The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman Part 22

The Popish doctors had undertaken to demonstrate a priori, that from the necessary influence of the planets on the twenty-second day of October 1483-when the moon was in the twelfth house, Jupiter, Mars, and Venus in the third, the Sun, Saturn, and Mercury, all got together in the fourth-that he must in course, and unavoidably, be a d.a.m.n'd man-and that his doctrines, by a direct corollary, must be d.a.m.n'd doctrines too.

By inspection into his horoscope, where five planets were in coition all at once with Scorpio (Haec mira, satisque horrenda. Planetarum coitio sub Scorpio Asterismo in nona coeli statione, quam Arabes religioni deputabant efficit Martinum Lutherum sacrilegum heretic.u.m, Christianae religionis hostem acerrimum atque prophanum, ex horoscopi directione ad Martis coitum, religiosissimus obiit, ejus Anima scelestissima ad infernos navigavit-ab Alecto, Tisiphone & Megara flagellis igneis cruciata perenniter.-Lucas Gaurieus in Tractatu astrologico de praeteritis multorum hominum accidentibus per genituras examinatis.) (in reading this my father would always shake his head) in the ninth house, with the Arabians allotted to religion-it appeared that Martin Luther did not care one stiver about the matter-and that from the horoscope directed to the conjunction of Mars-they made it plain likewise he must die cursing and blaspheming-with the blast of which his soul (being steep'd in guilt) sailed before the wind, in the lake of h.e.l.l-fire.

The little objection of the Lutheran doctors to this, was, that it must certainly be the soul of another man, born Oct. 22, 83. which was forced to sail down before the wind in that manner-inasmuch as it appeared from the register of Islaben in the county of Mansfelt, that Luther was not born in the year 1483, but in 84; and not on the 22d day of October, but on the 10th of November, the eve of Martinmas day, from whence he had the name of Martin.

(-I must break off my translation for a moment; for if I did not, I know I should no more be able to shut my eyes in bed, than the abbess of Quedlingberg-It is to tell the reader; that my father never read this pa.s.sage of Slawkenbergius to my uncle Toby, but with triumph-not over my uncle Toby, for he never opposed him in it-but over the whole world.

-Now you see, brother Toby, he would say, looking up, 'that christian names are not such indifferent things;'-had Luther here been called by any other name but Martin, he would have been d.a.m.n'd to all eternity-Not that I look upon Martin, he would add, as a good name-far from it-'tis something better than a neutral, and but a little-yet little as it is you see it was of some service to him.

My father knew the weakness of this prop to his hypothesis, as well as the best logician could shew him-yet so strange is the weakness of man at the same time, as it fell in his way, he could not for his life but make use of it; and it was certainly for this reason, that though there are many stories in Hafen Slawkenbergius's Decades full as entertaining as this I am translating, yet there is not one amongst them which my father read over with half the delight-it flattered two of his strangest hypotheses together-his Names and his Noses.-I will be bold to say, he might have read all the books in the Alexandrian Library, had not fate taken other care of them, and not have met with a book or pa.s.sage in one, which hit two such nails as these upon the head at one stroke.)

The two universities of Strasburg were hard tugging at this affair of Luther's navigation. The Protestant doctors had demonstrated, that he had not sailed right before the wind, as the Popish doctors had pretended; and as every one knew there was no sailing full in the teeth of it-they were going to settle, in case he had sailed, how many points he was off; whether Martin had doubled the cape, or had fallen upon a lee-sh.o.r.e; and no doubt, as it was an enquiry of much edification, at least to those who understood this sort of Navigation, they had gone on with it in spite of the size of the stranger's nose, had not the size of the stranger's nose drawn off the attention of the world from what they were about-it was their business to follow.

The abbess of Quedlingberg and her four dignitaries was no stop; for the enormity of the stranger's nose running full as much in their fancies as their case of conscience-the affair of their placket-holes kept cold-in a word, the printers were ordered to distribute their types-all controversies dropp'd.

'Twas a square cap with a silver ta.s.sel upon the crown of it-to a nut-sh.e.l.l-to have guessed on which side of the nose the two universities would split.

'Tis above reason, cried the doctors on one side.

