That we do not herein attribute to Rabelais deeper or more serious intentions than he really entertained, will be sufficiently evident from a quotation of his own language: "Whither, think ye," says he in his Preface, "tend this long teutative and preliminary of mine? I have written it, forasmuch as you, my good disciples, and other fools of leisure, reading the merry titles of some of the books of our invention, as Gargantua, Pantagruel, Fessepinthe, the Dignity of Breeches, Hopping John with a Commentary,-may think too lightly that there is nothing herein treated of but waggeries, tom-fooleries and pleasant leasings, since the outer sign-board (the title) is commonly received, without farther inquiry, as significant of sport and jest. But it is not meet to estimate the works of men after this guise: for ye say yourselves that the frock maketh not the monk; and many a man is covered with the friar's cowl, who is nothing less than friar; and, again, many wear the Spanish cloak, whose courage claims no kin with Spain. Wherefore, you must open the book, and carefully weigh what is delivered therein. Then shall you know that the drug contained is of very different value from that which the box promised you:-that is to say, the matter herein discussed is not so foolish as the above titles might indi cate. "But suppose you do find matter as merry in its literal significance, and agreeing as well with the name, as you might have expected, certes, there is no need to be lingering over it, as if you were listening to the song of the Sirens. Therefore, interpret in a higher sense what ye wist to be said in pure gaiety of heart. Did you ever uncork a bottle? Remember, I pry'thee, the face you put on. Or did you ever see a dog fall in with a bone? It is, saith Plato, lib. ii. de Rep., the most philosophic beast in the world. If you have witnessed this, you may have noticed with what devotion the dog seizes his bone,with what care he guards it,-with what fervour he holds it,-with what prudence he cracks it,-with what affection he craunches it,and with what diligence he sucks it. Who has induced him to do this? What hope has he in his industry? What good does he aim at? Nothing more than a little marrow. True it is, that this little is more delicious than the much of all other things; because marrow is an aliment specially elaborated to perfection by nature herself, as Galen discourseth, iii. Facult. Nat., et xi. De usu partium. "It behoves you, then, to become wise after the example of the dog, to the end that you may catch, feel and appreciate the fragrant essence of these books of high flavour, which are light in the pursuit, but difficult in the encounter. It becomes you, afterwards, by curious perusal and frequent meditation, to break the bone, and suck from it the substantific marrow,-that is, what I understand by such Pythagorean symbols,-with a sure hope of being rendered prudent and discreet by the said reading: for there will you discover a far other taste, and a doctrine far more abstruse, which will reveal to you very high sacraments and horrific mysteries, as well in what concerns our religion, as also our political state and domestic life." * * Liv. i., Prologe de l'Autheur, pp. 1-2, and compare liv. ii., c. 34, p. 122. And in proof that this was not merely a windy boast on the part of Rabelais, but a design coolly preconceived and ably executed, we shall occasionally illustrate its truth in the further course of this article. In the meantime, we may adduce the high authority of that eminent critic, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who remarks that "one cannot help regretting that no friend of Rabelais, (and surely friends he must have had,) has left an authentic account of him. His buffoonery was not merely Brutus' rough stick, which contained a rod of gold, it was necessary as an amulet* against the monks and bigots. And, beyond a doubt, he was among the deepest as well as boldest thinkers of his age. Never was a more plausible, and seldom, I am persuaded, a less appropriate line than the thousand times quoted, 'Rabelais laughing in his easy chair,' of Mr. Pope. The caricature of his filth and zanyism proves how fully he both knew and felt the danger in which he stood. I could write a treatise in proof and praise of the morality and moral elevation of Rabelais' work, which would make the church stare, and the conventicle groan, and should be the truth and nothing but the truth. I class Rabelais with the great creative minds of the world, Shakspeare, Dante, Cervantes, etc." † No one, we are certain, who has carefully read the Gargantua and Pantagruel, in the spirit in which they ought to be read, will doubt the perfect feasibility of that which Coleridge declared his ability to perform. To the incurious and slovenly reader, Rabelais may seem, indeed, little more than an inventor of monstrous and diseased creations, who has no fear that the yew will crack, when he pulls the long bow to the ear. The six months' sojourn and peregrination which Alcofribas Nasier made in the mouth of Pantagruelthe sights which he saw there §-the mode in which Panta * In confirmation of this remark of Coleridge, consider especially the Letter of Rabelais to the Cardinal de Châtillon, prefixed to liv. iv., pp. 2002. There are a hundred other loose passages indicating the same thing, in the pages of his work. + S. T. Coleridge. Literary Remains, vol. i., p. 138. Lond. 1836. Shepherd. If you are gaun to use the lang bow, sir, pu' the string to your lug, never fear the yew crackin,' and send the gray-guse-feathered arrow first wi' a lang whiz, and then wi' a short thud, right intill the bull's ee, at ten score, to the astonishment of the ghaist o' Robin Hood, Liitle John, Adam Bell, etc. Wilson, Noctes Ambrosianæ, No. I. § Liv. ii., c. 32. gruel was wont to be cured of his diseases -Gargantua's unconscious deglutition of six pilgrims in his salad one day t-the congelation and subsequent thaw of the words of Pantagruel, the size, habiliments, toys, etc., of the infant Gargantua,s-the rhetorical manipulations of Panurge and Thausmastes,-Pantagruel's covering an army beneath one half of his tongue, T-and a hundred such wild inventions, may, perhaps, induce such a reader to regard Rabelais as an earlier Baron Munchausen, though decidedly inferior to the wondrous German, inasmuch as his exaggerations are wilder and less consistent with each other, and his bolts apparently shot more at random, because the butt, at which the satire is aimed, is not so obvious. To such an one we have nothing more to say, than simply to advise him to procure and study, for his edification and improvement, the great work, Reverendi Patris Fratris Lubini, provincialis Banardi, de croguendis lardonibus.