a grave remonstrance with those who will not believe
in _ceste estrange nativite_.
[Sidenote: The birth and education.]
I doubt me ye believe not this strange birth assuredly. If
ye disbelieve, I care not; but a respectable man--a man of
good sense--_always_ believes what people tell him and what
he finds written. Does not Solomon say (Prov. xiv.), "The
innocent [simple] believeth every word" etc.? And St. Paul
(1 Cor. xiii.), "Charity believeth all things"? Why should
you _not_ believe it? "Because," says you, "there is no
probability[91] in it." I tell you that for this very and
only reason you ought to believe with a perfect faith. For
the Sorbonists say that faith is the evidence of things of
no probability.[92] Is it against our law or our faith?
against reason? against the Sacred Scriptures?[93] For my
part I can find nothing written in the Holy Bible which is
contrary thereto. But if the Will of God had been so, would
you say that He could not have done it? Oh for grace' sake
do not make a mess of your wits in such vain thoughts. For I
tell you that nothing is impossible with God.
And Divinity being done with, the Classics and pure fantasy are drawn
upon; the incredulous being finally knocked down by a citation from
Pliny, and a polite request not to bother any more.
This is, of course, the kind of passage which has been brought against
Rabelais, as similar ones have been brought against Swift, to justify
charges of impiety. But, again, it is not necessary to bother
(_tabuster_) about that. Any one who cannot see that it is the foolish
use of reverend things and not the things themselves that the satire
hits, is hardly worth argument. But there is no doubt that this sort of
mortar, framework, menstruum, canvas, or whatever way it may be best
metaphored, helps the apparent continuity of the work marvellously,
leaving, as it were, no rough edges or ill-mended joints. It is, to use
an admirable phrase of Mr. Balfour's about a greater matter, "the
logical glue which holds together and makes intelligible the
multiplicity" of the narrative units, or perhaps instead of
"intelligible" one should here say "appreciable."
Sometimes the "glue" of ironic comment rather saturates these units of
narrative than surrounds or interjoins them, and this is the case with
what follows. The infantine peculiarities of Gargantua; his dress and
the mystery of its blue and white colours (the blue of heaven and the
white of the joy of earth); how his governesses and he played together;
what smart answers he made; how he became early both a poet and an
experimental philosopher--all this is recounted with a marvellous
mixture of wisdom and burlesque, though sometimes, no doubt, with rather
too much of _haut gout_ seasoning. Then comes the, in Renaissance books,
inevitable "Education" section, and it has been already noted briefly
how different this is from most of its group (the corresponding part of
_Euphues_ may be suggested for comparison). Even Rabelais does not
escape the main danger--he neglects a little to listen to the wisest
voice, "Can't you let him alone?" But the contrasts in the case of
Gargantua, the general tenor (that good prince profiting by his own
experience for his son's benefit) in that of Pantagruel, are not too
"improving," and are made by their historian's "own sauce" exceedingly
piquant. Much as has been written on the subject, it is not easy to be
quite certain how far the "Old" Learning was fairly treated by the
"New." Rabelais and Erasmus and the authors of the _Epistolae Obscurorum
Virorum_ are such a tremendous overmatch for any one on the other side,
that the most judicial as well as judicious of critics must be rather
puzzled as to the real merits of the case. But luckily there is no need
to decide. Enjoyment, not decision, is the point, and there is no
difficulty in _that_. How Gargantua was transferred from the learned but
somewhat, as the vulgar would say, "stick-in-the-mud" tutorship of
Master Thubal Holofernes, who spent eighteen years in reading _De Modis
Significandi_ with his pupil, and Master Jobelin Bride, who has "become
a name"--not exactly of honour; how he was transferred to the less
antiquated guidance of Ponocrates, and set out for Paris on the famous
dappled mare, whose exploits in field and town were so alarming, and
who had the bells of Notre Dame hung round her neck, till they were
replaced rather after than because of the remonstrance of Master Janotus
de Bragmardo; how for a time, and under Sorbonic direction, he wasted
that time in short and useless study, with long intervals of
card-playing, sleeping, etc. etc., and of course a great deal of eating
and drinking, "not as he ought and as he ought not"--all this leads up
to the moment when the sage Ponocrates takes him again in hand, and
institutes a strenuous drill in manners, studies, manly exercises, and
the like, ending with one of those extraordinary flashes of perfect
style and noble meaning which it pleases Rabelais to emit from what some
call his "dunghill" and others his "marine-store."
Also they prayed to God the Creator, adoring Him, and
solemnly repledging to Him their faith, and glorifying Him
for His boundless goodness; while, giving Him thanks for all
time past, they commended themselves to His divine mercy for
all the future. This done, they turned to their rest.
[Sidenote: The war.]
