The Poetical Works of Thomas Moore :: :: University of Virginia Library

But, whither have these gentle ones,
These rosy nymphs and black-eyed nuns,
With all of Cupid's wild romancing,
Led my truant brains a dancing?
Instead of studying tomes scholastic,
Ecclesiastic, or monastic,
Off I fly, careering far
In chase of Pollys, prettier far
Than any of their namesakes are,—
The Polymaths and Polyhistors,
Polyglots and all their sisters.

187

So have I known a hopeful youth
Sit down in quest of lore and truth,
With tomes sufficient to confound him,
Like Tohu Bohu, heap'd around him,—
Mamurra stuck to Theophrastus,
And Galen tumbling o'er Bombastus.
When lo! while all that's learn'd and wise
Absorbs the boy, he lifts his eyes,
And through the window of his study
Beholds some damsel fair and ruddy,

188

With eyes, as brightly turn'd upon him as
The angel's were on Hieronymus.
Quick fly the folios, widely scatter'd,
Old Homer's laurel'd brow is batter'd,
And Sappho, headlong sent, flies just in
The reverend eye of St. Augustin.
Raptur'd he quits each dozing sage,
Oh woman, for thy lovelier page:
Sweet book!—unlike the books of art,—
Whose errors are thy fairest part;
In whom the dear errata column
Is the best page in all the volume!

189

But to begin my subject rhyme—
'Twas just about this devilish time,
When scarce there happen'd any frolics
That were not done by Diabolics,
A cold and loveless son of Lucifer,
Who woman scorn'd, nor saw the use of her,
A branch of Dagon's family,
(Which Dagon, whether He or She,
Is a dispute that vastly better is
Referr'd to Scaliger et cæteris,)
Finding that, in this cage of fools,
The wisest sots adorn the schools,
Took it at once his head Satanic in,
To grow a great scholastic manikin,—

190

A doctor, quite as learn'd and fine as
Scotus John or Tom Aquinas ,
Lully, Hales Irrefragabilis,
Or any doctor of the rabble is.
In languages , the Polyglots,
Compar'd to him, were Babel sots;
He chatter'd more than ever Jew did;—
Sanhedrim and Priest included,
Priest and holy Sanhedrim
Were one-and-seventy fools to him.

191

But chief the learned demon felt a
Zeal so strong for gamma, delta,
That, all for Greek and learning's glory ,
He nightly tippled “Græco more,”
And never paid a bill or balance
Except upon the Grecian Kalends:—
From whence your scholars, when they want tick,
Say, to be Attic's to be on tick,

192

In logics, he was quite Ho Panu ;
Knew as much as ever man knew.
He fought the combat syllogistic
With so much skill and art eristic,
That though you were the learned Stagyrite,
At once upon the hip he had you right.
In music, though he had no ears
Except for that amongst the spheres,
(Which most of all, as he averr'd it,
He dearly loved, 'cause no one heard it,)
Yet aptly he, at sight, could read
Each tuneful diagram in Bede,
And find, by Euclid's corollaria,
The ratios of a jig or aria.

193

But, as for all your warbling Delias,
Orpheuses and Saint Cecilias,
He own'd he thought them much surpass'd
By that redoubted Hyaloclast
Who still contriv'd by dint of throttle,
Where'er he went to crack a bottle.

Likewise to show his mighty knowledge, he,
On things unknown in physiology,
Wrote many a chapter to divert us,
(Like that great little man Albertus,)
Wherein he show'd the reason why,
When children first are heard to cry,
If boy the baby chance to be,
He cries O A!—if girl, O E!—
Which are, quoth he, exceeding fair hints
Respecting their first sinful parents;
“Oh Eve!” exclaimeth little madam,
While little master cries “Oh Adam!”

