A continuation of the answer of the Ephectic and Pyrrhonian philosopher Trouillogan.
You speak wisely, quoth Panurge, if the moon were green cheese. Such a tale once pissed my goose. I do not think but that I am let down into that dark pit in the lowermost bottom whereof the truth was hid, according to the saying of Heraclitus. I see no whit1 at all, I hear nothing, understand as little, my senses are altogether dulled and blunted; truly I do very shrewdly suspect that I am enchanted2. I will now alter the former style of my discourse3, and talk to him in another strain. Our trusty friend, stir not, nor imburse any; but let us vary the chance, and speak without disjunctives. I see already that these loose and ill-joined members of an enunciation4 do vex5, trouble, and perplex you.
Now go on, in the name of God! Should I marry?
Trouillogan. There is some likelihood therein.
Panurge. But if I do not marry?
Trouil. I see in that no inconvenience.
Pan. You do not?
Trouil. None, truly, if my eyes deceive me not.
Pan. Yea, but I find more than five hundred.
Trouil. Reckon them.
Pan. This is an impropriety of speech, I confess; for I do no more thereby6 but take a certain for an uncertain number, and posit7 the determinate term for what is indeterminate. When I say, therefore, five hundred, my meaning is many.
Trouil. I hear you.
Pan. Is it possible for me to live without a wife, in the name of all the subterranean8 devils?
Trouil. Away with these filthy9 beasts.
Pan. Let it be, then, in the name of God; for my Salmigondinish people use to say, To lie alone, without a wife, is certainly a brutish life. And such a life also was it assevered to be by Dido in her lamentations.
Trouil. At your command.
Pan. By the pody cody, I have fished fair; where are we now? But will you tell me? Shall I marry?
Trouil. Perhaps.
Pan. Shall I thrive or speed well withal?
Trouil. According to the encounter.
Pan. But if in my adventure I encounter aright, as I hope I will, shall I be fortunate?
Trouil. Enough.
Pan. Let us turn the clean contrary way, and brush our former words against the wool: what if I encounter ill?
Trouil. Then blame not me.
Pan. But, of courtesy, be pleased to give me some advice. I heartily11 beseech12 you, what must I do?
Trouil. Even what thou wilt13.
Pan. Wishy, washy; trolly, trolly.
Trouil. Do not invocate the name of anything, I pray you.
Pan. In the name of God, let it be so! My actions shall be regulated by the rule and square of your counsel. What is it that you advise and counsel me to do?
Trouil. Nothing.
Pan. Shall I marry?
Trouil. I have no hand in it.
Pan. Then shall I not marry?
Trouil. I cannot help it.
Pan. If I never marry, I shall never be a cuckold.
Trouil. I thought so.
Pan. But put the case that I be married.
Trouil. Where shall we put it?
Pan. Admit it be so, then, and take my meaning in that sense.
Trouil. I am otherwise employed.
Pan. By the death of a hog14, and mother of a toad15, O Lord! if I durst hazard upon a little fling at the swearing game, though privily16 and under thumb, it would lighten the burden of my heart and ease my lights and reins17 exceedingly. A little patience nevertheless is requisite18. Well then, if I marry, I shall be a cuckold.
Trouil. One would say so.
Pan. Yet if my wife prove a virtuous19, wise, discreet20, and chaste21 woman, I shall never be cuckolded.
Trouil. I think you speak congruously.
Pan. Hearken.
Trouil. As much as you will.
Pan. Will she be discreet and chaste? This is the only point I would be resolved in.
Trouil. I question it.
Pan. You never saw her?
Trouil. Not that I know of.
Pan. Why do you then doubt of that which you know not?
Trouil. For a cause.
Pan. And if you should know her.
Trouil. Yet more.
Pan. Page, my pretty little darling, take here my cap,— I give it thee. Have a care you do not break the spectacles that are in it. Go down to the lower court. Swear there half an hour for me, and I shall in compensation of that favour swear hereafter for thee as much as thou wilt. But who shall cuckold me?