It is only after this serious training that the first important division
of what may be called the action begins--the "War of the Cakes," in
which certain outrageous bakers, subjects of King Picrochole of Lerne,
first refuse the custom of the good Grandgousier's shepherds, and then
violently assault them, the incident being turned by the choleric
monarch into a _casus belli_ against the peaceful one. Invasion, the
early triumph of the aggressor, the triumphant appearance of the
invincible Friar John, and the complete turning of the tables by the
advent of Gargantua and his terrible mare, follow each other in rapid
and brilliant telling, and perhaps no parts of the book are better
known. The extraordinary felicity with which Rabelaisian irony--here
kept in quieter but intenser activity than almost anywhere else--seizes
and renders the common causes, excuses, manners, etc., of war can never
have escaped competent readers; but it must have struck more persons of
late than perhaps at any former time. It would be impertinent to
particularise largely; but if the famous adaptation and amplification of
the old Pyrrhus story in the counsel of Spadassin and Merdaille to
Picrochole were printed in small type as the centre of a fathom-square
sheet, the whole margin could be more than filled with extracts, from
German books and newspapers, of advice to Kaiser Wilhelm II. Nor is
there anything, in literature touching history, where irony has bitten
more deeply and lastingly into Life and Time than the brief record of
Picrochole's latter days after his downfall.
He was informed by an old hag that his kingdom would be
restored to him at the coming of the Cocqsigrues: since then
it is not certainly known what has become of him. However, I
have been told that he now works for his poor living at
Lyons, and is as choleric as ever. And always he bemoans
himself to strangers about the Cocqsigrues--yet with a
certain hope, according to the old woman's prophecy, that at
their coming he will be reinstated in his kingdom.
Edward FitzGerald would have called this "terrible"; and perhaps it is.
But there is much more humour than terror in the rest, and sometimes
there are qualities different from either. The rescue of the sacred
precincts of the Abbey of Seuille from the invaders by that glorious
monk (a personage at no great remove from our own Friar Tuck, to the
later portraits of whom he has lent some of his own traits) pleases the
soul well, as do the feats of Gymnast against Tripet, and the fate of
the unlucky Touquedillon, and the escalade of La Roche Clermande, and (a
little less perhaps) the pure burlesque of the eating of the pilgrims,
and the combing out of the cannon balls, and the contrasted sweet
reasonableness of the amiable though not at all cowardly Grandgousier.
But the advice of the Evil Counsellors to Picrochole is still perhaps
the pearl:
[Sidenote: The Counsel to Picrochole.]
Then there appeared before Picrochole the Duke of Mennail,
Count Spadassin, and Captain Merdaille, and said to him,
"Sire, this day we make you the most happy and chivalrous
prince that ever has been since the death of Alexander of
Macedon." "Be covered, be covered," said Picrochole.
"Gramercy, sire", said they, "but we know our duty. The
means are as follows. You will leave here in garrison some
captain with a small band of men to hold the place, which
seems to us pretty strong, both by nature and by the
fortifications you have contrived. You will, as you know
well, divide your army in half. One half will fall upon this
fellow Grandgousier and his people, and easily discomfit him
at the first assault. There we shall gain money in heaps,
for the rascal has plenty. (Rascal we call him, because a
really noble prince never has a penny. To hoard is the mark
of a rascal.)
"The other part will meanwhile draw towards Aunis,
Saintonge, Angoumois, and Gascony, as well as Perigord,
Medoc, and Elanes. Without any resistance they will take
towns, castles, and fortresses. At Bayonne, at St. Jean de
Luz, and at Fontarabia you will seize all the ships, and
coasting towards Galicia and Portugal, will plunder all the
seaside places as far as Lisbon, where you will be
reinforced with all the supplies necessary to a conqueror:
_Corbleu!_ Spain will surrender, for they are all poltroons.
You will pass the Straits of Seville,[94] and will there
erect two columns more magnificent than those of Hercules
for the perpetual memory of your name. And that Strait shall
thenceforward be named the Sea of Picrochole.
"When that sea has been passed, lo! comes Barbarossa[95] to
surrender as your slave." "I," said Picrochole, "will extend
mercy to him." "Very well," said they, "on condition that he
is baptized. And then you will assault the kingdoms of
Tunis, of Hippo,[96] of Argier, of Bona, of Corona--to cut
it short, all Barbary. Going further,[97] you will keep in
your hands Majorca, Minorca, Sardinia, Corsica, and the
other islands of the Ligurian and Balearic sea. Coasting to
the left[98] you will dominate all Narbonese Gaul, Provence,
the Allobroges, Genoa, Florence, Lucca, and, begad! Rome.
Poor master Pope is already dying for fear of you." "I will
never kiss his slipper," said Picrochole.
"Italy being taken, behold Naples, Calabria, Apulia, and
Sicily all at your mercy, and Malta into the bargain. I
should like to see those funny knights, formerly of Rhodes,
resist you! if it were only to examine their water." "I
should like," said Picrochole, "to go to Loretto." "No, no,"
said they, "that will be on the way back. Thence we shall
take Candia, Cyprus, Rhodes, and the Cyclades, and make a
set at Morea. We shall get it at once. By St. Treignan, God
keep Jerusalem! for the soldan is nothing in power to you."
