“Up to him, and down upon him!” says his lordship, turning to Counsellor Dunning, “what does the fellow mean?”
“Why, I mean, my lord, as deep as he thought himself, I stagged him.”
“I cannot conceive, friend,” says his lordship, “what you mean by this sort of language; I do not understand it.”
“Not understand it!” rejoined the fellow, with surprise: “Lord, what a flat you must be!”
Though he undervalued Lord Mansfield, this man does not seem to have been a very bright genius. In his cant words, “up to him, down upon him, stagged him,” there are no metaphors; and we confess ourselves to be as great flats as his lordship, for we do not understand this sort of language.
“True no meaning puzzles more than wit,”
as we may see in another English example. Proverbs have been called the wisdom of nations; therefore it is fair to have recourse to them in estimating national abilities. Now there is an old English proverb, “Tenterden steeple is the cause of Goodwin sands.”
“This proverb,” says Mr. Ray, “is used when an absurd and ridiculous reason is given of any thing in question; an account of the original whereof, I find in one of Bishop Latimer’s sermons in these words—‘Mr. Moore was once sent with commission into Kent to try out, if it might be, what was the cause of Goodwin sands, and the shelf which stopped up Sandwich haven. Thither cometh Mr. Moore, and calleth all the country before him, such as were thought to be men of experience, and men that could, of all likelihood, best satisfy him of the matter concerning the stopping of Sandwich haven. Among the rest came in before him an old man with a white head, and one that was thought to be little less than a hundred years old. When Mr. Moore saw this aged man, he thought it expedient to hear him say his mind in this matter (for being so old a man, it was likely that he knew the most in that presence or company); so Mr. Moore called this old aged man unto him and said, ‘Father,’ said he, ‘tell me, if you can, what is the cause of the great arising of the sands and shelves here about this haven, which stop it up so that no ships can arrive here. You are the oldest man I can espy in all the company, so that if any man can tell any cause of it, you, of all likelihood, can say most to it, or, at leastwise, more than any man here assembled.’
“‘Yea, forsooth, good Mr. Moore,’ quoth this old man, ‘for I am well nigh a hundred years old, and no man here in this company any thing near my age.’
“‘Well then,’ quoth Mr. Moore, ‘how say you to this matter? What think you to be the cause of these shelves and sands which stop up Sandwich haven?’