with Shakespeare, Dante, and Cervantes, as one of the great creative minds of the world. The work on which his title to this eminence rests was composed by him during the last twenty years of his age. Had Rabelais died before the age of fifty, his name would have been quite unknown. Of the work itself, considered as a narrative, it is easy to give an outline. In the First Book, or Gargantua, we are told how the great giant, Gargantua, the son of King Grangousier and his wife Gargamelle, is born into the world; how he is educated at home; how he is sent to Paris to be further instructed; how there he astonishes the citizens by various exploits, the chief of which is the carrying away of the great bells of Notre Dame round his mare's neck; how he is called back from his studies to help his father against Picrochole, King of Lerné, who has invaded his paternal territories; how, assisted by his friends, and especially by a jolly and valiant monk, called Friar John des Entomeures, or Friar John of the Choppingknives, he routs the enemy; and how peace is restored, and Friar John rewarded. In the next Book, or the First Part of Pantagruel, we have the early life and actions of Prince Pantagruel, the son of the foregoing Gargantua, who has now succeeded his father, Grangousier, on the throne; how this prince, who was a giant like his father, was sent, like him, to Paris to be educated; how, in a curious way, he there fell in with a strange being, called Panurge, whom he immediately engaged as his companion, and whom he loved all his life-time;" how, while he and Panurge are having odd adventures in Paris, he receives intelligence of the invasion of his father's kingdom by the Dipsodes and the giants; and how, thereupon, he returns, defeats the invaders, and introduces Panurge to his father, and to all his friends, including, of course, Friar John of the Chopping-knives. In the Third Book, or Second Part of Pantagruel, we learn how Pantagruel colonizes Dipsody; how he makes Panurge laird of Salmagundin in that country, with a noble income; how, nevertheless, Panurge gets into debt, and becoming half crazy, resolves to marry, if only he can first be assured that his matrimonial fortune will be a happy one; how, in order to obtain this assurance, he consults one person after another-Pantagruel, Friar John, a lawyer, a theologian, a physician, a witch, a fool, a philosopher, but all without satisfaction; and how, at last, to put all beyond a doubt, it is arranged by Gargantua that Pantagruel and his friend Panurge, accompanied by Friar John, and many other persons, shall proceed in a ship to the other end of the world, there to consult the famous oracle of Bacbuc, or the Holy Bottle. Finally, in Books Fourth and Fifth, (Book Fifth was published from the MS., after the death of Rabelais,) we have a narrative of the voyage-how the voyagers conversed and amused themselves while on board; how they encountered a great storm; how they touched at one place after another-the land of the Chitterlings, or Sausages; the land of the Papimanes, or Pope-maniacs; the land of Gaster, or Lord Belly; the Ringing Island; the Queendom of Quintessence, &c. &c.-what wonders they saw in each; and how at last they arrived safely at their destination, and consulted the Bottle. And here the tale abruptly closes. To give one that does not know the work an idea of the extraordinary mass of miscellaneous matter that is piled up in it on this almost absurd basis, is impossible. Dissertation, dialogue, anecdote, quaint learning, grotesque conception, trenchant sarcasm, the oddest and sharpest wit, the most riotous laughter, the profoundest allegory, the most abject driveling, the filthiest word-garbage, the most astounding profanity are here mingled, and jumbled into union. The book is literally unique. There does not exist in the whole literature of the world any other that can be said really to resemble it. What Jean Paul is in German, Rabelais is in French; and yet the two men are wholly unlike. Dismissing, as irrelevant and absurd, the controversy carried on with such pitiful results by Motteux and others, as to the real dramatis persona (Louis XII., Francis I., Henry II., Cardinal Châtillon, the Cardinal d'Amboise, &c. &c.) supposed to be represented under the names, Grangousier, Cargantua, Pantagruel, Friar John, Panurge, &c. &c., and believing nothing more than that Rabelais designed his work to be, as M. Jacob well names it, "a critique of the world,” clutching here and there, possibly, at a real bit of fact when it suited his purpose, a judicious critic, we imagine, would find it convenient to discuss specially these four things. in respect to Rabelais - his obscenity, his humor, his poetic or dramatic power, and his opinions or philosophy. We have space but for a word on each. The obscenity of Rabelais, it has been remarked, is something stupendous. "He who has his mind stored," says a critic, "with the objectionable passages of Swift, Sterne, Boccaccio, and the Elizabethan dramatists, may fancy that he knows the limit to which | making it more accessible than it was. grossness in writing may extend. But alas! if he has not read