"Shall I," said he, "then rebuild the Temple of Solomon?"
"Not yet," said they, "wait a little. Be not so hasty in
your enterprises."
And so with the most meticulous exactness (Rabelais' geography is
irreproachable, and he carefully avoids the cheap expedient of making
Spadassin and Merdaille blunder) and the sagest citations of _Festina
lente_, they take him through Asia Minor to the Euphrates and Arabia,
while the other army (that which has annihilated Grandgousier) comes
round by the northern route, sweeping all Europe from Brittany and the
British Isles to Constantinople, where the great rendezvous is made and
the universal empire established, Picrochole graciously giving his
advisers Syria and Palestine as their fiefs.
"Pretty much like our own days," said Mr. Rigmarole. Have we not heard
something very like this lately, as "Berlin to Baghdad," if not "Calais
to Calcutta"? And even if we had not, would not the sense and the satire
of it be delectable? A great deal has been left out: the chapter is, for
Rabelais, rather a long one. The momentary doubt of the usually
undoubting Picrochole as to what they shall drink in the desert, allayed
at once by a beautiful scheme of commissariat camels and elephants,[99]
which would have done credit to the most modern A.S.C., is very capital.
There is, indeed, an unpleasant Echephron[100] who points the old moral
of Cineas to Pyrrhus himself. But Picrochole rebuffs him with the
invaluable _Passons oultre_, and closes the discussion by anticipating
Henri Quatre (who, no doubt, learnt the phrase from him), crying, "_Qui
m'aime, si me suive!_" and ordering all haste in the war.
It is possible that, here or earlier, the
not-quite-so-gentle-as-he-is-traditionally-called reader may ejaculate,
"This is all true enough; but it is all very well known, and does not
need recapitulation." Is this quite so certain? No doubt at one time
Englishmen did know their Rabelais well. Southey did, for instance, and
so, according to the historian of Barsetshire, did, in the next
generation, Archdeacon Grantly. More recently my late friend Sir Walter
Besant spent a great deal of pains on Master Francis, and mainly owing
to his efforts there existed for some years a Rabelais Club (already
referred to), which left some pleasant memories. But _is_ it quite so
certain that the average educated Englishman can at once distinguish
Eudemon from Epistemon, give a correct list of the various answers to
Panurge's enquiries as to the probable results of his marriage, relate
what happened when (as glanced at above and returned to later) _nous
passasmes oultre_, and say what the adorable Quintessence admitted to
her dainty lips besides second intentions? I doubt it very much. Even
special students of the Great Book, as in other cases, have too often
allowed themselves to be distracted from the pure enjoyment of it by
idle questions of the kinds above mentioned and others--questions of
dates and names and places, of origins and borrowings and
imitations--questions the sole justification of which, from the genuine
Pantagruelian point of view, is that their utter dryness inevitably
suggests the cries--the Morning Hymn and the Evening Voluntary of the
book itself--_A boire!_ and _Trinq_.
But, even were this not so, a person who has undertaken, wisely or
unwisely, to write the history of the French Novel is surely entitled to
lay some stress on what seems to him the importance of this its first
eminent example. At any rate he proposes _not_ to _passer oultre_, but
to stick to the line struck out, and exhibit, in reasonable detail, the
varieties of novel-matter and manner contained in the book.
[Sidenote: The peace and the Abbey of Thelema.]
The conclusion of _Gargantua_--after the victor has addressed a _concio_
to the vanquished, has mildly punished the originators of the trouble or
those he could catch (Spadassin and Merdaille having run away "six hours
before the battle") by setting them to work at his newly established
printing-press, and has distributed gifts and estates to his
followers--may be one of the best known parts of the whole book, but is
not of the most strictly novel character, though it has suggested at
least one whole novel and parts or passages of others. The "Abbey of
Thelema"--the home of the order of _Fay ce que vouldras_--is, if not a
devout, a grandiose imagination, and it gives occasion for some
admirable writing. But it is one of the purest exercises of "purpose,"
and one of the least furnished with incident or character, to be found
in Rabelais. In order to introduce it, he may even be thought guilty of
what is extremely rare with him, a fault of "keeping." He avoids this
fault surprisingly in the contrasted burlesque and serious chronicles of
Grandgousier and Gargantua himself, as well as in the expanded contrast
of Pantagruel and Panurge. Yet the heartiest admirer of "Friar John of
the Funnels" (or "Collops," for there is a schism on this point) may
fail to see in him a suitable or even a possible Head for an assemblage
of gallant gentlemen and stately ladies (both groups being also
accomplished scholars) like the Thelemites. But Rabelais, like
Shakespeare, had small care for small objections. He wanted to sketch a
Paradise of Anti-Monkery, and for this he wanted an Anti-Abbot. Friar
John was the handiest person, and he took him. But it is worth noting
that the Abbot of Thelema never afterwards appears as such, or in the
slightest relation to this miniature but most curious and interesting
example of the Renaissance fancy for imaginary countries, cities,
institutions, with its splendours of architecture and decoration, its
luxurious but not loose living, its gallantry and its learning, its
gorgeous dress, its polished manners (the Abbot must have had some
trouble to learn them), and its "inscriptions and enigmas" in verse
which is not quite so happy as the prose. One would not cut it out of
the book for anything, and parallels to it (not merely of the kind above
referred to) have found and may find place in other books of fiction.