** We may think him a fitting member of that great fraternity, of which Rabelais, in a charitable mood, wrote, Beati lourdes, quoniam ipsi trebuchauerunt. We will dismiss, with a wish conceived in like charity, Dieu guard de mal qui ne veryt bien et noyt goutte, but cannot deem him competent to hazard an opinion on Rabelais. The Gargantua and Pantagruel is a work not to be estimated by a light and superficial perusal : and, even should its whimsical imaginations seem to transcend in their extravagance the riotous license permitted to this kind of fiction, we may doubt whether they are not approached in Gulliver's Travels, and equalled in the quaint fancies of Aristophanes. A more serious objection would be, the manifest inequalities and dissimilarities of the work. There is a wide difference of texture in the several books. The first in place, though we question much whether it was also first in order of composition, is the least finished and the least profound of * Liv. ii., c. 33. + Liv. i., chap. 31. Liv. iv., chap. lvi. This has been borrowed from Rabelais in Baron Munchausen. Shakspeare has not disdained to explore the same mine. Sterne does so continually. § Liv. i., chap. 8. Liv. ii., chap. 9. T Liv. ii., chap. 32. **Liv. ii., chap. 7. To be obtained in the Library of St. Victor at Paris, if it has not been mislaid. tt Liv. ii., chap. 11. Liv. iii., chap. 15. We have inserted the former 'ne.' those which are indubitably genuine while the fifth* throws off almost entirely the mask, which the author had assumed, and in it the humour is less redundant, and the execution otherwise defective. Perhaps, if all things be taken into consideration, the third book, lying between the two extremes in character as in position, is that which deserves greatest praise and admiration, and most fully exhibits the peculiar genius of Rabelais. It is in this that he has been most successful in blending the humorous and grotesque in form with the grave in design. Throughout all, however, run the same inexhaustible current of good-humour, and the same merry recklessness of deviltry and fun. Rabelais never forgets altogether the disguise he has assumed, the principal object he has in view, or the spirit which dictated his first address to the reader : "My friendly readers, do not fear We would willingly undertake to do all that Coleridge said he could have done, but we are conscious how lamentably defective our execution might seem after his bold assertion, and might in reality be, for it is not easy to do justice to that singular union of bavardage and practical philosophy, which distinguishes Rabelais above all other writers,— a union beyond that of Mezentius. We can, however, with * We have already stated our conviction that Rabelais did not write the whole of the fifth book. Our remark must, therefore, be limited to so much as bears the impress of legitimacy. Amyz lecteurs, qui ce liure lisez, Liv.i., p. 1. out any extraordinary effort, point how eminently sober and solid were his real views on the great questions which distracted his age,-how effectually his satire was directed against abuses and follies, obvious now, but hardly recognized then, and how infinitely his opinions were in advance of his contemporaries, in nearly all points of general theology, politics, literature and science. This we will attempt to do, though our limits will compel us to do it very imperfectly. And, as his humour will sufficiently exemplify itself by the quotations we may make in our progress, or have already made, we shall not devote any particular attention to its special illustration. But the principal features in the genius of Rabelais, are his bold independence of thought, and his rebellion against the constituted and rigid formularies by which the human intellect had been so long trammelled. It may, accordingly, be expedient to allude to the chief phenomena of the day in which he lived and wrote; for his greatest claim to honour arises from a due estimate of his relation to those times; and this will also explain, in a great measure, the reasons which determined him to adopt his peculiar manner of promulgating new doctrines and assailing old ones, while, at the same time, it will exhibit the absolute necessity for his own safety of that rough and farcical mask, which he assumed for the concealment of his true lineaments from all but the few sufficiently initiated into the Pantagruelistic mysteries, to be able to penetrate the veil wherewith he had invested himself.* Putting out of view that solemn era, which witnessed the incarnation of Deity, and the commencement of a new system of religion and civilization, there has been no period in the history of the world more memorable for its events, or more fruitful in rich results, than the century which lies between the years 1450 and 1550. The enumeration of the more notable occurrences of this age, though an imperfect indication of its vast importance, is well calculated to arrest the attention of the most careless, and to exhibit the magnitude of the influences then at work for the renovation and regeneration of society, after the long, dull slumber of the Middle Ages. The Fall of Constantinople and the Eastern * See particularly Liv. iii., Prologue de l'Autheur, pp. 123-7, and especially the passage, p. 126, commencing 'cestuy exemple me faict entre espoir et craincte varier,' etc. There are many other places where he indicates his own sense of the danger he had to guard against. |