194

But, 'twas in Optics and Dioptrics,
Our dæmon play'd his first and top tricks.
He held that sunshine passes quicker
Through wine than any other liquor;
And though he saw no great objection
To steady light and clear reflection,
He thought the aberrating rays,
Which play about a bumper's blaze,
Were by the Doctors look'd, in common, on,
As a more rare and rich phenomenon.
He wisely said that the sensorium
Is for the eyes a great emporium,
To which these noted picture-stealers
Send all they can and meet with dealers.
In many an optical proceeding
The brain, he said, show'd great good breeding;
For instance, when we ogle women
(A trick which Barbara tutor'd him in),
Although the dears are apt to get in a
Strange position on the retina,
Yet instantly the modest brain
Doth set them on their legs again!

195

Our doctor thus, with “stuff'd sufficiency”
Of all omnigenous omnisciency,
Began (as who would not begin
That had, like him, so much within?)
To let it out in books of all sorts,
Folios, quartos, large and small sorts;
Poems, so very deep and sensible
That they were quite incomprehensible
Prose, which had been at learning's Fair,
And bought up all the trumpery there,

196

The tatter'd rags of every vest.
In which the Greeks and Romans drest,
And o'er her figure swoll'n and antic
Scatter'd them all with airs so frantic,
That those, who saw what fits she had,
Declar'd unhappy Prose was mad!
Epics he wrote and scores of rebusses,
All as neat as old Turnebus's;
Eggs and altars, cyclopædias,
Grammars, prayer-books—oh! 'twere tedious,
Did I but tell thee half, to follow me:
Not the scribbling bard of Ptolemy,
No—nor the hoary Trismegistus,
(Whose writings all, thank heaven! have miss'd us,)
E'er fill'd with lumber such a wareroom
As this great “porcus literarum!”

[OMITTED]

Mamurra, a dogmatic philosopher, who never doubted about any thing, except who was his father.—“Nullâ de re unquam præterquam de patre dubitavit.” —In Vit. He was very learned—“Là-dedans, (that is, in his head when it was opened,) le Punique heurte le Persan, l'Hébreu choque l'Arabique, pour ne point parler de la mauvaise intelligence du Latin avec le Grec,” &c. —See L'Histoire de Montmaur, tom. ii. p. 91.

Bombastus was one of the names of that great scholar and quack Paracelsus.—“Philippus Bombastus latet sub splendido tegmine Aureoli Theophrasti Paracelsi,” says Stadelius de circumforaneâ Literatorum vanitate.—He used to fight the devil every night with a broadsword, to the no small terror of his pupil Oporinus, who has recorded the circumstance. (Vide Oporin. Vit. apud Christian. Gryph. Vit. Select. quorundam Eruditissimorum, &c.) Paracelsus had but a poor opinion of Galen:—“My very beard (says he in his Paragrænum) has more learning in it than either Galen or Avicenna.”

The angel, who scolded St. Jerom for reading Cicero, as Gratian tells the story in his “Concordantia discordantium Canonum,” and says, that for this reason bishops were not allowed to read the Classics: “Episcopus Gentilium libros non legat.” —Distinct. 37. But Gratian is notorious for lying —besides, angels, as the illustrious pupil of Pantenus assures us, have got no tongues. Ουχ' ως ημιν τα ωτα, ουτως εκεινοις η γλωττα: ουδ' αν οργανα τις δωη φωνης αγγελοις. —Clem. Alexand. Stromat.

The idea of the Rabbins, respecting the origin of woman, is not a little singular. They think that man was originally formed with a tail, like a monkey, but that the Deity cut off this appendage, and made woman of it. Upon this extra-ordinary supposition the following reflection is founded:—

If such is the tie between women and men,
The ninny who weds is a pitiful elf,
For he takes to his tail like an idiot again,
And thus makes a deplorable ape of himself.

Yet, if we may judge as the fashions prevail,
Every husband remembers th' original plan,
And, knowing his wife is no more than his tail,
Why he—leaves her behind him as much as he can.

Scaliger. de Emendat. Tempor.—Dagon was thought by others to be a certain sea-monster, who came every day out of the Red Sea to teach the Syrians husbandry.—See Jaques Gaffarel (Curiosités Inouies, chap. i.), who says he thinks this story of the sea-monster “carries little show of probability with it.”