But it is only a sort of chantry, in the Court of the Gentiles too, of
the mighty Temple of the Novel.
[Sidenote: _Pantagruel_ I. The contrasted youth.]
What it was exactly that made Rabelais "double," as it were, on
_Gargantua_ in the early books of _Pantagruel_[101] it would probably be
idle to enquire. His deliberate mention in the Prologue of some of the
most famous romances (with certain others vainly to be sought now or at
any time) might of course most easily be a mere red herring. It may be,
that as _Gargantua_ was not entirely of his own creation, he determined
to "begin at the beginning" in his original composition. But it matters
little or nothing. We have, once more, a burlesque genealogy with known
persons--Nimrod, Goliath, Polyphemus, etc. etc.--entangled in a chain of
imaginaries, one of the latter, Hurtaly, forming the subject of a solemn
discussion of the question why he is not received among the crew of the
Ark. The unfortunate concomitants of the birth of Pantagruel--which is
fatal to his mother Badebec--contrast with the less chequered history of
Gargantua and Gargamelle, while the mixed sorrow and joy of Gargantua at
his wife's death and his son's birth completes this contrast.
Pantagruel, though quite as amiable as his father, if not more so, has
in infancy the natural awkwardnesses of a giant, and a hairy giant
too--devouring cows whole instead of merely milking them, and tearing to
pieces an unfortunate bear who only licked his infant chops. As was said
above, he has no wild-oats period of education like his father's, but
his company is less carefully chosen than that of Gargantua in the days
of his reformation, and gives his biographer opportunities for his
sharpest satire.
First we have (taken, as everybody is supposed now to know, from
Geoffrey Tory, but improved) the episode of the Limousin scholar with
his "pedantesque"[102] deformation of French and Latin at once, till the
giant takes him by the throat and he cries for mercy in the strongest
meridional brogue.[103] Then comes the famous catalogue of the Library
of Saint Victor, a fresh attack on scholastic and monastic degeneracy,
and a kind of joining hands (Ortuinus figures) with the German guerrilla
against the _Obscuri_, and then a long and admirable letter from
Gargantua, whence we learn that Grandgousier is dead, and that his son
is now the sagest of monarchs, who has taken to read Greek, and shows no
memory of his governesses or his earlier student days. And then again
comes Panurge.
[Sidenote: Panurge.]
Many doubtful things have been said about this most remarkable
personage. He has been fathered upon the Cingar of Folengo, which is too
much of a compliment to that creation of the great Macaronic, and
Falstaff has been fathered upon him, which is distinctly unfair to
Falstaff. Sir John has absolutely nothing of the ill-nature which
characterises both Cingar and Panurge; and Panurge is an actual and
contemptible coward, while many good wits have doubted whether Falstaff
is, in the true sense, a coward at all. But Panurge is certainly one
thing--the first distinct and striking _character_ in prose fiction.
Morally, of course, there is little to be said for him, except that,
when he has no temptations to the contrary, he is a "good fellow"
enough. As a human example of _mimesis_ in the true Greek sense, not of
"imitation" but of "fictitious creation," he is, once more, the first
real character in prose fiction--the ancestor, in the literary sense, of
the mighty company in which he has been followed by the similar
creations of the masters from Cervantes to Thackeray. The fantastic
colouring, and more than colouring, of the whole book affects him, of
course, more than superficially. One could probably give some not quite
absurd guesses why Rabelais shaped him as he did--presented him as a
very naughty but intensely clever child, with the monkey element in
humanity thrown into utmost prominence. But it is better not to do so.
Panurge has some Yahooish characteristics, but he is not a Yahoo--in
fact, there is no misanthropy in Rabelais.[104] He is not merely impish
(as in his vengeance on the lady of Paris), but something worse than
impish (as in that on Dindenault); and yet one cannot call him diabolic,
because he is so intensely human. It is customary, and fairly correct,
to describe his ethos as that of understanding and wit wholly divorced
from morality, chivalry, or religion; yet he is never Mephistophelian.
If one of the hundred touches which make him a masterpiece is to be
singled out, it might perhaps be the series of rapturous invitations to
his wedding which he gives to his advisers while he thinks their advice
favourable, and the limitations of enforced politeness which he appends
when the unpleasant side of their opinions turns up. And it may perhaps
be added that one of the chief reasons for believing heartily in the
last Book is the delectable and unimprovable contrast which La Quinte
and her court of intellectual fantastry present to this picture of
intellectual materialism.
[Sidenote: Short view of the sequels in Book II.]
