Part 1 — Francis Rablais, to the Physicians of Paris.

IT is in vain for your flatterers to cry you up for able doctors, for you will never arrive at my knowledge; and I am asham’d every hour to hear such asses are admitted into the college. Do not believe ’tis a sensible vanity that induces me to say this, but the perfect knowledge I have of my own worth; and tho’ I was design’d for a more lazy profession, yet that does not in the least diminish my merit. You know I was born at Chinon, and that my parents, hoping I should one day make a precious saint, put me, in my foolish infancy, into a convent of Cordeliers: but that greasy habit, in a little time, seem’d to me as heavy and uneasy as the armour of a giant; so that by intercession made to Pope Clement VII. I was permitted to change my grey frock for a black; so I quitted the equipage of St. Francis for that of St. Benedict, and that I was as weary of in a short time as of the other. As I had learnt a great deal of craft, and but little religion, during my noviciate in those good schools, so I found a way to get loose from that cloyster for ever, and took to the study of Hippocrates. Besides that I had a subtle and clear genius; my comrades discover’d in me an acute natural raillery, which made me acceptable to the best companions, Cardinal Bellay, who made me his physician, took me to Rome with him in that quality, where the sanctity of the triple crown, the ador’d slipper, and all-opening key, could not hinder me from jesting in the presence of his holiness. ’Twas Paul III. before called Alexander Fernese, who then fill’d the apostolical chair, and was more remarkable for his lewdness than piety. I had the good fortune to please him with the inclination he found in me to lewdness; and he gave me a bull of absolution for my apostacy, free from all fee and duties, which I think was a gracious reward for a foreign, atheistical buffoon. After I had compil’d a catalogue of his vices, to make use of as I should find an opportunity, the cardinal, my patron, return’d to Paris, and I with him, where he immediately gratify’d me with a canonship of St. Maur, and the benefice of Meudon. Hiving all I could desire, I liv’d luxuriously; and the love of satire pleasing me much more than the service of God, after I had wrote several things without success, for the learned, I composed the history of Gargantua and Pantagruel; for the ignorant, things which some call a cock and a bull, and others the product of a lively imagination. I know most men understand them as little as they do Arabick; and as it is not to our present purpose, so do not I intend to explain that stuff to them, but will now, since ’tis more a propos, give you some advice concerning the malady of your blustering monarch. The residence I made at the court of France, in the reign of Francis I. makes me more bold in judging of the nature of those distempers. You conceal the virulency of Lewis XIVth’s disease, because you dare not examine into the bottom of the cause, and are more modest in proposing remedies, than he has been in contracting the distemper. Yet every one talks according to his interest, and the news-mongers always keep a blank to set down the manner of his death. If he does not tremble, he must be thorow-pac’d in iniquity, for he has several reckonings to make up with Heaven, which are not so easily adjusted; and as he has often affronted the majesty of several popes, he will scarce obtain a pass-port to go scot-free into the other world. We are told here, by some of his good friends, he begins to putrify, and has ulcers a yard in length, where vermin, very soldier like, intrench themselves. There is no other remedy for this, according to old Æsculapius, but to make him a new man, by a severe penitential pilgrimage into some of the provinces of Mercury and Turpentine. If he still fears the danger of war, let him go in disguise; and if at this age he cannot be without a she-companion, let him take his old friend Maintenon along with him, she is poison-proof, and may, to save charges, serve him in three capacities, viz. as a bedfellow, nurse, and guide; keep him also to a strict diet; scrape his bones, and purge him thoroughly, and all may be found again but his conscience. You cannot imagine how merrily we gentlemen of the faculty live at Pluto’s court: I am secretary to the same Paul III. who pardon’d me gratis the violation of my vows, my irreverence for the church, and my want of respect for him; Scaramouch is his gentleman-usher, Harlequin his page, and Scarron his poet laureat. Don’t suppose I was such a blockhead as to kiss his sweaty toe, when I visited him in the Vatican; he had nothing from me, but such an hypocritical hug, as your monks give each other at the ridiculous ceremony of high-mass. This old goat still keeps his amorous inclinations; and I, who have so often made others blush, am often asham’d to hear his ribaldry. He would certainly make love to Proserpine, but our sultan would not be pleas’d with his courtship; and besides, his seraglio is as well guarded as the grand seignior’s, otherwise we might have a litter of fine puppies betwixt them. Little hump-shoulder’d Luxembourg, lately mareschal of France, is the captain of her guards, and so damnably jealous, that he will not suffer any to come near her; at which Pluto is very well pleas’d, and does not mistrust him, thinking it impossible for any body to be in love with such a lump of deformity. But to return to our friend Paul, he scorns to copy after the Devil, who turn’d hermit when he was old; and I am now making another collection of his impieties and amours, which will be ready to come out with a Gazette Nostradamus he has been composing since the year 1600. That sly conjurer is so earnest upon the matter, that he lifts not up his head, tho’ Pluto’s black-guard boys are continually burning brimstone under his nose. However, I do not know but this mountain may bring forth a mouse; for to speak freely, I put as little faith in those prophets, who, like sots, lose their reason in the abyss of futurity, as the honest whigs of England do in the oaths and treaties of your swaggering master. As for you, brother doctor, cut, scarify, blister, and glyster, since ’tis your profession; but take this along with you, that they who do the least mischief, pass with me for the ablest men. But I would advise you not to suffer any longer those barbarous names of assassins, poisoners, closestool-mongers, factors of death, &c. the world gives you. I have had high words with Moliere on your account, and I expect that fine rhiming fellow, Boileau, will give him a wipe over the nose in one of his satires. For tho’ I have made bold to talk freely with you, yet I do not mean all the world should take the same liberty.

