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gree of inveteracy in their manner of kicking it, as if the laws had been origi- nally made for the peace and preservation of mankind : -- perhaps a more enormous mistake committed by them still, -- a li- tigated point fairly hung up ; ---- for in- stance, Whether John o'Nokes his nose, could stand in Tom o'Stiles his face, with- out a trespass, or not, -- rashly determin- ed by them in five and twenty minutes, which, with the cautious pro's and con's required in so intricate a proceeding, might have taken up as many months, -- and if carried on upon a military plan, as your honours know, an ACTION should be, with all the stratagems practicable there- in, -- such as feints, -- forced marches, -- surprizes, -- ambuscades, -- mask-batte- ries, and a thousand other strokes of ge- neralship which consist in catching at all advantages on both sides, ---- might rea- |
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reasonably have lasted them as many years, finding food and raiment all that term for a centumvirate of the profes- sion. As for the clergy -------- No --- If I say a word against them, I'll be shot. -- I have no desire, -- and besides, if I had, ---- I durst not for my soul touch upon the subject, ---- with such weak nerves and spirits, and in the condition I am in at present, 'twould be as much as my life was worth, to deject and contrist my- self with so bad and melancholy an ac- count, ---- and therefore, 'tis safer to draw a curtain across, and hasten from it, as fast as I can, to the main and principal point I have undertaken to clear up, ---- and that is, How it comes to pass, that your men of least wit are reported to be men of most judgment. ---- But mark, -- G 3 I say, |
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I say, reported to be, ---- for it is no more, my dear Sirs, than a report, and which like twenty others taken up every day upon trust, I maintain to be a vile and a malicious report into the bar- gain. This by the help of the observations al- ready premised,and I hope already weigh- ed and perpended by your reverences and worships, I shall forthwith make ap- pear. I hate set dissertations, ---- and above all things in the world, 'tis one of the sil- liest things in one of them, to darken your hypothesis by placing a number of tall, opake words, one before another, in a right line, betwixt your own and your readers conception, ---- when in all like- lihood, if you had looked about, you might |
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might have seen something standing, or hanging up, which would have cleared the point at once, -- `` for what hinde- ``rance, hurt, or harm, doth the laudable ``desire of knowledge bring to any man, ``if even from a sot, a pot, a fool, a stool, a ``winter-mittain, a truckle for a pully, ``the lid of a goldsmith's crucible, an oyl ``bottle, an old slipper, or a cane chair,'' ---- I am this moment sitting upon one. Will you give me leave to illustrate this affair of wit and judgment, by the two knobs on the top of the back of it, ---- they are fasten'd on, you see, with two pegs stuck slightly into two gimlet-holes, and will place what I have to say in so clear a light, as to let you see through the drift and meaning of my whole preface, as plainly as if every point and particle of it was made up of sun beams. G 4 I enter |
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I enter now directly upon the point. ---- Here stands wit, ---- and there stands judgment, close beside it, just like the two knobbs I'm speaking of, upon the back of this self same chair on which I am sitting. ---- You see, they are the highest and most ornamental parts of its frame, ---- as wit and judgment are of ours, ---- and like them too, indubitably both made and fitted to go together, in order as we say in all such cases of duplicated embel- lishments, ---- to answer one another. Now for the sake of an experiment, and for the clearer illustrating this matter, -- let us for a moment, take off one of these two curious ornaments (I care not which) from the point or pinacle of the chair it now |
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now stands on ; ---- nay, don't laugh at it. ---- But did you ever see in the whole course of your lives such a ridiculous bu- siness as this has made of it ? ---- Why, 'tis as miserable a sight as a sow with one ear; and there is just as much sense and symmetry in the one, as in the other : -- do, -- pray, get off your seats, only to take a view of it. ---- Now would any man who valued his character a straw, have turned a piece of work out of his hand in such a condition ? ---- nay, lay your hands upon your hearts, and answer this plain question, Whether this one sin- gle knobb which now stands here like a blockhead by itself, can serve any pur- pose upon earth, but to put one in mind of the want of the other ; ---- and let me further ask, in case the chair was your own, if you would not in your consci- ences think, rather than be as it is, that 3 it |
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it would be ten times better without any knobb at all. Now these two knobs ---- or top or- naments of the mind of man, which crown the whole entablature, -- being, as I said, wit and judgment, which of all others, as I have proved it, are the most needful, -- the most priz'd, ---- the most calami- tous to be without, and consequently the hardest to come at, ---- for all these rea- sons put together, there is not a mor- tal amongst us, so destitute of a love of good fame or feeding, ---- or so ignorant of what will do him good therein, -- who does not wish and stedfastly resolve in his own mind, to be, or to be thought at least master of the one or the other, and indeed of both of them, if the thing seems any way feasible, or likely to be brought to pass. Now |