It was impossible that such a figure should not to a certain extent
dwarf others; but Rabelais, unlike some modern character-mongers, never
lets his psychology interfere with his story. After a few episodes, the
chief of which is the great sign-duel of Thaumast and Panurge himself,
the campaign against the Dipsodes at once enables Pantagruel to display
himself as a war-like hero of romance, permits him fantastic exploits
parallel to his father's, and, by installing Panurge in a lordship of
the conquered country and determining him, after "eating his corn in
the blade," to "marry and settle," introduces the larger and most
original part of the whole work--the debates and counsellings on the
marriage in the Third Book, and, after the failure of this, the voyage
to settle the matter at the Oracle of the Bottle in the Fourth and
Fifth. This "plot," if it may be called so, is fairly central and
continuous throughout, but it gives occasion for the most surprising
"alarums and excursions," variations and divagations, of the author's
inexhaustible humour, learning, inventive fertility, and never-failing
faculty of telling a tale. If the book does sometimes in a fashion "hop
forty paces in the public street," and at others gambade in a less
decorous fashion even than hopping, it is also Cleopatresque in its
absolute freedom from staleness and from tedium.
[Sidenote: _Pantagruel_ II. (Book III.)
The marriage of Panurge and the consultations on it.]
The Third Book has less of apparent variety in it, and less of what
might be called striking incident, than any of the others, being all but
wholly occupied by the enquiries respecting the marriage of Panurge. But
this gives it a "unity" which is of itself attractive to some tastes,
while the delightful sonnet to the spirit Of Marguerite,
Esprit abstraict, ravy et ecstatique,
(perhaps the best example of _rhetoriqueur_ poetry), at the beginning,
and the last sight (except in letters) of Gargantua at the end, with the
curious _coda_ on the "herb Pantagruelion" (the ancestor of Joseph de
Maistre's famous eulogy of the Executioner), give, as it were, handle
and top to it in unique fashion. But the body of it is the thing. The
preliminary outrunning of the constable--had there been constables in
Salmigondin, but they probably knew the story of the Seigneur of Basche
too well--and the remarkable difference between the feudatory and his
superior on the subject of debt, serve but as a whet to the project of
matrimony which the debtor conceives. Of course, Panurge is the very
last man whom a superficial observer of humanity--the very first whom a
somewhat profounder student thereof--would take as a marrying one. He is
"a little failed"; he thinks to rest himself while not foregoing his
former delights, and he shuts eyes and ears to the proverb, as old as
Greek in words and as old as the world in fact, that "the doer shall
suffer." That he should consult Pantagruel is in the circumstances
almost a necessity, and Pantagruel's conduct is exactly what one would
expect from that good-natured, learned, admirable, but rather enigmatic
personage. Merely "aleatory" decision--by actual use of dice--he rejects
as illicit, though towards the close of the book one of its most
delectable episodes ends in his excusing Mr. Justice Bridoye for
settling law cases in that way. But he recommends the _sortes
Virgilianae_, and he, others, and Panurge himself add the experiment of
dreams, and the successive consultation of the Sibyl of Panzoust, the
dumb Nazdecabre, the poet Raminagrobis, Epistemon, "Her Trippa," Friar
John himself, the theologian Hippothadee, the doctor Rondibilis, the
philosopher Trouillogan, and the professional fool Triboulet. No reader
of the most moderate intelligence can need to be told that the
counsellors opine all in the same sense (unfavourable), though with more
or less ambiguity, and that Panurge, with equal obstinacy and ingenuity,
invariably twists the oracles according to his own wishes. But what no
reader, who came fresh to Rabelais and fasting from criticism on him,
could anticipate, is the astonishing spontaneity of the various dealings
with the same problem, the zest and vividness of the whole thing, and
the unceasing shower of satire on everything human--general,
professional, and individual--which is kept up throughout. There is less
pure extravagance, less mere farce, and (despite the subject) even less
"sculduddery" than in any other Book; but also in no other does Rabelais
"keep up with humanity" (somewhat, indeed, in the fashion in which a
carter keeps up with his animal, running and lashing at the same time)
so triumphantly.
In no book, moreover, are the curious intervals--or, as it were, prose
choric odes--of interruption more remarkable. Pantagruel's own serious
wisdom supplies not a few of them, and the long and very characteristic
episode of Judge Bridoye and his decision by throw of dice is very
loosely connected with the main subject. But the most noteworthy of
these excursions comes, as has been said, at the end--the last personal
appearance of the good Gargantua, and the famous discourse, several
chapters long, on the Herb Pantagruelion, otherwise Hemp.
[Sidenote: _Pantagruel_ III. (IV.) The first part of the voyage.]
