 | The merry tales of the three wise men of Gotham |  |
INTRODUCTORY DISSERTATION.
Although most of the celebrated cities of antiquity
have been described with such accuracy, and
their situations pointed out with so much precision,
that there is little difficulty in at least making a
tolerable guess at their remains; yet are there
two most remarkable exceptions. To this day no
one has succeeded in establishing beyond question
where Babylon once stood, and still less have the
most indefatigable inquiries even led to a reasonable
conjecture as to the site of the little less renowned
city of Gotham. No circumstance can furnish a
higher proof of the superiority of the works of the
head, over those of the hands, than that the fame of
these two great cities should have been preserved
in books long after every other certain vestige of
their existence, had perished from the face of the
earth.
History, sacred and profane, alone preserves the
remembrance of Babylon; and of Gotham, we
possess scarcely any other memorial than the immortal
work. And this example furnishes a striking proof
of the importance of heroes, poets and philosophers
in cities and states. How many of these
have been utterly forgotten in the lapse of time,
merely for want of some great man to rescue
them from oblivion! How many of the most insignificant
have, on the contrary, become renowned
solely in consequence of having been the birth-place
or residence of some illustrious citizen!
Who would ever have heard of Stagira, but for the
nativity of Aristotle? Who would have remembered
half the cities that contended for the honour of
being the birth-place of Homer, had it not been for
that illustrious rivalry? who would not go ten miles
out of the way to avoid Arpinum, but for the glory
of Cicero? And who, finally, would ever have
dreamed of the existence of such a city as Gotham,
had it not been for the unparalleled distinction of
having possessed three sages at one and the same
time, a circumstance which places her far above all
the cities of ancient Greece. They had their
single wise men; and all that the force of ancient
genius seems to have been capable of, was to produce
one of these at a time. In short, a thousand
proofs are extant to show that the memory of
illustrious men constitutes those everlasting links
which bind together the different ages and nations
of the earth; and that were it not for these indestructable
have any thing to remind us, that we have been
preceded by hundreds of generations.
These reflections may serve to place in a more
striking point of view the ingratitude of mankind,
in so often neglecting or persecuting those profound
sages and philosophers, who not only confer
upon them while living the most substantial benefits,
but carry the renown of their birth-place
to the latest posterity. The virtues, talents, and
glorious services, of illustrious men of every nation,
constitute their best inheritance, their most
rational source of pride and exultation, and it has
often happened that the renown of a people, like
that of the Thebans, began and ended with a single
man. Yet how often we find nations either entirely
indifferent to their best benefactors, or persecuting
them with all the barbarous rigors of religious,
political, or philosophical intolerance! Not to
mention the numerous instances recorded of ancient
times, we shall find, even in the most enlightened
ages, humanized by the mild and forgiving
precepts of Christianity, these examples if possible
still more numerous and flagrant. Galileo is a
hackneyed instance; but it is not so generally
known that Newton was charged by biogtry and
ignorance with holding opinions at war with orthodoxy,
and Locke expelled from that reverend
bedlam, Oxford, by political intolerance. Among
enlightened of reasoners, Melancthon, Erasmus,
and even Theodore Beza, were suspected and denounced,
because they did not keep pace with the
rampant zealots of the times, who would willingly
have warmed them at the stake. In short, it
would seem to be among the inflexible dispensations
of Providence, that no selfish motive should
ever operate upon the great benefactors of mankind,
in their glorious endeavours, since all they
can rationally anticipate as their reward in this
world, is to pass their lives amid persecutions and
slanders, among a race of ungrateful beings, who
never become sensible of their ingratitude or their
obligations, still it is too late to make reparation.
Owing to this waywardness of mankind it has
happened, that now when a disposition prevails to
do justice to the illustrious dead, and for want of a
sufficient number of distinguished persons to employ
the pens of the innumerable biographers that stand
ready, pen in hand, to strip the dead before they are
cold, and lay their foibles open to the world, they
are fain to bestow their labours on persons whose
greatest merit is their insignificance.—Owing to
this, I say, it has happened that not only the precise
place occupied by the famous city of Gotham,
but likewise the æra in which her three sages
flourished, cannot now be ascertained. All that
can be done is to grope in the obscurity of vague
than before. It may be, however, worth while to
pass in review the different opinions heretofore advanced
upon this important point.
Some will have it, that Gotham was the ancient
capital of the Goths, of whom, we thank our stars,
king Roderick was the last, according to Mr.
Southey. At any rate we hope it will be the last
of the laureate's epics. Others, on the contrary,
have maintained with great zeal that Gotham is a
corruption of Gotha, the seat of a northern university,
where they philosophise pretty deeply, and
study metaphysics. A third class of inquirers affirm,
that such a city never existed, because they
have not been able to find any traces of its existence,
which in our opinion is the poorest reason in
the world. The four lines of our title-page, furnish
better proof of its existence than all the fragments
of Carthage, or stately ruins of Thebes and Palmyra.