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Now your graver gentry having little or no kind of chance in aiming at the one, -- unless they laid hold of the other, ---- pray what do you think would be- come of them ? -- Why, Sirs, in spight of all their gravities, they must e'en have been contented to have gone with their insides naked : -- this was not to be borne, but by an effort of philosophy not to be supposed in the case we are upon, ---- so that no one could well have been angry with them, had they been satisfied with what little they could have snatched up and secreted under their cloaks and great perrywigs, had they not raised a hue and cry at the same time against the lawful owners. I need not tell your worships, that this was done with so much cunning and arti- fice, -- that the great Locke, who was sel- dom |
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dom outwitted by false sounds, ---- was nevertheless bubbled here. The cry, it seems, was so deep and solemn a one, and what with the help of great wigs, grave faces, and other implements of de- ceit, was rendered so general a one against the poor wits in this matter, that the phi- losopher himself was deceived by it, -- it was his glory to free the world from the lumber of a thousand vulgar errors ; ---- but this was not of the number ; so that instead of sitting down cooly, as such a philosopher should have done, to have examined the matter of fact before he philosophised upon it; ---- on the contra- ry, he took the fact for granted, and so joined in with the cry, and halloo'd it as boisterously as the rest. This has been made the Magna Charta of stupidity ever since, -- but your reve- rences |
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rences plainly see, it has been obtained in such a manner, that the title to it is not worth a groat ; ---- which by the bye is one of the many and vile impositions which gravity and grave folks have to an- swer for hereafter. As for great wigs, upon which I may be thought to have spoken my mind too freely, ---- I beg leave to qualify what- ever has been unguardedly said to their dispraise or prejudice, by one general de- claration ---- That I have no abhorrence whatever, nor do I detest and abjure either great wigs or long beards, ---- any further than when I see they are bespoke and let grow on purpose to carry on this self-same imposture -- for any purpose, -- peace be with them ; --  mark only, -- I write not for them. C H A P. |
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EVERY day for at least ten years to- gether did my father resolve to have it mended, ---- 'tis not mended yet; ---- no family but ours would have borne with it an hour, -- and what is most asto- nishing, there was not a subject in the world upon which my father was so elo- quent, as upon that of door-hinges. ---- And yet at the same time, he was certain- ly one of the greatest bubbles to them, I think, that history can produce : his rhe- toric and conduct were at perpetual handy-cuffs. ---- Never did the parlour- door open -- but his philosophy or his principles fell a victim to it; ---- three drops of oyl with a feather, and a smart stroke of a hammer, had saved his ho- nour for ever. 1 -- Incon- |
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---- Inconsistent soul that man is ! -- languishing under wounds, which he has the power to heal ! -- his whole life a con- tradiction to his knowledge! -- his reason, that precious gift of God to him -- (instead of pouring in oyl) serving but to sharpen his sensibilities, ---- to multiply his pains and render him more melancholy and un- easy under them ! -- poor unhappy crea- ture, that he should do so ! ---- are not the necessary causes of misery in this life enow, but he must add voluntary ones to his stock of sorrow ; ---- struggle against evils which cannot be avoided, and sub- mit to others, which a tenth part of the trouble they create him, would remove from his heart for ever ? By all that is good and virtuous! if there are three drops of oyl to be got, and a hammer to be found within ten miles of |
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of Shandy-Hall, -- the parlour-door hinge shall be mended this reign. WHEN corporal Trim had brought his two mortars to bear, he was delighted with his handy-work above measure ; and knowing what a pleasure it would be to his master to see them, he was not able to resist the desire he had of carrying them directly into the parlour. Now next to the moral lesson I had in view in mentioning the affair of hinges, I had a speculative consideration arising out of it, and it is this. Had the parlour-door open'd and turn'd upon its hinges, as a door should do ------ -- Or |