The Fourth Book (Third of _Pantagruel_) starts the voyage, and begins to
lead the commentator who insists on fixing and interpreting the
innumerable real or apparent double, treble, and almost centuple
meanings, into a series of dances almost illimitable. As has been
suggested more than once, the most reasonable way is probably to regard
the whole as an intentional mixture of covert satire, pure fooling, not
a little deliberate leading astray, and (serving as vehicle and
impelling force at once) the irresistible narrative impulse animating
the writer and carrying the reader on to the end--any end, if it be only
the Other End of Nowhere. The "curios," living and other, of Medamothi
(Nowhere to begin with!), and the mysterious appearance of a shipful of
travellers coming back from the Land of Lanterns, whither the
Pantagruelian party is itself bound; the rather too severely punished
ill-manners of the sheep-dealer Dindenault; the strange isles of various
nature--such, especially, as the abode of the bailiffs and
process-servers, which gives occasion to the admirably told story of
Francois Villon and the Seigneur of Basche; the great storm--another of
the most famous passages of the book--with the cowardice of Panurge and
the safe landing in the curious country of the Macreons (long-livers);
the evil island where reigns Quaresmeprenant, and the elaborate analysis
of that personage by the learned Xenomanes; the alarming Physeter
(blowing whale) and his defeat by Pantagruel; the land of the
Chitterlings, the battle with them, and the interview and peace-making
with their Queen Niphleseth (a passage at which the sculduddery-hunters
have worked their hardest), and then the islands of the Papefigues and
the Papimanes, where Rabelais begins his most obvious and boldest
meddling with the great ecclesiastical-political questions of the
day--all these things and others flit past the reader as if in an actual
voyage. Even here, however, he rather skirts than actually invades the
most dangerous ground. It is the Decretals, not the doctrines, that are
satirised, and Homenas, bishop of Papimania, despite his adoration of
these forgeries, and the slightly suspicious number and prettiness of
the damsels who wait upon him, is a very good fellow and an excellent
host. There is something very soothing in his metaphorical way of
demanding wine from his Hebes, "_Clerice_, esclaire icy," the necessary
illumination being provided by a charming girl with a hanap of
"extravagant" wine. These agreeable if satiric experiences--for the
Decretals do no harm beyond exciting the bile of Master Epistemon (who,
it is to be feared, was a little of a pedant)--are followed by the once
more almost universally known passage of the "Frozen Words" and the
visit to "Messer Gaster, the world's first Master of Arts"; by the
islands (once more mysterious) of Chaneph (hypocrisy) and Ganabin
(thieves); the book concluding abruptly with an ultra-farcical
_cochonnerie_ of the lower kind, relieved partially by a libellous but
impossible story about our Edward the _Fifth_ and the poet Villon again,
as well as by the appearance of an interesting but not previously
mentioned member of the crew of the _Thalamege_ (Pantagruel's flagship),
the great cat Rodilardus.
[Sidenote: _Pantagruel_ IV. (Book V.) The second part of the voyage. The
"Isle Sonnante."]
[Sidenote: The "Chats Fourres."]
One of the peculiarities of the Fifth Book, and perhaps one of those
which have aroused that suspicion about it which, after what has been
said above, it is not necessary further to discuss, is that it is more
"in blocks" than the others.[105] The eight chapters of the _Isle
Sonnante_ take up the satire of the Fourth Book on Papimania and on the
"Papegaut," who is here introduced in a much fiercer tone--a tone which,
if one cared for hypothetical criticism, might be attributed with about
equal probability to a genuine deepening of hostile feeling, to absence
of revision, and to possible sophistication by some one into whose hands
it fell between the author's death and its publication. But a perfectly
impartial critic, who, on the one hand, does not, in Carlyle's admirable
phrase, "regard the Universe as a hunting-field from which it were good
and pleasant to drive the Pope," and, on the other, is content to regard
the extremer Protestants as singularly unpleasant persons without
pronouncing Ernulphus-curses on them, may perhaps fail to find in it
either the cleverest or the most amusing part of the voyage. The episode
of the next Isle--that _des Ferrements_--is obscure, whether it is or is
not (as the commentators were sure to suggest) something else beginning
with "obsc-," and the succeeding one, with its rocks fashioned like
gigantic dice, is not very amusing. But the terrible country of the
_Chats Fourres_ and their chief Grippeminaud--an attack on the Law as
unsparing as, and much more vivid than that on the Church in the
overture--may rank with the best things in Rabelais. The tyrant's
ferocious and double-meaning catchword of _Or ca!_ and the power at his
back, which even Pantagruel thinks it better rather to run away from
than to fight openly, which Panurge frankly bribes, and over which even
the reckless and invincible Friar John obtains not much triumph, except
that of cutting up, after buying it, an old woman's bed--these and the
rest have a grim humour not quite like anything else.
[Sidenote: "La Quinte."]