Trouil. Somebody.
Pan. By the belly22 of the wooden horse at Troy, Master Somebody, I shall bang, belam thee, and claw thee well for thy labour.
Trouil. You say so.
Pan. Nay23, nay, that Nick in the dark cellar, who hath no white in his eye, carry me quite away with him if, in that case, whensoever I go abroad from the palace of my domestic residence, I do not, with as much circumspection24 as they use to ring mares in our country to keep them from being sallied by stoned horses, clap a Bergamasco lock upon my wife.
Trouil. Talk better.
Pan. It is bien chien, chie chante, well cacked and cackled, shitten, and sung in matter of talk. Let us resolve on somewhat.
Trouil. I do not gainsay25 it.
Pan. Have a little patience. Seeing I cannot on this side draw any blood of you, I will try if with the lancet of my judgment26 I be able to bleed you in another vein27. Are you married, or are you not?
Trouil. Neither the one nor the other, and both together.
Pan. O the good God help us! By the death of a buffle-ox, I sweat with the toil28 and travail29 that I am put to, and find my digestion30 broke off, disturbed, and interrupted, for all my phrenes, metaphrenes, and diaphragms, back, belly, midriff, muscles, veins31, and sinews are held in a suspense32 and for a while discharged from their proper offices to stretch forth33 their several powers and abilities for incornifistibulating and laying up into the hamper34 of my understanding your various sayings and answers.
Trouil. I shall be no hinderer thereof.
Pan. Tush, for shame! Our faithful friend, speak; are you married?
Trouil. I think so.
Pan. You were also married before you had this wife?
Trouil. It is possible.
Pan. Had you good luck in your first marriage?
Trouil. It is not impossible.
Pan. How thrive you with this second wife of yours?
Trouil. Even as it pleaseth my fatal destiny.
Pan. But what, in good earnest? Tell me — do you prosper35 well with her?
Trouil. It is likely.
Pan. Come on, in the name of God. I vow36, by the burden of Saint Christopher, that I had rather undertake the fetching of a fart forth of the belly of a dead ass10 than to draw out of you a positive and determinate resolution. Yet shall I be sure at this time to have a snatch at you, and get my claws over you. Our trusty friend, let us shame the devil of hell, and confess the verity37. Were you ever a cuckold? I say, you who are here, and not that other you who playeth below in the tennis-court?
Trouil. No, if it was not predestinated.
Pan. By the flesh, blood, and body, I swear, reswear, forswear, abjure38, and renounce39, he evades and avoids, shifts, and escapes me, and quite slips and winds himself out of my grips and clutches.
At these words Gargantua arose and said, Praised be the good God in all things, but especially for bringing the world into that height of refinedness beyond what it was when I first came to be acquainted therewith, that now the learnedst and most prudent40 philosophers are not ashamed to be seen entering in at the porches and frontispieces of the schools of the Pyrrhonian, Aporrhetic, Sceptic, and Ephectic sects41. Blessed be the holy name of God! Veritably, it is like henceforth to be found an enterprise of much more easy undertaking42 to catch lions by the neck, horses by the main, oxen by the horns, bulls by the muzzle43, wolves by the tail, goats by the beard, and flying birds by the feet, than to entrap44 such philosophers in their words. Farewell, my worthy45, dear, and honest friends.