Rabelais, his knowledge in this respect is as nothing; he cannot conceive the full strong torrent of undisguised and elaborated filth which rolls through a work as bulky as Don Quixote." All that mass of objects and facts, in short, that society has agreed to keep nailed down under hatches, as suppressed and unnameable between cleanly men, is here broken in upon, shoveled out, and exposed to the sun. Here, of course, there start up the two apologetic commonplaces-the custom of the age, and the difference between mere coarseness and studiously-seductive description. Both apologies are worth something; but neither is sufficient. That gentlemen and ladies of the age of Francis I. read Rabelais and found him "delectable ;" that the Cardinal du Bellay called his book, par excellence, "The Book," and caused a gentleman that had not read it to retire from his table,—is all very true; but it is just as true, that in no age whatever could "The Book" have been written except by a man æsthetically depraved. Again; that the style is not purposely seductive that it is not pictures of intellectual Aspasias, or of Laises rosy from the bath, that Rabelais delights to offer, but pictures of dirty Molls and hag-like Sycoraxes-is just as true; but we question if, all things considered, this mends the matter. In short, let it be distinctly understood by all heads of households that Rabelais is not a family author. Nor is our English translation a whit purer, in this respect, than the original. Begun by Sir Thomas Urquhart, a wit of the reign of Charles II., who, in the execution of his difficult task, ransacked the entire vocabulary of the English tongue, besides dipping occasionally into his native Scotch, for expressions tantamount to those of the original; and continued by Mr. Peter Motteux, a naturalized French Londoner of the beginning of last century, who, after a desultory, semi-literary life, was found dead, under suspicious circumstances, in a house of bad fame in St. Clement Danes, on the morning of his fifty-eighth birthday,-this translation is a perfect marvel for exuberance of foul speech. The most terrible sight on earth, as the critic quoted above has very truly said, would be that of a young lady in white muslin opening a volume of Urquhart's "Rabelais." We are not sure, indeed, if Mr. Bohn has done right in including this work in his valuable series of reprints, and so VOL. XIX. NO. II. It is but fair, however, after all this, to quote, in regard to this very point, the deliberate judgment of so high an authority as Coleridge. "I could write," says Coleridge," a treatise in praise of the moral elevation of Rabelais' work, which would make the church stare and the conventicle groan, and yet would be truth and nothing but truth." And again (Table Talk, p. 93), "the morality of the work is of the most refined and exalted kind; as for the manners, to be sure, I cannot say as much." And really, whatever may be the impression made by parts, it is with a feeling toward the author very different from that of disgust, that one concludes a continuous perusal of the Pantagruel. The humor of Rabelais is a subject for a dissertation rather than a paragraph; and the critic in such a case should prepare his ground by means of whole pages of examples. All that we can do here is to quote a specimen or two, to exhibit a frequent verbal form of the Rabelæsian jest. Panurge's Praise of Indebtedness.—“ God for bid that I should ever be out of debt. He that paste the next morning. Be still indebted to leaves not some leaven overnight will hardly have somebody or other, that there may always be somebody to pray for you. * * Creditors, I will maintain it to the very fire, are fair and goodly creatures; and whoso lendeth nothing is a foul and ugly creature-an imp of the rogue below. O what a rare and ancient thing are debts! * * all my life, I have not esteemed debts to be, as it I give myself to Saint Babolin, if, were, a connection and colligation of the heavens and the earth-the sole cement of the human lineage (yea, without them all humanity would perish); perchance that they are even that great soul of the universe which, according to the academicians, vivifies all things. To perceive this, only represent to your calm mind the idea and form of some world (take, if you please, the thirtieth of those that the philosopher, Metrodorus, imagined) wherein there shall be neither debtor nor creditor. A world without debts! Then, among the stars there will be no regular course; all will be disorder. Jupiter, not considering himself a debtor to Saturn, will depose him from his sphere; and &c."-Book iii., chap. 3. How Panurge behaved during the Storm."Panurge having fed the fishes with the contents of his stomach, lay on the deck all huddled up, forlorn, jointless, and half dead; invoked all the blessed saints and saintesses to his aid; vowed he would confess himself in time and place confather, my uncle, a little salt meat; we shall venient; then called out 'Steward, my friend, my drink too much anon, I fear. Would I were now at this very moment safe on shore. O thrice and four times happy those that plant cabbages! O 15 * * * Fates, why did you not spin me to be a planter 6 | neither heaven nor earth! Alas, alas! O that at this present hour I were in the close of Seuille, or at Innocent the pastrycook's, before the public house at Chinon, though I had to put on an apron and make pies myself! My honest man-(he speaks to a sailor)--could you throw me ashore? You can do never so many things, they have informed me. I will give you all Salmagundin to yourself, if by any contrivance you can get me ashore."