The next section--that of the Apedeftes or Uneducated Ones[106]--has
been a special object of suspicion; it is certainly a little difficult,
and perhaps a little dull. One is not sorry when the explorers, in the
ambiguous way already noted, "_passent_ _Oultre_," and, after
difficulties with the wind, come to "the kingdom of Quintessence, named
Entelechy." Something has been said more than once of this already, and
it is perhaps unnecessary to say more, or indeed anything, except to
those who themselves "hold of La Quinte," and who for that very reason
require no talking about her. "We" (if one may enrol oneself in their
company) would almost rather give up Rabelais altogether than sacrifice
this delightful episode, and abandon the idea of having the ladies of
the Queen for our partners in Emmelie, and Calabrisme, and the thousand
other dances, of watching the wonderful cures by music, and the
interesting process of throwing, not the house out of the window, but
the window out of the house, and the miraculous and satisfactory
transformation of old ladies into young girls, with very slight
alteration of their former youthful selves, and all the charming
topsyturvifications of Entelechy. Not to mention the gracious if
slightly unintelligible speeches of the exquisite princess, when clear
Hesperus shone once more, and her supper of pure nectar and ambrosia
(not grudging more solid viands to her visitors), and the great
after-supper chess-tournament with living pieces, and the "invisible
disparition" of the lady, and the departure of the fortunate visitors
themselves, duly inscribed and registered as Abstractors of
Quintessence. The whole is like a good dream, and is told so as almost
to be one.
Between this and the final goal of the Country of Lanterns the interest
falls a little. The island of "Odes" (not "poems" but "ways"), where the
"walks walk" (_les chemins cheminent_); that of "Esclots" ("clogs"),
where dwell the Freres Fredonnants, and where the attack on monkery is
renewed in a rather unsavoury and rather puerile fashion; and that of
Satin, which is a sort of Medamothi rehandled, are not first-rate--they
would have been done better, or cut out, had the book ever been issued
by Master Francis. But the arrival at and the sojourn in Lanternia
itself recovers the full powers of Rabelais at his best, though one may
once more think that some of the treatment might have been altered in
the case just mentioned.
[Sidenote: The conclusion and The Bottle.]
Apart from the usual mixture of serious and purely jocular satire, of
learning and licence, of jargonic catalogues, of local references to
Western France and the general topography of Utopia, this conclusion
consists of two main parts--first, a most elaborate description of the
Temple, containing underground the Oracle of the Bottle, to which the
pilgrims are conducted by a select "Lantern," and of its priestess
Bacbuc, its _adytum_ with a fountain, and, in the depth and centre of
all, the sacred Bottle itself; and secondly, the ceremonies of the
delivery of the Oracle; the divine utterance, _Trinq!_ its
interpretation by Bacbuc; the very much _ad libitum_ reinterpretations
of the interpretation by Panurge and Friar John, and the dismissal of
the pilgrims by the priestess, _Or allez de par Dieu, qui vous
conduise!_[107]
* * * * *
What, it may be asked, is the object of this cumbrous analysis of
certainly one of the most famous and (as it at least should be) one of
the best known books of the world? That object has been partly indicated
already; but it may be permissible to set it forth more particularly
before ending this chapter. Of the importance, on the one hand, of the
acquisition by the novel of the greatest known and individual writer of
French up to his date, and of the enormous popularity of this example of
it, enough may have been said. But the abstract has been given, and the
further comment is now added, with the purpose of showing, in a little
detail, how immensely the resources and inspirations of future
practitioners were enriched and strengthened, varied and multiplied, by
_Gargantua_ and _Pantagruel_. The book as a whole is to be classed, no
doubt, as "Eccentric" fiction. But if you compare with Rabelais that one
of his followers[108] who possessed most genius and who worked at his
following with most deliberation, you will find an immense falling off
in richness and variety as well as in strength. The inferiority of
Sterne to Master Francis in his serious pieces, whether he is whimpering
over dead donkeys and dying lieutenants, or simulating honest
indignation against critics, is too obvious to need insistence. Nor can
one imagine any one--unless, like Mackenzie and other misguided
contemporaries or juniors, he himself wanted to whimper, or unless he
also aimed at the _fatrasie_--going to Sterne for pattern or
inspiration. Now Rabelais is a perpetual fount of inspiration, an
inexhaustible magazine of patterns to the most "serious" novelist whose
seriousness is not of the kind designated by that term in dissenting
slang. That abounding narrative faculty which has been so much dwelt on
touches so many subjects, and manages to carry along with it so many
moods, thoughts, and even feelings, that it could not but suggest to any
subsequent writer who had in him the germ of the novelist's art, how to
develop and work out such schemes as might occur to him. While, for his
own countrymen at least, the vast improvement which he made in French
prose, and which, with the accomplishment of his younger contemporaries
Amyot and Montaigne, established the greatness of that prose itself, was
a gain, the extent of which cannot be exaggerated. Therefore it has
seemed not improper to give him a chapter to himself, and to treat his
book with a minuteness not often to be paralleled in this
_History_.[109]
FOOTNOTES:
[90] A complete argument on this much vexed subject can hardly be wished
for here: but it may be permitted to say that nearly fifty years'
consideration of the matter has left less and less doubt in my mind as
to the genuineness of the "_Quart_" or "_Quint_" _Livre_ as it is
variously called--according as _Gargantua_ is numbered separately or
not. One of the apparently strongest arguments against its
genuineness--the constant presence of "_Je_" in the narrative--really
falls, with the others--the fiercer and more outspoken character of the
satire, the somewhat lessened prominence of Pantagruel, etc.
