CHAPTER XV.
_Of the Books in the Moon, and their Fashion; of Death, Burial, andBurning; of the Manner of telling the Time; and of_ Noses.
Next Morning about Nine a Clock, my Spirit came in, and told me thathe was come from Court, where bar 1] one of the QueensMaids of Honour, had sent for him, and that she had enquired after me,protesting that she still persisted in her Design to be as good as herWord; that is, that with all her Heart she would follow me, if I wouldtake her along with me to the other World; "which exceedingly pleasedme," said he, "when I understood that the chief Motive which inclinedher to the Voyage, was to become Christian: And therefore, I havepromised to forward her Design, what lies in me; and for that end toinvent a Machine that may hold three or four, wherein you may mount today, both together, if you think fit. I'll go seriously set about theperformance of my Undertaking; and in the mean time, to entertain you,during my Absence, I leave you here a Book, which heretofore I broughtwith me from my Native Countrey; the Title of it is, _The States andEmpires of the Sun, with an Addition of the History of the Spark_.[1] Ialso give you this, which I esteem much more; it is the great Work ofthe Philosophers, composed by one of the greatest Wits of the Sun.[2]He proves in it that all things are true, and shews the way of unitingPhysically the Truths of every Contradiction; as, for Example, ThatWhite is Black, and Black White; that one may be, and not be at thesame time; that there may be a Mountain without a Valley; that nothingis something, and that all things that are, are not; but observe,that he proves all these unheard-of Paradoxes without any Captious orSophistical Argument."
THE AUTHOR'S FLYING MACHINE.--From a 17th CenturyEngraving]
"When you are weary of Reading, you may Walk, or Converse with ourLandlord's Son, he has a very Charming Wit; but that which I dislikein him is, that he is a little Atheistical. If he chance to Scandalizeyou, or by any Argument shake your Faith, fail not immediately to comeand propose it to me, and I'll clear the Difficulties of it; any other,but I, would enjoin you to break Company with him; but since he isextreamly proud and conceited, I am certain he would take your flightfor a Defeat, and would believe your Faith to be grounded on no Reason,if you refused to hear his."
Having said so, he left me; and no sooner was his back turned, but Ifell to consider attentively my Books and their Boxes, that's to say,their Covers, which seemed to me to be wonderfully Rich; the one wascut of a single Diamond, incomparably more resplendent than ours; thesecond looked like a prodigious great Pearl, cloven in two. My Spirithad translated those Books into the Language of that World; but becauseI have none of their Print, I'll now explain to you the Fashion ofthese two Volumes.
[Sidenote: Books in the Moon]
As I opened the Box, I found within somewhat of Metal, almost like toour Clocks, full of I know not what little Springs and imperceptibleEngines: It was a Book, indeed; but a Strange and Wonderful Book, thathad neither Leaves nor Letters: In fine, it was a Book made wholly forthe Ears, and not the Eyes. So that when any Body has a mind to read init, he winds up that Machine with a great many Strings; then he turnsthe Hand to the Chapter which he desires to hear, and straight, as fromthe Mouth of a Man, or a Musical Instrument, proceed all the distinctand different Sounds,[3] which the _Lunar_ Grandees make use of forexpressing their Thoughts, instead of Language.
When I since reflected on this Miraculous Invention, I no longerwondred that the Young--Men of that Country were more knowing atSixteen or Eighteen years Old, than the Gray-Beards of our Climate;for knowing how to Read as soon as Speak, they are never withoutLectures,[4] in their Chambers, their Walks, the Town, or Travelling;they may have in their Pockets, or at their Girdles, Thirty of theseBooks, where they need but wind up a Spring to hear a whole Chapter,and so more, if they have a mind to hear the Book quite through; sothat you never want the Company of all the great Men, living and Dead,who entertain you with Living Voices. This Present employed me about anhour; and then hanging them to my Ears, like a pair of Pendants, I wenta Walking; but I was hardly at End of the Street when I met a Multitudeof People very Melancholy.
