Hang sorrow, let us ne’er complain;
I think all of us should turn sots,
And fuddle with one another,
His name, and so his arms, are pots,
And a gallon pot was his mother;
Then let us brightly celebrate
This most august Pontificate.
In the main, this is nothing but a little punning or playing with words, but it is one of those agreeable trifles that may now and then be worth our thinking on.
One may add to the number of such popes as loved fuddling, all those who sat at Avignon; for if we believe Petrarch[2], the long residence that the court of Rome made at Avignon, was only to taste the good French wines; and that it was merely on that account they stayed so long in Provence, and removed with so much reluctance.
Let us now pass on to Saints and Bishops. I shall only instance one of each, because I hate prolixity. The first Saint that presents himself to me, is the renowned St. Augustin, who himself owns, that he used to get drunk sometimes. Crapula autem nonnunquam surrepit servo tuo misereberis ut longe fiat à me. Thy servant has been sometimes crop-sick through excess of wine, have mercy on me, that it may be ever far from me. It is true, [3]M. Cousin maintains against my author, M. Petit, the Journal des Sçavans, of the year 1689, 27th June, that St. Augustin, however, never got drunk. The arguments on both sides you may find in Bayle’s Dictionary, under the article Augustin. But yet there are somewhere in St. Augustin these words, viz. My soul certainly being a spirit cannot dwell in a dry place. Anima mea certè quia spiritus est, in sicco habitare non potest.