O thrice and four times happy people! cried they; you are welcome, and more than double welcome! They then kneeled down before us and would have kissed our feet, but we would not suffer it, telling them that should the pope come thither in his own person, ‘tis all they could do to him. No, certainly, answered they, for we have already resolved upon the matter. We would kiss his bare arse without boggling at it, and eke his two pounders; for he has a pair of them, the holy father, that he has; we find it so by our fine decretals, otherwise he could not be pope. So that, according to our subtle decretaline philosophy, this is a necessary consequence: he is pope; therefore he has genitories, and should genitories no more be found in the world, the world could no more have a pope.
While they were talking thus, Pantagruel inquired of one of the coxswain’s crew who those persons were. He answered that they were the four estates of the island, and added that we should be made as welcome as princes, since we had seen the pope. Panurge having been acquainted with this by Pantagruel, said to him in his ear, I swear and vow, sir, ‘tis even so; he that has patience may compass anything. Seeing the pope had done us no good; now, in the devil’s name, ‘twill do us a great deal. We then went ashore, and the whole country, men, women, and children, came to meet us as in a solemn procession. Our four estates cried out to them with a loud voice, They have seen him! they have seen him! they have seen him! That proclamation being made, all the mob kneeled before us, lifting up their hands towards heaven, and crying, O happy men! O most happy! and this acclamation lasted above a quarter of an hour.
Then came the Busby (!) of the place, with all his pedagogues, ushers, and schoolboys, whom he magisterially flogged, as they used to whip children in our country formerly when some criminal was hanged, that they might remember it. This displeased Pantagruel, who said to them, Gentlemen, if you do not leave off whipping these poor children, I am gone. The people were amazed, hearing his stentorian voice; and I saw a little hump with long fingers say to the hypodidascal, What, in the name of wonder! do all those that see the pope grow as tall as yon huge fellow that threatens us? Ah! how I shall think time long till I have seen him too, that I may grow and look as big. In short, the acclamations were so great that Homenas (so they called their bishop) hastened thither on an unbridled mule with green trappings, attended by his apposts (as they said) and his supposts, or officers bearing crosses, banners, standards, canopies, torches, holy-water pots, &c. He too wanted to kiss our feet (as the good Christian Valfinier did to Pope Clement), saying that one of their hypothetes, that’s one of the scavengers, scourers, and commentators of their holy decretals, had written that, in the same manner as the Messiah, so long and so much expected by the Jews, at last appeared among them; so, on some happy day of God, the pope would come into that island; and that, while they waited for that blessed time, if any who had seen him at Rome or elsewhere chanced to come among them, they should be sure to make much of them, feast them plentifully, and treat them with a great deal of reverence. However, we civilly desired to be excused.
Chapter 4.XLIX.—How Homenas, Bishop of Papimany, showed us the Uranopet decretals.
Homenas then said to us: ‘Tis enjoined us by our holy decretals to visit churches first and taverns after. Therefore, not to decline that fine institution, let us go to church; we will afterwards go and feast ourselves. Man of God, quoth Friar John, do you go before, we’ll follow you. You spoke in the matter properly, and like a good Christian; ‘tis long since we saw any such. For my part, this rejoices my mind very much, and I verily believe that I shall have the better stomach after it. Well, 'tis a happy thing to meet with good men! Being come near the gate of the church, we spied a huge thick book, gilt, and covered all over with precious stones, as rubies, emeralds, (diamonds,) and pearls, more, or at least as valuable as those which Augustus consecrated to Jupiter Capitolinus. This book hanged in the air, being fastened with two thick chains of gold to the zoophore of the porch. We looked on it and admired it. As for Pantagruel, he handled it and dandled it and turned it as he pleased, for he could reach it without straining; and he protested that whenever he touched it, he was seized with a pleasant tickling at his fingers’ end, new life and activity in his arms, and a violent temptation in his mind to beat one or two sergeants, or such officers, provided they were not of the shaveling kind. Homenas then said to us, The law was formerly given to the Jews by Moses, written by God himself. At Delphos, before the portal of Apollo’s temple, this sentence, GNOTHI SEAUTON, was found written with a divine hand. And some time after it, EI was also seen, and as divinely written and transmitted from heaven. Cybele’s image was brought out of heaven, into a field called Pessinunt, in Phrygia; so was that of Diana to Tauris, if you will believe Euripides; the oriflamme, or holy standard, was transmitted out of heaven to the noble and most Christian kings of France, to fight against the unbelievers. In the reign of Numa Pompilius, second King of the Romans, the famous copper buckler called Ancile was seen to descend from heaven. At Acropolis, near Athens, Minerva’s statue formerly fell from the empyreal heaven. In like manner the sacred decretals which you see were written with the hand of an angel of the cherubim kind. You outlandish people will hardly believe this, I fear. Little enough, of conscience, said Panurge. And then, continued Homenas, they were miraculously transmitted to us here from the very heaven of heavens; in the same manner as the river Nile is called Diipetes by Homer, the father of all philosophy—the holy decretals always excepted. Now, because you have seen the pope, their evangelist and everlasting protector, we will give you leave to see and kiss them on the inside, if you think meet. But then you must fast three days before, and canonically confess; nicely and strictly mustering up and inventorizing your sins, great and small, so thick that one single circumstance of them may not escape you; as our holy decretals, which you