Four of them carried upon their Shoulders a kind of a Herse, coveredwith Black: I asked a Spectator, what that Procession, like to aFuneral in my Country, meant? He made me answer, that that naughty[Illustration bar 2] called so by the People because of a knock he hadreceived upon the Right Knee, being convicted of Envy and Ingratitude,died the day before; and that Twenty Years ago, the Parliament hadCondemned him to die in his Bed, and then to be interred after hisDeath. I fell a Laughing at that Answer. And he asking me, why? "Youamaze me," said I, "that that which is counted a Blessing in our World,as a long Life, a peaceable Death, and an Honourable Burial, shouldpass here for an exemplary Punishment." "What, do you take a Burial fora precious thing then," replyed that Man? "And, in good earnest, canyou conceive any thing more Horrid than a Corps crawling with Worms, atthe discretion of Toads which feed on his Cheeks; the Plague it selfClothed with the Body of a Man? Good God! The very thought of having,even when I am Dead, my Face wrapt up in a Shroud, and a Pike-depth ofEarth upon my Mouth, makes me I can hardly fetch breath. The Wretchwhom you see carried here, besides the disgrace of being thrown intoa Pit, hath been Condemned to be attended by an Hundred and Fiftyof his Friends; who are strictly charged, as a Punishment for theirhaving loved an envious and ungrateful Person, to appear with a sadCountenance at his Funeral; and had it not been that the Judges tooksome compassion of him, imputing his Crimes partly to his want of Wit,they would have been commanded to Weep there also.
"All are Burnt here, except Malefactors: And, indeed, it is a mostrational and decent Custom: For we believe, that the Fire havingseparated the pure from the impure, the Heat by Sympathy reassemblesthe natural Heat which made the Soul, and gives it force to mountup till it arrive at some Star, the Country of certain people moreimmaterial and intellectual than us; because their Temper ought to suitwith, and participate of the Globe which they inhabit.
"However, this is not our neatest way of Burying neither; for when anyone of our Philosophers comes to an Age, wherein he finds his Wit beginto decay, and the Ice of his years to numm the Motions of his Soul, heinvites all his Friends to a sumptuous Banquet; then having declared tothem the Reasons that move him to bid farewel to Nature, and the littlehopes he has of adding any thing more to his worthy Actions, theyshew him Favour; that's to say, they suffer him to Dye; or otherwiseare severe to him and command him to Live. When then, by plurality ofVoices, they have put his Life into his own Hands, he acquaints hisdearest Friends with the day and place. These purge, and for Four andTwenty hours abstain from Eating; then being come to the House of theSage, and having Sacrificed to the Sun, they enter the Chamber wherethe generous Philosopher waits for them on a Bed of State; every oneembraces him, and when it comes to his turn whom he loves best, havingkissed him affectionately, leaning upon his Bosom, and joyning Mouth toMouth, with his right hand he sheaths a Dagger in his Heart."
[Sidenote: Telling the Time]
I interrupted this Discourse, saying to him that told me all, That thisManner of Acting much resembled the ways of some People of our World;and so pursued my Walk, which was so long that when I came back Dinnerhad been ready Two Hours. They asked me, why I came so late? It is notmy Fault, said I to the Cook, who complained: I asked what it was aClock several times in the Street, but they made me no answer but byopening their Mouths, shutting their Teeth, and turning their Facesawry.
"How," cried all the Company, "did not you know by that, that theyshewed you what it was a Clock?" "Faith," said I, "they might haveheld their great Noses in the Sun long enough, before I had understoodwhat they meant." "It's a Commodity," said they, "that saves them theTrouble of a Watch; for with their Teeth they make so true a Dial, thatwhen they would tell any Body the Hour of the day, they do no more butopen their Lips, and the shadow of that Nose, falling upon their Teeth,like the Gnomon of a Sun-Dial, makes the precise time.