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-- Or for example, as cleverly as our government has been turning upon its hinges, ---- (that is, in case things have all along gone well with your worship, -- otherwise I give up my simile) -- in this case, I say, there had been no danger ei- ther to master or man, in corporal Trim's peeping in : the moment, he had beheld my father and my uncle Toby fast asleep, ---- the respectfulness of his carriage was such, he would have retired as silent as death, and left them both in their arm- chairs, dreaming as happy as he had found them : but the thing was morally speaking so very impracticable, that for the many years in which this hinge was suffered to be out of order, and amongst the hourly grievances my father submit- ted to upon its account, -- this was one; that he never folded his arms to take his nap after dinner, but the thoughts of be- VOL. H ing |
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ing unavoidably awakened by the first person who should open the door, was always uppermost in his imagination, and so incessantly step'd in betwixt him and the first balmy presage of his repose, as to rob him, as he often declared, of the whole sweets of it. `` When things move upon bad hinges, an' please your lordships, how can it be other- wise ?'' Pray, what's the matter ? Who is there? cried my father, waking, the moment the door began to creak. ---- I wish the smith would give a peep at that confound- ed hinge. ---- 'Tis nothing, an' please your honour, said Trim, but two mor- tars I am bringing in. ---- They shan't make a clatter with them here, cried my father hastily. ---- If Dr. Slop has any drugs |
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drugs to pound, let him do it in the kitchen. ---- May it please your honour, cried Trim, -- they are two mortar-pieces for a siege next summer, which I have been making out of a pair of jack-boots, which Obadiah told me your honour had left off wearing. ---- By heaven ! cried my father, springing out of his chair, as he swore, -- I have not one appointment belonging to me, which I set so much store by, as I do by these jack-boots, ---- they were our great-grandfather's, brother Toby, ---- they were hereditary. Then I fear, quoth my uncle Toby, Trim has cut off the entail. ---- I have only cut off the tops, an' please your honour, cried Trim. ---- I hate perpetuities as much as any man alive, cried my father, ---- but these jack-boots, continued he, (smiling, though very angry at the same time) have been in the family, brother, H 2 ever |
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ever since the civil wars ; ---- Sir Roger Shandy wore them at the battle of Marston- Moor. -- I declare I would not have taken ten pounds for them. ---- I'll pay you the money, brother Shandy, quoth my uncle Toby, looking at the two mortars with infinite pleasure, and putting his hand in- to his breeches-pocket, as he viewed them. ---- I'll pay you the ten pounds this mo- ment with all my heart and soul. ---- Brother Toby, replied my father, alter- ing his tone, you care not what money you dissipate and throw away, provided, continued he, 'tis but upon a SIEGE. -- Have I not a hundred and twenty pounds a year, besides my half-pay ? cried my uncle Toby. ---- What is that, replied my father, hastily, -- to ten pounds for a pair of jack-boots ? ---- twelve guineas for your pontoons; ---- half as much for your |
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your Dutch-draw-bridge; -- to say nothing ofthe train of little brass-artillery you be- spoke last week, with twenty other prepa- rations for the siege of Messina; believe me, dear brother Toby, continued my father, taking him kindly by the hand, -- these mi- litary operations of yours are above your strength ; -- you mean well, brother, -- but they carry you into greater expences than you were first aware of, ---- and take my word, ---- dear Toby, they will in the end quite ruin your fortune, and make a beggar of you. ---- What signifies it if they do, brother, replied my uncle Toby, so long as we know 'tis for the good of the nation. -- My father could not help smiling for his soul ; -- his anger at the worst was ne- ver more than a spark, -- and the zeal and simplicity of Trim, ---- and the generous H 3 (tho' |
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(tho' hobby-horsical) gallantry of my uncle Toby, brought him into perfect good humour with them in an instant. Generous souls ! -- God prosper you both, and your mortar-pieces too, quoth my father to himself. ALL is quiet and hush, cried my father, at least above stairs, -- I hear not one foot stirring. ---- Prithee, Trim, who is in the kitchen ? There is no one soul in the kitchen, answered Trim, making a low bow as he spoke, except Dr. Slop. ---- Confusion ! cried my father, (getting up upon his legs a second time) ---- not one single thing has gone right this day ! had I faith in astrology, bro- ther, (which by the bye, my father had) 2 I would |
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I would have sworn some retrograde pla- net was hanging over this unfortunate house of mine, and turning every indi- vidual thing in it out of its place. ---- Why, I thought Dr. Slop had been above stairs with my wife, and so said you. -- What can the fellow be puzzling about in the kitchen ? ---- He is busy, an' please your honour, replied Trim, in making a bridge. ---- 'Tis very obliging in him, quoth my uncle Toby ; ---- pray give my humble service to Dr. Slop, Trim, and tell him I thank him heartily. You must know, my uncle Toby mis- took the bridge as widely as my father mistook the mortars ; ---- but to under- stand how my uncle Toby could mistake the bridge, -- I fear I must give you an exact account of the road which led to it; ---- or to drop my metaphor, (for H 4 there |
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