see, direct. This will take up some time. Man of God, answered Panurge, we have seen and descried decrees, and eke decretals enough o’ conscience; some on paper, other on parchment, fine and gay like any painted paper lantern, some on vellum, some in manuscript, and others in print; so you need not take half these pains to show us these. We’ll take the goodwill for the deed, and thank you as much as if we had. Ay, marry, said Homenas, but you never saw these that are angelically written. Those in your country are only transcripts from ours; as we find it written by one of our old decretaline scholiasts. For me, do not spare me; I do not value the labour, so I may serve you. Do but tell me whether you will be confessed and fast only three short little days of God? As for shriving, answered Panurge, there can be no great harm in’t; but this same fasting, master of mine, will hardly down with us at this time, for we have so very much overfasted ourselves at sea that the spiders have spun their cobwebs over our grinders. Do but look on this good Friar John des Entomeures (Homenas then courteously demi-clipped him about the neck), some moss is growing in his throat for want of bestirring and exercising his chaps. He speaks the truth, vouched Friar John; I have so much fasted that I’m almost grown hump-shouldered. Come, then, let’s go into the church, said Homenas; and pray forgive us if for the present we do not sing you a fine high mass. The hour of midday is past, and after it our sacred decretals forbid us to sing mass, I mean your high and lawful mass. But I’ll say a low and dry one for you. I had rather have one moistened with some good Anjou wine, cried Panurge; fall to, fall to your low mass, and despatch. Ods-bodikins, quoth Friar John, it frets me to the guts that I must have an empty stomach at this time of day; for, had I eaten a good breakfast and fed like a monk, if he should chance to sing us the Requiem aeternam dona eis, Domine, I had then brought thither bread and wine for the traits passes (those that are gone before). Well, patience; pull away, and save tide; short and sweet, I pray you, and this for a cause.
Chapter 4.L.—How Homenas showed us the archetype, or representation of a pope.
Mass being mumbled over, Homenas took a huge bundle of keys out of a trunk near the head altar, and put thirty-two of them into so many keyholes; put back so many springs; then with fourteen more mastered so many padlocks, and at last opened an iron window strongly barred above the said altar. This being done, in token of great mystery he covered himself with wet sackcloth, and drawing a curtain of crimson satin, showed us an image daubed over, coarsely enough, to my thinking; then he touched it with a pretty long stick, and made us all kiss the part of the stick that had touched the image. After this he said unto us, What think you of this image? It is the likeness of a pope, answered Pantagruel; I know it by the triple crown, his furred amice, his rochet, and his slipper. You are in the right, said Homenas; it is the idea of that same good god on earth whose coming we devoutly await, and whom we hope one day to see in this country. O happy, wished-for, and much-expected day! and happy, most happy you, whose propitious stars have so favoured you as to let you see the living and real face of this good god on earth! by the single sight of whose picture we obtain full remission of all the sins which we remember that we have committed, as also a third part and eighteen quarantaines of the sins which we have forgot; and indeed we only see it on high annual holidays.
This caused Pantagruel to say that it was a work like those which Daedalus used to make, since, though it were deformed and ill drawn, nevertheless some divine energy, in point of pardons, lay hid and concealed in it. Thus, said Friar John, at Seuille, the rascally beggars being one evening on a solemn holiday at supper in the spital, one bragged of having got six blancs, or twopence halfpenny; another eight liards, or twopence; a third, seven caroluses, or sixpence; but an old mumper made his vaunts of having got three testons, or five shillings. Ah, but, cried his comrades, thou hast a leg of God; as if, continued Friar John, some divine virtue could lie hid in a stinking ulcerated rotten shank. Pray, said Pantagruel, when you are for telling us some such nauseous tale, be so kind as not to forget to provide a basin, Friar John; I’ll assure you, I had much ado to forbear bringing up my breakfast. Fie! I wonder a man of your coat is not ashamed to use thus the sacred name of God in speaking of things so filthy and abominable! fie, I say. If among your monking tribes such an abuse of words is allowed, I beseech you leave it there, and do not let it come out of the cloisters. Physicians, said Epistemon, thus attribute a kind of divinity to some diseases. Nero also extolled mushrooms, and, in a Greek proverb, termed them divine food, because with them he had poisoned Claudius his predecessor. But methinks, gentlemen, this same picture is not over-like our late popes. For I have seen them, not with their pallium, amice, or rochet on, but with helmets on their heads, more like the top of a Persian turban; and while the Christian commonwealth was in peace, they alone were most furiously and cruelly making war. This must have been then, returned Homenas, against the rebellious, heretical Protestants; reprobates who are disobedient to the holiness of this good god on earth. ‘Tis not only lawful for him to do so, but it is enjoined him by the sacred decretals; and if any dare transgress one single iota against their commands, whether they be emperors, kings, dukes, princes, or commonwealths, he is immediately to pursue them with fire and sword, strip them of all their goods, take their kingdoms from them, proscribe them, anathematize them, and destroy not only their bodies, those of their children, relations, and others, but damn also their souls to the very bottom of the most hot and burning cauldron in hell. Here, in the devil’s name, said Panurge, the people are no heretics; such as was our Raminagrobis, and as they are in Germany and England. You are Christians of the best edition, all picked and culled, for aught I see. Ay, marry are we, returned Homenas, and for that reason we shall all be saved. Now let us go and bless ourselves with holy water, and then to dinner.