-Book iv. chapters 18-20. here than to cry like a calf, sitting on your hams Vow, * 6 Were we required to characterize, in one word, the style, or method, as it may be called, of the peculiar humor of Rabelais, we should say it consists in abandonment—i. e., in unchecked, headlong effusion of everything that comes into the head. In many passages he reminds us of a rough, uncultivated genius, scribbling off after page fit for page of prose horses, simply to make his friends laugh. There is no erasure, no suppression; sentence tumbles after sentence; rubbish is rolled upon sense; good things are not picked out and placed in concatenation, but are presented native as they grew, amid whole beds of weeds. Analyzing this method of humorous invention by sheer abandonment of the faculties to their own course, psychologists would probably arrive at the conclusion that its extreme efficacy depends on the extraordinary complexity of the associative or suggestive processes it gives rise to. In ordinary conversation, in a calm mood, one passes from thought to thought by very simple bonds of association; in public speaking, again, the associative links or hooks by which one advances from one thought on to its successor, are more numerous-the associations of cadence or rhythm, for example, and those of gesticulation or muscular movement, not to speak of the high suggestive power of emotional warmth, all working in unison with the mere logical connection of reason, so as to lead to more splendid reaches of invention, and produce richer effects; but a higher complication still, and consequently a more marvelous power of production, comes into play, in those special moods of either Pythic fervor on the one hand, or voluntary zanyism on the other, when the mind loses all control, as it were, over any part of itself, and drifts along as fate decrees. Omitting the higher kind of abandonment-Pythic fervor, as we have here named it—that leads to bursts of lofty and earnest expression, we think we could cull passages in abundance from our noted humorists, illustrative of the force, for purely humorous effect, of that other variety of the same mental condition, that consists in mere zanyism. "I would I were a weaver; I could sing psalms or anything"-" If I live to be served such another trick, I'll have my brains taken out and buttered, and give them to a dog for a new-year's gift.” What are these, and a hundred other such conceits in Falstaff, but the lucky result, as it were, of sheer voluntary drivel-the lips speaking on in blind haste, and Nature, per force, supplying the matter? And precisely so it is in Rabelais. In him, however, the zanyism is most frequently of a peculiar genus-a vinous zanyism, so to speak; the zanyism of intoxication. We seem to see all through the heavy eye, the swaggering look, the alternate mock-solemnity and downright idiotcy of drunkenness. Indeed, as has been well remarked, the whole of Rabelais's book may be best conceived as a drama within a drama; the real scene being the tavern-parlor of the hostelry at Chinon warm and well lighted in a blustering winter night, with a company of jolly topers seated in it round a board; and the professed story, with its Gargantuas, Panurges, and Friar Johns, passing through this only as a mad phantasmagory, or drunken revel. And thus we see how Rabelais was still the old man, and how, even in his mature age, all that he could do was to roll back his later experience of life, so as to bed and smother it in his early recollections. Of the vigor of the dramatic or creative faculty in Rabelais, the proof lies in the distinctness with which one learns to picture the main characters of his fiction. What can be finer, in its way, than his description of the domestic old giant, Grangousier, as he was quietly spending his time when the news reached him of the invasion of his territories by Picrochole?" Grangousier, good old man, warming his thighs at a good, great, clear fire, waiting upon the broiling of some chestnuts, very serious in drawing scratches on the hearth with a stick burnt at one end, wherewith they stirred the fire, telling to his wife and the rest of his family pleasant old stories and tales of former times." Nor is the portrait of Gargantua less clear to the reader. It is, however, upon the three friends and companions-Pantagruel, Friar John, and Panurge, that Rabelais has taken most pains. The characters of these three stand out as conceptions perfectly and peculiarly Rabelæsian. Pantagruel, the wise, the good, the invincible, the modest, the sad, the speculative, half a Hamlet, half a giant; Friar John, the lusty, the fearless, the jovial, the profane, "going through