When he had done thus speaking, he withdrew himself from the company. Pantagruel and others with him would have followed and accompanied him, but he would not permit them so to do. No sooner was Gargantua departed out of the banqueting-hall than that Pantagruel said to the invited guests: Plato’s Timaeus, at the beginning always of a solemn festival convention, was wont46 to count those that were called thereto. We, on the contrary, shall at the closure and end of this treatment reckon up our number. One, two, three; where is the fourth? I miss my friend Bridlegoose. Was not he sent for? Epistemon answered that he had been at his house to bid and invite him, but could not meet with him; for that a messenger from the parliament of Mirlingois, in Mirlingues, was come to him with a writ47 of summons to cite and warn him personally to appear before the reverend senators of the high court there, to vindicate48 and justify49 himself at the bar of the crime of prevarication50 laid to his charge, and to be peremptorily51 instanced against him in a certain decree, judgment, or sentence lately awarded, given, and pronounced by him; and that, therefore, he had taken horse and departed in great haste from his own house, to the end that without peril52 or danger of falling into a default or contumacy he might be the better able to keep the prefixed and appointed time.
I will, quoth Pantagruel, understand how that matter goeth. It is now above forty years that he hath been constantly the judge of Fonsbeton, during which space of time he hath given four thousand definitive53 sentences, of two thousand three hundred and nine whereof, although appeal was made by the parties whom he had judicially54 condemned55 from his inferior judicatory to the supreme56 court of the parliament of Mirlingois, in Mirlingues, they were all of them nevertheless confirmed, ratified57, and approved of by an order, decree, and final sentence of the said sovereign court, to the casting of the appellants, and utter overthrow58 of the suits wherein they had been foiled at law, for ever and a day. That now in his old age he should be personally summoned, who in all the foregoing time of his life hath demeaned himself so unblamably in the discharge of the office and vocation59 he had been called unto, it cannot assuredly be that such a change hath happened without some notorious misfortune and disaster. I am resolved to help and assist him in equity60 and justice to the uttermost extent of my power and ability. I know the malice61, despite, and wickedness of the world to be so much more nowadays exasperated62, increased, and aggravated63 by what it was not long since, that the best cause that is, how just and equitable64 soever it be, standeth in great need to be succoured, aided, and supported. Therefore presently, from this very instant forth, do I purpose, till I see the event and closure thereof, most heedfully to attend and wait upon it, for fear of some underhand tricky65 surprisal, cavilling66 pettifoggery, or fallacious quirks67 in law, to his detriment68, hurt, or disadvantage.
Then dinner being done, and the tables drawn69 and removed, when Pantagruel had very cordially and affectionately thanked his invited guests for the favour which he had enjoyed of their company, he presented them with several rich and costly70 gifts, such as jewels, rings set with precious stones, gold and silver vessels71, with a great deal of other sort of plate besides, and lastly, taking of them all his leave, retired72 himself into an inner chamber73.
1 whit | |
n.一点,丝毫 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
2 enchanted | |
adj. 被施魔法的,陶醉的,入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
3 discourse | |
n.论文,演说;谈话;话语;vi.讲述,著述 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
4 enunciation | |
n.清晰的发音;表明,宣言;口齿 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
5 vex | |
vt.使烦恼,使苦恼 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
6 thereby | |
adv.因此,从而 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
7 posit | |
v.假定,认为 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
8 subterranean | |
adj.地下的,地表下的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
9 filthy | |
adj.卑劣的;恶劣的,肮脏的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
10 ass | |
n.驴;傻瓜,蠢笨的人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
11 heartily | |
adv.衷心地,诚恳地,十分,很 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
12 beseech | |
v.祈求,恳求 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
13 wilt | |
v.(使)植物凋谢或枯萎;(指人)疲倦,衰弱 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
14 hog | |
n.猪;馋嘴贪吃的人;vt.把…占为己有,独占 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
15 toad | |
n.蟾蜍,癞蛤蟆 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
16 privily | |
adv.暗中,秘密地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
17 reins | |
感情,激情; 缰( rein的名词复数 ); 控制手段; 掌管; (成人带着幼儿走路以防其走失时用的)保护带 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