"Now that you may know the reason, why all People in this
Country havegreat Noses; as soon as a Woman is brought to Bed the Midwife carriesthe Child to the _Master of the Seminary_; and exactly at the yearsend, the Skillful being assembled, if his Nose prove shorter than thestanding Measure, which an Alderman keeps, he is judged to be a _FlatNose_, and delivered over to be gelt. You'll ask me, no doubt, theReason of that Barbarous Custom, and how it comes to pass that we,amongst whom Virginity is a Crime, should enjoyn Continence by force;but know that we do so, because after Thirty Ages experience we haveobserved, that a great Nose is the mark of a Witty, Courteous, Affable,Generous and Liberal Man; and that a little Nose is a Sign of thecontrary:[5] Wherefore of _Flat Noses_ we make Eunuchs, because theRepublick had rather have no Children at all than Children like them."
[Sidenote: Of Noses]
He was still a speaking, when I saw a man come in stark Naked; Ipresently sat down and put on my Hat to shew him Honour, for theseare the greatest Marks of Respect, that can be shew'd to any inthat Country. "The Kingdom," said he, "desires you would give theMagistrates notice, before you return to your own World; becausea Mathematician hath just now undertaken before the Council, thatprovided when you are returned home, you would make a certain Machine,that he'll teach you how to do; he'll attract your Globe, and joyn itto this."
During all this Discourse we went on with our Dinner; and as soon as werose from Table, we went to take the Air in the Garden; where takingOccasion to speak of the Generation and Conception of things, he saidto me, "You must know, that the Earth, converting it self into a Tree,from a Tree into a Hog, and from a Hog into a Man, is an Argument thatall things in Nature aspire to be Men; since that is the most perfectBeing, as being a Quintessence, and the best devised Mixture in theWorld; which alone unites the Animal and Rational Life into one. Nonebut a Pedant will deny me this, when we see that a Plumb-Tree, by theHeat of its Germ, as by a Mouth, sucks in and digests the Earth that'sabout it; that a Hog devours the Fruit of this Tree, and converts itinto the Substance of it self; and that a Man feeding on that Hog,reconcocts that dead Flesh, unites it to himself, and makes that Animalto revive under a more Noble Species. So the Man whom you see, perhapsthreescore years ago was no more but a Tuft of Grass in my Garden;which is the more probable, that the Opinion of the _PythagoreanMetamorphosis_, which so many Great Men maintain, in all likelyhood hasonly reached us to engage us into an Enquiry after the truth of it; as,in reality, we have found that Matter, and all that has a Vegetativeor Sensitive Life, when once it hath attained to the period of itsPerfection, wheels about again and descends into its Inanity, that itmay return upon the Stage and Act the same Parts over and over." I wentdown extreamly satisfyed to the Garden, and was beginning to rehearseto my Companion what our Master had taught me; when the Physiognomistcame to conduct us to Supper, and afterwards to Rest.
[1] Cyrano's own work. It is full of interesting matters, includinga trip through the country of the Birds, which offers many points ofcomparison with Gulliver's Voyage to the country of the Houyhnhms.Cyrano finally, under the guidance of Campanella, arrives at the landof the Philosophers of the Sun (compare Swift's Laputa), where he meetsDescartes and Gassendi, as Gulliver does in the Laputan province ofGlubbdubdrib (Voyage to Laputa, chap. viii.).
Cyrano's machine for reaching the sun, depicted in the illustrationopposite, is best described in the words of M. Rostand's play, andcompletes our parallels with all the six means of scaling the skywhich Cyrano there enumerates: "Or else, I could have let the windinto a cedar coffer, then ratified the imprisoned element by means ofcunningly adjusted burning glasses, and soared up with it."
[2] Probably Campanella; cf. p. 78, n. 1. On his "great work," _cf_.also p. 79, n. 1. (see note 12 and 13 chap. VII.)
[3] Is this an anticipation of the phonograph?
[4] _Readings_. Cf. Sir Thomas Browne: "In the lecture of HolyScripture, their apprehensions are commonly confined unto the literalsense of the text."
[5] _Cf_. M. Rostand's _Cyrano de Bergerac_, act I. scene iv.:"_Cyrano_. A great nose is properly the index of an affable, kindly,courteous man, witty, liberal, brave, such as I am! and such as you areforevermore precluded from supposing yourself, deplorable rogue!"
Histoire comique des états et empires de la lune. English Page 18