the world like a bull;" and Panurge, the witty, the mischievous, the wily, the unprincipled, half a Pistol and half a Mephistopheles, with all the lying and cowardice of the one, and all the clever rascality of the other, yet somehow loveable, after all-where shall we find such another triad? And how they set off each other! Panurge always active, always amusing, never at a loss, sneaking off at the first glimpse of danger, re-appearing whenever it past; Friar John, with his hanger ever ready for a foe, and his knife for a joint, often bullying his poor co-mate, yet bearing with him like a brother; and Pantagruel, sometimes standing apart and looking on, at others joining in the sport, but always as a superior nature, occupied with thoughts of his own there is something almost fearful in such a conjunction. The affection that Pantagruel bears to Panurge, the uniform kindness and consideration with which he treats that strange unearthly being, who seems but one lump of facetiousness and vice, are positively mystic. He sometimes rebukes Friar John, Panurge never. Of the three characters, Panurge is, beyond question, the masterpiece. As a poetic impersonation of the principle of evil -we do not hesitate to say it-the character of Panurge, by Rabelais, is a more original and masterly conception than that of Mephistopheles, by Goethe. And this leads us, finally, to the philosophy of Rabelais. It was a favorite opinion of Coleridge, that the real scope of the great work of Rabelais was not political, but philosophical. "Pantagruel," he said, " was the Reason; Panurge, the Understanding-the pollarded man, the man with every faculty except the Reason." With virtually this meaning in view, Rabelais, as Coleridge conceived, was led, by the necessity of the times, to assume the guise of zanyism-now making a deep thrust; then, to appear unconscious of what he had done, writing a chapter or two of pure buffoonery. This hypothesis, a little altered and softened, would almost seem admissible; so clear is it, above all in the delineation of Pantagruel, that Rabelais, too, had his high thoughts and serious moments. moments. And here, without investigating the matter further, let u: quote, in conclusion, one passage, in which, more than in any other in the whole work, (we can say this as conscientious readers,) Rabelais has shown his deeper susceptibilities-a passage which proves, we think, that even he, mass of fat, fun, and filth, as people would fain represent him to have been, was subject to visits of a mystic melancholy that Horace never knew. It is where, in Book iv. chapter 28, Pantagruel, discoursing on immortality, relates what is called " sad story of the death of the forecastle, and casting his eyes on the shore, said that he had been commanded to proclaim that the great god Pan was dead. The words were hardly out of his mouth, when deep groans, great lamentations, and doleful shrieks, not of one person, but of many together, were heard from the land. The news of this was soon spread at Rome; insomuch, that Tiberius, who was then emperor, sent for this Thamous, and having heard him, gave credit to his words. * * For my part, I understand the story of that great Saviour of the faithful who was put to death at Jerusalem. He may be called, in the Greek tongue, Pan, since he is our all. He is Pan, the great shepherd, also, who, as the loving Corydon affirms, hath a tender love, not for his sheep only, but also for their shepherds. At his death, complaints, sighs, tears, and lamentations were spread throughout the whole fabric of the universe-heavens, land, sea, and hell. The time also concurs with this interpretation of mine; for this most mighty Pan, our Saviour, died near Jerusalem, in the reign of Tiberius Cæsar.' Pantagruel having ended this discourse, 1 emained silent and full of contemplation. A little while after, we saw tears flow out of his eyes, as big as ostrich's eggs. God take me presently if I tell you one syllable of a lie in the mutter." "Epitherses, the father of Emilian, the rhetorician sailing from Greece to Italy, in a ship freighted with divers goods and passengers, at night the wind failed them near the Echinades, some islands that lie between the Morea, and Tunis; and the vessel was driven near Paxos. When they got thither, some of the passengers being asleep, others awake, the rest eating and drinking, a voice was heard that called aloud, "Thamous!" which surprised them all. This same Thamous was their pilot, an Egyptian by birth, but known by name only to some few of the passengers. The voice was heard a second time calling" Thamous," in a frightful tone; and none making answer, but all trembling and remaining silent, the voice was heard a third time, more dreadful than before. This caused Thamous to answer, "Here am I; what dost thou call me for ?" Then the voice, louder than before, bid him publish, when he should come to Palodes, that the great god Pan was dead. All the mariners and passengers having heard this, were amazed and affrighted. * * Now when they had come to Palodes, they had no wind, neither were they in any current. Thamous then getting up on the top of the ship's |