18 requisite | |
adj.需要的,必不可少的;n.必需品 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
19 virtuous | |
adj.有品德的,善良的,贞洁的,有效力的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
20 discreet | |
adj.(言行)谨慎的;慎重的;有判断力的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
21 chaste | |
adj.贞洁的;有道德的;善良的;简朴的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
22 belly | |
n.肚子,腹部;(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分,膛 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
23 nay | |
adv.不;n.反对票,投反对票者 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
24 circumspection | |
n.细心,慎重 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
25 gainsay | |
v.否认,反驳 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
26 judgment | |
n.审判;判断力,识别力,看法,意见 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
27 vein | |
n.血管,静脉;叶脉,纹理;情绪;vt.使成脉络 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
28 toil | |
vi.辛劳工作,艰难地行动;n.苦工,难事 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
29 travail | |
n.阵痛;努力 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
30 digestion | |
n.消化,吸收 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
31 veins | |
n.纹理;矿脉( vein的名词复数 );静脉;叶脉;纹理 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
32 suspense | |
n.(对可能发生的事)紧张感,担心,挂虑 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
33 forth | |
adv.向前;向外,往外 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
34 hamper | |
vt.妨碍,束缚,限制;n.(有盖的)大篮子 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
35 prosper | |
v.成功,兴隆,昌盛;使成功,使昌隆,繁荣 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
36 vow | |
n.誓(言),誓约;v.起誓,立誓 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
37 verity | |
n.真实性 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
38 abjure | |
v.发誓放弃 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
39 renounce | |
v.放弃;拒绝承认,宣布与…断绝关系 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
40 prudent | |
adj.谨慎的,有远见的,精打细算的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
41 sects | |
n.宗派,教派( sect的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
42 undertaking | |
n.保证,许诺,事业 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
43 muzzle | |
n.鼻口部;口套;枪(炮)口;vt.使缄默 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
44 entrap | |
v.以网或陷阱捕捉,使陷入圈套 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
45 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
46 wont | |
adj.习惯于;v.习惯;n.习惯 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
47 writ | |
n.命令状,书面命令 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
48 vindicate | |
v.为…辩护或辩解,辩明;证明…正确 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
49 justify | |
vt.证明…正当(或有理),为…辩护 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
50 prevarication | |
n.支吾;搪塞;说谎;有枝有叶 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
51 peremptorily | |
adv.紧急地,不容分说地,专横地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
52 peril | |
n.(严重的)危险;危险的事物 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
53 definitive | |
adj.确切的,权威性的;最后的,决定性的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
54 judicially | |
依法判决地,公平地 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
55 condemned | |
adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
56 supreme | |
adj.极度的,最重要的;至高的,最高的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
57 ratified | |
v.批准,签认(合约等)( ratify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
58 overthrow | |
v.推翻,打倒,颠覆;n.推翻,瓦解,颠覆 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
59 vocation | |
n.职业,行业 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
60 equity | |
n.公正,公平,(无固定利息的)股票 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
61 malice | |
n.恶意,怨恨,蓄意;[律]预谋 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
62 exasperated | |
adj.恼怒的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
63 aggravated | |
使恶化( aggravate的过去式和过去分词 ); 使更严重; 激怒; 使恼火 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
64 equitable | |
adj.公平的;公正的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
65 tricky | |
adj.狡猾的,奸诈的;(工作等)棘手的,微妙的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
66 cavilling | |
n.(矿工的)工作地点抽签法v.挑剔,吹毛求疵( cavil的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句: |
|
|
67 quirks | |
n.奇事,巧合( quirk的名词复数 );怪癖 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
68 detriment | |
n.损害;损害物,造成损害的根源 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
69 drawn | |
v.拖,拉,拔出;adj.憔悴的,紧张的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
70 costly | |
adj.昂贵的,价值高的,豪华的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
71 vessels | |
n.血管( vessel的名词复数 );船;容器;(具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的)人 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
72 retired | |
adj.隐退的,退休的,退役的 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
73 chamber | |
n.房间,寝室;会议厅;议院;会所 | |
参考例句: |
|
|
欢迎访问英文小说网 |