I wish it were known with any degree of certainty whether the Commentary on Boethius attributed to Thomas Aquinas be really the work of this Angelic Doctor. There are some bold assertions hazarded in it: for instance, he says that Plato kept school in a town called Academia, and that Alcibiades was a very beautiful woman whom some of Aristotle's pupils fell in love with:—“Alcibiades mulier fuit pulcherrima, quam videntes quidam discipuli Aristotelis,” &c. —See Freytag Adparat. Litterar. art. 86. tom. i.

The following compliment was paid to Laurentius Valla, upon his accurate knowledge of the Latin language:—

Nunc postquam manes defunctus Valla petivit,
Non audet Pluto verba Latina loqui.
Since Val arriv'd in Pluto's shade,
His nouns and pronouns all so pat in,
Pluto himself would be afraid
To say his soul's his own, in Latin!

See for these lines the “Auctorum Censio” of Du Verdier (page 29.).

It is much to be regretted that Martin Luther, with all his talents for reforming, should yet be vulgar enough to laugh at Camerarius for writing to him in Greek. “Master Joachim (says he) has sent me some dates and some raisins, and has also written me two letters in Greek. As soon as I am recovered, I shall answer them in Turkish, that he too may have the pleasure of reading what he does not understand.” “Græca sunt, legi non possunt,” is the ignorant speech attributed to Accursius; but very unjustly:—for, far from asserting that Greek could not be read, that worthy jurisconsult upon the Law 6. D. de Bonor. Possess. expressly says, “Græcæ literæ possunt intelligi et legi.” (Vide Nov. Libror. Rarior. Collection. Fascic. IV.)—Scipio Carteromachus seems to have been of opinion that there is no salvation out of the pale of Greek Literature: “Via prima salutis Graiâ pandetur ab urbe:” and the zeal of Laurentius Rhodomannus cannot be sufficiently admired, when he exhorts his countrymen, “per gloriam Christi, per salutem patriæ, per reipublicæ decus et emolumentum,” to study the Greek language. Nor must we forget Phavorinus, the excellent Bishop of Nocera, who careless of all the usual commendations of a Christian, required no further eulogium on his tomb than “Here lieth a Greek Lexicographer.”

Ο πανυ.—The introduction of this language into English poetry has a good effect, and ought to be more universally adopted. A word or two of Greek in a stanza would serve as ballast to the most “light o' love” verses. Ausonius, among the ancients, may serve as a model:—

Ου γαρ μοι θεμις εστιν in hac regioneμενοντι.
Αξιον ab nostris επιδευεα esse καμηναις

Ronsard, the French poet, has enriched his sonnets and odes with many an exquisite morsel from the Lexicon. His “chère Entelechie,” in addressing his mistress, can only be equalled by Cowley's “Antiperistasis.”

Or Glass-Breaker—Morhofius has given an account of this extraordinary man, in a work, published 1682,—“De vitreo scypho fracto,” &c.

Translated almost literally from a passage in Albertus de Secretis, &c.

Alluding to that habitual act of the judgment, by which, notwithstanding the inversion of the image upon the retina, a correct impression of the object is conveyed to the sensorium.

Under this description, I believe “the Devil among the Scholars” may be included. Yet Leibnitz found out the uses of incomprehensibility, when he was appointed secretary to a society of philosophers at Nuremberg, chiefly for his ingenuity in writing a cabalistical letter, not one word of which either they or himself could interpret. See the Eloge Historique de M. de Leibnitz, l'Europe Savante.—People in all ages have loved to be puzzled. We find Cicero thanking Atticus for having sent him a work of Serapion “ex quo (says he) quidem ego (quod inter nos liceat dicere) millesimam partem vix intelligo.” Lib. ii. epist. 4. And we know that Avicen, the learned Arabian, read Aristotle's Metaphysics forty times over for the mere pleasure of being able to inform the world that he could not comprehend one syllable throughout them. (Nicolas Massa in Vit. Avicen.)