Antiquaries ought to blush for such frivolous doubts!
They are utterly unworthy of the strong faith which
should ever animate this class of explorers.
Among the vast variety of opinions upon this
point, that which identifies Gotham with the famous
city of Gottingen, which is the seat of a university,
founded by the renowned Baron Munchausen,
is not the least plausible at first sight. There
are numerous examples not only of cities but of
empires, whose names, being ill adapted to poetry,
harmonious. In short, almost all countries have a
prosaical and a poetical name—Gallia, Iberia, Ausonia,
Hesperia, Albion, Hibernia, Columbia, and a
hundred others, will at once occur to the general
reader. It will readily be concealed by all unprejudiced
persons, that Gottingen, is neither sonorous,
musical or poetical, and therefore without any
great violation of probability, we may suppose a
poet of a delicate ear would soften it down to Gotham,
a name wonderfully adapted to poetry. But
there is a still stronger presumption in favour of this
opinion. At Gottingen, as we are credibly informed,
the professors actually adventure upon animal
magnetism, phrenology and such dangerous sciences,
which would seem to justify a shrewd suspicion,
they would not be a whit too good to venture out
to sea in a large bowel, well ballasted with punch,
such as whilom used to be placed upon the smoking
board of a jolly New Netherlander, by four stout
menials on new year's eve, ere the dire irruption of
liqueurs, and other outlandish poisons. Nor would
this adventure have appeared so rash as might seem
at first sight, since we have been assured by a person
of great experience in nautical affairs and
punch drinking, that there is a natural antipathy
between salt water and punch, insomuch that being
once half seas over, he fell into the ocean with a
bowl of punch in his hands, and floated several
not a single drop of sea water had polluted his beverage
all this while. He declares a punch bowl
is far preferable to a life boat, and a skin well
lined with punch, a thousand times superior to a
cork jacket. These facts are sufficient to put to
the blush, all those who conceive it any imputation
upon our Three Wise Men, that they should venture
to sea in a bowl.
But there is one opinion put forth by certain
English writers, who, if they could bring it about,
would not leave the rest of the world a single philosopher,
which we are inclined to treat with infinite
contempt. We mean the absurd notion, that
Gothan is actually a town in Northamptonshire,
or rather a rotten borough, which, although
entirely destitute of inhabitants, returns three
members, who are generally called the Wise Men
of Gotham, because they instinctively vote with
the ministry, agreeably to the instructions of their
constituents. It is said that this place was remarkable
for goats in the time of William the conqueror,
and that the people used to ride them,
instead of horses, which, in the opinion of some,
gave rise to their being called the Wise Men, or
according to the opinions of others, the Mad Men
of Gotham. A great Oxford antiquary, of whom
it has been said that he remembered whatever
others forgot, and forgot whatever other people
Mad Men of Gotham,” a work in great repute
in his time, when the kindest name given to a philosopher,
was that of madman, a phrase which often
saved him from the stake or the block. This
work was long supposed to be extinct, but at length
came to light, not long since, at Mr. Bindley's sale,
and was bought by a young American traveller for
a trifle, owing to the deplorable ignorance of two
munificent noblemen, who little suspected that it
was the only copy in the known world, and for that
reason considered it as worth nothing.
It is this work which is now presented to the
reader, divested of its antique garb, that it may be
more extensively circulated and understood, and
restored to its genuine title of the “Merry Tales of
the Three Wise Men of Gotham.” It was thought
inhuman to hoard up the treasure, and keep all this
huge bundle of knowledge to ourselves, after the
manner of certain great lovers of literature, who
think a book is like a mistress, of no value if her
beauties are enjoyed by another. But to return to
our subject.
Though we have adopted the work as genuine,
we are by no means inclined to humour the English
writers in their claim to this illustrious city. They
are welcome to London and Liverpool, and even to
Oxford and Cambridge, with all our heart. But as
to the renowned city of Gotham, we will not yield
country. We are willing to let the matter rest as
it is, so that every nation may have an equal claim,
but our disinterestedness will go no farther. All we
will concede is, that Gotham, like some illustrious
philosophers and benefactors of the human race, is
a city belonging to the whole civilized world. The
emporium of the arts, the head-quarters of philosophy,
and the illustrious seat of the perfection of
reason. Whether in the new or the old world, is
of little consequence, since such is its glory and
renown, that there is quite enough of it to satisfy
half a dozen worlds. Leaving this part of our
inquiry to take care of itself, we will proceed to
discuss other equally important matters.