'Tis below reason, cried the others.

'Tis faith, cried one.

'Tis a fiddle-stick, said the other.

'Tis possible, cried the one.

'Tis impossible, said the other.

G.o.d's power is infinite, cried the Nosarians, he can do any thing.

He can do nothing, replied the Anti-nosarians, which implies contradictions.

He can make matter think, said the Nosarians.

As certainly as you can make a velvet cap out of a sow's ear, replied the Anti-nosarians.

He cannot make two and two five, replied the Popish doctors.-'Tis false, said their other opponents.-

Infinite power is infinite power, said the doctors who maintained the reality of the nose.-It extends only to all possible things, replied the Lutherans.

By G.o.d in heaven, cried the Popish doctors, he can make a nose, if he thinks fit, as big as the steeple of Strasburg.

Now the steeple of Strasburg being the biggest and the tallest church-steeple to be seen in the whole world, the Anti-nosarians denied that a nose of 575 geometrical feet in length could be worn, at least by a middle-siz'd man-The Popish doctors swore it could-The Lutheran doctors said No;-it could not.

This at once started a new dispute, which they pursued a great way, upon the extent and limitation of the moral and natural attributes of G.o.d-That controversy led them naturally into Thomas Aquinas, and Thomas Aquinas to the devil.

The stranger's nose was no more heard of in the dispute-it just served as a frigate to launch them into the gulph of school-divinity-and then they all sailed before the wind.

Heat is in proportion to the want of true knowledge.

The controversy about the attributes, &c. instead of cooling, on the contrary had inflamed the Strasburgers imaginations to a most inordinate degree-The less they understood of the matter the greater was their wonder about it-they were left in all the distresses of desire unsatisfied-saw their doctors, the Parchmentarians, the Bra.s.sarians, the Turpentarians, on one side-the Popish doctors on the other, like Pantagruel and his companions in quest of the oracle of the bottle, all embarked out of sight.

-The poor Strasburgers left upon the beach!

-What was to be done?-No delay-the uproar increased-every one in disorder-the city gates set open.-

Unfortunate Strasbergers! was there in the store-house of nature-was there in the lumber-rooms of learning-was there in the great a.r.s.enal of chance, one single engine left undrawn forth to torture your curiosities, and stretch your desires, which was not pointed by the hand of Fate to play upon your hearts?-I dip not my pen into my ink to excuse the surrender of yourselves-'tis to write your panegyrick. Shew me a city so macerated with expectation-who neither eat, or drank, or slept, or prayed, or hearkened to the calls either of religion or nature, for seven-and-twenty days together, who could have held out one day longer.

On the twenty-eighth the courteous stranger had promised to return to Strasburg.

Seven thousand coaches (Slawkenbergius must certainly have made some mistake in his numeral characters) 7000 coaches-15000 single-horse chairs-20000 waggons, crowded as full as they could all hold with senators, counsellors, synd.i.c.ks-beguines, widows, wives, virgins, canons, concubines, all in their coaches-The abbess of Quedlingberg, with the prioress, the deaness and sub-chantress, leading the procession in one coach, and the dean of Strasburg, with the four great dignitaries of his chapter, on her left-hand-the rest following higglety-pigglety as they could; some on horseback-some on foot-some led-some driven-some down the Rhine-some this way-some that-all set out at sun-rise to meet the courteous stranger on the road.

Haste we now towards the catastrophe of my tale-I say Catastrophe (cries Slawkenbergius) inasmuch as a tale, with parts rightly disposed, not only rejoiceth (gaudet) in the Catastrophe and Peripeitia of a Drama, but rejoiceth moreover in all the essential and integrant parts of it-it has its Protasis, Epitasis, Catastasis, its Catastrophe or Peripeitia growing one out of the other in it, in the order Aristotle first planted them-without which a tale had better never be told at all, says Slawkenbergius, but be kept to a man's self.

In all my ten tales, in all my ten decades, have I Slawkenbergius tied down every tale of them as tightly to this rule, as I have done this of the stranger and his nose.

-From his first parley with the centinel, to his leaving the city of Strasburg, after pulling off his crimson-sattin pair of breeches, is the Protasis or first entrance-where the characters of the Personae Dramatis are just touched in, and the subject slightly begun.