The Answer of Mr. Fagon, first Physician to Lewis XIV. to Francis Rablais.

YOU are a very pretty gentleman, friend Rablais, to boast of yourself so much, and value the rest of your fraternity so little. Do not you know that I am of the tribe of Judah, and perhaps related to some of the kings of Israel? Had you heard me preach in a synagogue, you wou’d soon be convinc’d whether I am an illiterate fellow or no. Is it such an honour to be of your college? Or wou’d it be any advantage to be like you? You have been, by your own confession, a most horrid rake-hell; and I would not, for all the mammon of unrighteousness in my king’s coffer, transgress one point of the law. You ought not to be astonished at my greatness, for I concern myself with more than one trade, and no man was ever in such favour, and grew so rich, by only applying warm injections to the backside. If you enjoy’d a prebend, and other benefices, you must, I know, have assisted cardinal Bellay in his amours. For my part, I boast of having been a broker, sollicitor, and, under the rose, Billet-deux carrier and door-keeper, because all employments at court are honourable, especially in that great concern of S——y. Do not you think you were the first that thought of the remedy you speak of; we had several learned consultations about it, but know not which way to mention it, for Madam Scarron, who is very tender of her reputation, and reigns sovereignly at court, will say we accuse her of bringing the Neapolitan distemper to Versailles, and have us sent to the gallies, or hang’d for our good advice. I have often reflected on the scandalous bantering stuff of those they call wits, have said, and do say of us; and wish with all my heart, the first brimstone they take for the itch, and mercury for the pox, may poison ’em; but for us to stir in’t, would bring ’em all about our ears; and we know the consequence of that from a neighbouring [43] country, where they have mumbled a poor physician [44], and one that can versify also, almost as severely as a troop of hungry wolves would a fat ass. However, we thank you for your zeal; but at the same time advise you not to make a quarrel for so small a business; and I, in a particular manner, kiss your hand, and desire you will give my service to Nostradamus. I cannot beat it out of my head, but that he has put me into his [45] centuries; and that an ingenious man might discover me there. I own ’tis looking for a needle in a bottle of hay; but you know I sprung up like a mushroom, and that he foretels nothing but prodigies.