etc.--before one simple consideration. We know from the dates of
publication of the other books that Rabelais was by no means a rapid
writer, or at any rate that, if he wrote rapidly, he "held up" what he
did write long, and pretty certainly rewrote a good deal. Now the
previous Book had appeared only a short time before what must have been
the date of his death; and this could not, according to analogy and
precedent, have been ready, or anything like ready, when he died. On the
other hand, time enough passed between his death and the publication
(even of the _Ile Sonnante_ fragment) for the MS. to have passed through
other hands and to have been adulterated, even if it was not, when the
Master's hands left it, in various, as well as not finally finished
form. I can see nothing in it really inconsistent with the earlier
Books; nothing unworthy of them (especially if on the one hand possible
meddling, and on the other imperfect revision be allowed for); and much,
especially the _Chats Fourres_, the Quintessence part, and the
Conclusion, without which the whole book would be not only incomplete
but terribly impoverished. I may add that, having a tolerably full
knowledge of sixteenth-century French literature, and a great admiration
of it, I know no single other writer or group of other writers who
could, in my critical judgment, by any reasonable possibility have
written this Book. Francois Rabelais could have done it, and I have no
doubt that he did it; though whether we have it as he left it no man can
say.
[91] It is perhaps hardly necessary, but may not be quite idle, to
observe that our Abstractor of Quintessence takes good care not to quote
the other half of the parallelism, "but the prudent looketh well to his
going."
[92] It is possible, but not certain, that he is playing on the two
senses of the word _apparence_, the ambiguity of which is not so great
in English. The A. V., "evidence of things _not seen_," would not have
suited his turn.
[93] In which, it will be remembered, the "liquor called punch," which
one notes with sorrow that Rabelais knew not, but which he certainly
would have approved, is also "nowhere spoken against."
[94] Original "Sibyle." I owe to Prof. Ker an important reminder (which
I ought not to have needed) of Dante's "Sibilia" in the famous "Ulysses"
passage, _Inf._ xxvi. 110.
[95] The Turkish corsair, not the German Emperor.
[96] Probably erected into a kingdom in honour of St. Augustine.
[97] _Passant oultre_--one of Rabelais' favourite and most _polymorphic_
expressions. It has nearly always an ironical touch in it; and it enjoys
a chapter all to itself in that mood--V. xvii.
[98] Perhaps this _a gauche_ might make as good a short test as any of a
reader's sense of humour. But here also a possible Dantean reminiscence
(not suggested to me this time) comes in; for in the lines already
quoted "dalla man _destra_" occurs.
[99] The King is, however, more difficult to satisfy on this point than
on others; and objects with a delightful _preterite_, "Yes: but we _did
not get_ our wine fresh and cool"; whereat they rebuke him with a
respectful reminder that great conquerors cannot be always entirely
comfortable.
[100] "Suspender of judgment."
[101] Of course the first book of the son _preceded_ the reconstructed
history of the father; but this is immaterial.
[102] The correct opposition of this term (Latin or Greek words
vernacularised) to "Macaronic" (vernacular words turned into Latin or
Greek form) is not always observed.
[103] It is very seldom, after his infantine and innocent excesses, that
Pantagruel behaves thus. He is for the most part a quiet and somewhat
reserved prince, very generous, very wise, very devout, and, though
tolerating the eccentricities of Panurge and Friar John, never taking
part in them.
[104] If Swift had drunk more wine and had not put water in what he did
drink, possibly this quality might have been lessened in _him_.
[105] The first of these, the _Isle Sonnante_, as is well enough known
to all students, appeared separately and before the rest.
[106] A sort of dependency or province of the _Chats Fourres_.
[107] A MS. "addition" unknown to the old printed forms, appears in some
modern ones. It is a mere disfigurement: and is hardly likely even to
have been a rejected draft.
[108] Not Swift here, but Sterne. There is far higher genius in
_Gulliver_ than in _Shandy_; but the former is not _fatrasie_, the
latter is.
[109] That the not quite unknown device of setting up a man of straw in
order to knock him down has not been followed in this chapter, a single
piece of evidence out of many may be cited. H. Koerting in his justly
well reputed _Geschichte des Franz. Romans im XVII. Jahrh._ (Oppeln u.
Leipzig, 1891, i. 133 _note_) would rule Rabelais out of the history of
the novel altogether. This book, which will be quoted again with
gratitude later, displays a painstaking erudition not necessitating any
make-weight of sympathy for its author's early death after great
suffering. It is extremely useful; but it does not escape, in this and
other places, the censure which, ten years before the war of 1914, the
present writer felt it his duty to express on modern German critics and
literary historians generally (_History of Criticism_, London, 1904,
vol. iii. Bks. viii. and ix.), that on points of literary appreciation,
as distinguished from mere philology, "enumeration," bibliographical
research, and the like, they are "sadly to seek." It may not be
impertinent to add that Herr Koerting's history happened never to have
been read by me till after the above chapter of the present book was
written.