The Epitasis, wherein the action is more fully entered upon and heightened, till it arrives at its state or height called the Catastasis, and which usually takes up the 2d and 3d act, is included within that busy period of my tale, betwixt the first night's uproar about the nose, to the conclusion of the trumpeter's wife's lectures upon it in the middle of the grand parade: and from the first embarking of the learned in the dispute-to the doctors finally sailing away, and leaving the Strasburgers upon the beach in distress, is the Catastasis or the ripening of the incidents and pa.s.sions for their bursting forth in the fifth act.

This commences with the setting out of the Strasburgers in the Frankfort road, and terminates in unwinding the labyrinth and bringing the hero out of a state of agitation (as Aristotle calls it) to a state of rest and quietness.

This, says Hafen Slawkenbergius, const.i.tutes the Catastrophe or Peripeitia of my tale-and that is the part of it I am going to relate.

We left the stranger behind the curtain asleep-he enters now upon the stage.

-What dost thou p.r.i.c.k up thy ears at?-'tis nothing but a man upon a horse-was the last word the stranger uttered to his mule. It was not proper then to tell the reader, that the mule took his master's word for it; and without any more ifs or ands, let the traveller and his horse pa.s.s by.

The traveller was hastening with all diligence to get to Strasburg that night. What a fool am I, said the traveller to himself, when he had rode about a league farther, to think of getting into Strasburg this night.-Strasburg!-the great Strasburg!-Strasburg, the capital of all Alsatia! Strasburg, an imperial city! Strasburg, a sovereign state! Strasburg, garrisoned with five thousand of the best troops in all the world!-Alas! if I was at the gates of Strasburg this moment, I could not gain admittance into it for a ducat-nay a ducat and half-'tis too much-better go back to the last inn I have pa.s.sed-than lie I know not where-or give I know not what. The traveller, as he made these reflections in his mind, turned his horse's head about, and three minutes after the stranger had been conducted into his chamber, he arrived at the same inn.

-We have bacon in the house, said the host, and bread-and till eleven o'clock this night had three eggs in it-but a stranger, who arrived an hour ago, has had them dressed into an omelet, and we have nothing.-

Alas! said the traveller, hara.s.sed as I am, I want nothing but a bed.-I have one as soft as is in Alsatia, said the host.

-The stranger, continued he, should have slept in it, for 'tis my best bed, but upon the score of his nose.-He has got a defluxion, said the traveller.-Not that I know, cried the host.-But 'tis a camp-bed, and Jacinta, said he, looking towards the maid, imagined there was not room in it to turn his nose in.-Why so? cried the traveller, starting back.-It is so long a nose, replied the host.-The traveller fixed his eyes upon Jacinta, then upon the ground-kneeled upon his right knee-had just got his hand laid upon his breast-Trifle not with my anxiety, said he rising up again.-'Tis no trifle, said Jacinta, 'tis the most glorious nose!-The traveller fell upon his knee again-laid his hand upon his breast-then, said he, looking up to heaven, thou hast conducted me to the end of my pilgrimage-'Tis Diego.

The traveller was the brother of the Julia, so often invoked that night by the stranger as he rode from Strasburg upon his mule; and was come, on her part, in quest of him. He had accompanied his sister from Valadolid across the Pyrenean mountains through France, and had many an entangled skein to wind off in pursuit of him through the many meanders and abrupt turnings of a lover's th.o.r.n.y tracks.

-Julia had sunk under it-and had not been able to go a step farther than to Lyons, where, with the many disquietudes of a tender heart, which all talk of-but few feel-she sicken'd, but had just strength to write a letter to Diego; and having conjured her brother never to see her face till he had found him out, and put the letter into his hands, Julia took to her bed.

Fernandez (for that was her brother's name)-tho' the camp-bed was as soft as any one in Alsace, yet he could not shut his eyes in it.-As soon as it was day he rose, and hearing Diego was risen too, he entered his chamber, and discharged his sister's commission.

The letter was as follows:

'Seig. Diego,

'Whether my suspicions of your nose were justly excited or not-'tis not now to inquire-it is enough I have not had firmness to put them to farther tryal.