It cannot be sufficiently lamented by those who
rightly consider the forgetting of any thing a great
misfortune, whether it was worth remembering or
not, that such a culpable carelessness and indifference
prevailed in early times in respect of the little peculiarities
and private particulars which no doubt
distinguished the great men of those days. It is
melancholy to think how much we read, and how
little we know of, the great writers of antiquity.
The race of pains-taking biographers, who in the present
age so amply furnish all these interesting particulars,
was unknown at that time, at least none of
their works have come down to us. It is owing in
a great measure to this circumstance, that the great
over the moderns; not that they were really
wiser or more virtuous, or brave, but because
there were no prying, curious, industrious, pains-taking
persons, who noted their foibles, set down
their folly for wisdom, and made use of the intimacy
they had obtained by cringing sycophancy, to furnish
themselves with materials to shame them with
posterity.
Thus it is that the ancients tower above the moderns,
because of the former we know scarcely any
thing but what is great, and the greatness of the latter
is overshadowed by littlenesses. Their virtues
and vices, their wisdom and folly, their magnanimity
and meanness, their strength and their weakness,
are so mixed up, and withal so impartially dwelt
upon by the faithful biographer, that we approach
the most illustrious sage with the familiarity of a
pert valet, by long service become acquainted with
all the foibles and secrets of his master. We become
as it were quite relieved from that sense of
degrading inferiority inspired by the naked simplicity
of ancient virtue, as handed down to us by
writers so neglectful of their duty, as one half the
time to forget whether their heroes had in reality
any vices to bring them down to the level of humanity.
Still more is it to be regretted that the noble ambition
of collecting those works which derive their
did not originate somewhat earlier, and before
so many valuable relics, so much invaluable information,
had been irretrievably lost. Follies and
weaknesses that might have been dignified by the
examples of illustrious men, are become degraded
by being supposed to appertain exclusively to the
vulgar; and the mousing gossips of literature cheated
of all chance of pulling to pieces the character of
an ancient worthy.
This blameable neglect in recording the littlenesses
and preserving memorials of the vices of
great persons, can perhaps best be accounted for
and excused, on the supposition that a great portion
of the now illustrious sages of antiquity had not
their merits brought to light until long after they
were dead, when the only memorials of their
having once existed, were their immortal works.
Conquerors, heroes, and fashionable bards, receive
the admiration of their cotemporaries, and reap
their harvest while living; but sages and virtuous
men must, for the most part, content themselves
with being venerated in their ashes, and rewarded
in a future world. The difference between the
mere vulgar idol of a fashionable mob, and the retired
votary of wisdom, genius, and virtue, is, that
the one is remembered while living and forgot when
dead, while the other emerges to light and immortality
at the moment he ceases to live. It is then
time, discover that he is worth disinterring, and
that they set about disturbing his ashes, and raking
up, with pious industry, the memory of all those
little, frivolous, and impertinent particulars, the
knowledge of which answers little other purpose
but that of adding to our contempt for poor human
nature. Thus it is, that the longer the time which
clapses after the death of great men, before mankind
discover they were really great, the more
fortunate for their lasting reputation. They revive
with greater lustre, when all the little clouds and
shadows which dimmed their glories are passed
away, and appear in the imperishable brightness
of their own immortal productions. Of Homer,
Shakspeare, and the few names that occupy the
summit of the temple of Fame, how little do we
know; while every body knows all about the lesser
lights, that will twinkle for a little while in the
darkness which surrounds them, and then go out
for ever. The “Great Unknown,” has, we
are credibly informed, not less than six industrious
“resurrection men,” watching day and night only
for the breath to be fairly out of his body, to make
an example of him. Nay, so impatient are they
for his decease, that it is currently rumoured on this
side the water, they have it in serious contemplation
to make away with him the first convenient
opportunity, in their apprehension that he will
them all. We earnestly advise him not to go out at
night, nor wander in solitary places; or at least, if
he will, to wear a coat of mail, and take every reasonable
precaution. It would be twice unfortunate,
to be first made away with, in cold blood, and afterward
murdered in a biography. The best way, we
think, and we advise him to it forthwith, will be to
write his own life, after the manner of certain persecuted
worthies, who, in order to disappoint the
mob of a public spectacle, fairly hang themselves
up the night before execution. Be this as it may,
it is, without doubt, owing in a great measure to
the fact, that our Three Wise Men were of the
class of the immortals who live only in after ages,
that their fame has lain thus long, as it were in
abeyance, while so many insignificant persons have
been handed down with honour, not indeed from
generation to generation, but from the reviewer to
the magazines, and from the magazines to the
newspapers.
A still greater uncertainty, obtains in respect
to the precise æra in which our sages flourished,
than exists in relation to the place of
their nativity. In the original Black Letter copy,
neither the date of the publication, nor the name of
the printer, are preserved, so that we are left entirely
in the dark, as to these interesting particulars.
Neither can any thing decisive be inferred,
events alluded to, in the course of the work, since
nothing is more certain than that the opinions as
well as the events of the world, like the world itself,
are perpetually moving in a circle. Revolving
years, as they bring about a return of the same
seasons, and the same fashions in dress, reproduce
at the same time similar errors of the vulgar, and
absurdities of the wise. Old errors are pretty sure
to return, after having been absent long enough to
be forgotten, under a new name, and with a new
face. They are like spaniels; we cannot beat them
from us. Thus it is, in like manner, with the theories
and inventions which are daily passed upon us
for original, but which for the most part, will be
found to be nothing more than revivals of old and
exploded fashions, which the world had wore till it
was tired, and then thrown by among the lumber of
antiquity, for some new rattle, that had its day, and
then followed its predecessor, quietly into a temporary
oblivion. To argue then that the following
work is modern, because it treats of topics fashionable
at the present day, is in effect to deny, what is
certainly true, that one age is a mere edition of
another, with some alterations, but the contents
substantially the same. It tickles human vanity, to
tell us, that we are wiser than our fathers; and it
is one of those propositions, which is likely to pass
without contradiction, from the circumstance that
gone. But if the grave could speak, and the
churchyards vote upon the question, we living
boasters would be in a most pitiful minority. That
the knowledge of mankind is not always progressive,
and one age inevitably wiser than another, is exemplified
most miserably in the history of the
world. It is only to cast our eyes towards the
country of Homer, of Aristotle, and of Socrates, to
behold millions of living testimonies to prove that
the mind of man, like the crab, moves backwards
and forwards with equal facility, and that ages of
knowledge seem naturally succeeded by ages of
ignorance. Man cannot do or know every thing
at once; and it is not altogether improbable, that in
proportion as a succeeding age adds to the knowledge
of a preceding one, it makes way for it, by
displacing something equally important. Men may
forget as well as learn; and, without doubt, many,
very many, wise and virtuous habits and practices
have been from time to time elbowed out of the
world, to make room for outlandish and pestilent
novelties. He, therefore, who should take upon
him, to pronounce this work a production of the
present age, merely on the authority of the topics
it discusses, would very probably decide that the
elderly gentlemen about town are all young, because
some of them dress like dandies, dance cotillions,
and aspire to the possession of youthful belles.
Some may suppose that the names of the Three
Wise Men, might possibly lead to detection. But
we feel bound in candour to confess that these are
of our own invention. Such is the innate modesty
of true wisdom, that not one of this illustrious trio
ever took occasion to disclose his name to any living
person, so far as we have been able to discover.
Certain it is, that if they did, the author or compiler,
whose name is equally unknown, has either wilfully
or ignorantly omitted it through the whole course
of the work, leaving blanks, which we thought proper
to fill up to the best of our judgment, as the
frequent omissions had an unpleasant effect on the
eye of the reader.
The circumstance of their going to sea in a bowl,
we are rather inclined to consider as allegorical;
or perhaps it may be a poetic licence. At all
events, whether it be so or not, it indicates in the
most striking manner, the opinion entertained by
the poet, of their daring intrepidity in thus venturing
out upon the most unstable of all elements, in so
frail a barque. It shows a contempt of danger,
when encountered in search of knowledge, far
above that of Belzoni, Parke, Hornman, or any
martyr to Egyptian mummies, incognita African
rivers, or northwest passages. A love of knowledge,
so elevated above all fear of consequences,
places them on a level with that distinguished
phrenologist of Edinburgh, who is reported to have
the truth of his favourite science.
Having now, as we presume to flatter ourselves,
sufficiently established to the satisfaction of the
reader the three points we set out to prove, to wit,
that neither the birth-place, the æra, or the names of
the Three Wise Men of Gotham, can now ever be
known, we shall put an end to our inquiry. Before
we conclude, however, we will take occasion to
state, that the engraving in the title-page, is an
exact copy of the frontispiece to the Black
Letter copy. Should any doubt the existence of
the original, we refer them to our publisher, for
further satisfaction.
It may be proper to add that there is neither introduction
nor preface to the originals of these Tales;
no explanation of the particular circumstances
which brought our Three Wise Men together; nor
of the occasion which prompted them to relate their
stories to each other. We may reasonably, however,
suppose that it was done to while away the
tedium of a long voyage; and that upon some placid
summer morning, while the wave was calm, the
sky serene, the sea-birds skimming over head, and
the dolphins playing beside them, the Man Machine,
being politely requested by his companions, began,
as will be seen in the following pages.
| The merry tales of the three wise men of Gotham | |