ArcaMax Publishing > Books > Fiction > The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman > Section 22
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Laurence Sterne

Section 22 of 48 - Table of Contents
Chapter 2.L.

I wish I could write a chapter upon sleep.

A fitter occasion could never have presented itself, than what this moment
offers, when all the curtains of the family are drawn--the candles put out-
-and no creature's eyes are open but a single one, for the other has been
shut these twenty years, of my mother's nurse.

It is a fine subject.

And yet, as fine as it is, I would undertake to write a dozen chapters upon
button-holes, both quicker and with more fame, than a single chapter upon
this.

Button-holes! there is something lively in the very idea of 'em--and trust
me, when I get amongst 'em--You gentry with great beards--look as grave as
you will--I'll make merry work with my button-holes--I shall have 'em all
to myself--'tis a maiden subject--I shall run foul of no man's wisdom or
fine sayings in it.

But for sleep--I know I shall make nothing of it before I begin--I am no
dab at your fine sayings in the first place--and in the next, I cannot for
my soul set a grave face upon a bad matter, and tell the world--'tis the
refuge of the unfortunate--the enfranchisement of the prisoner--the downy
lap of the hopeless, the weary, and the broken-hearted; nor could I set out
with a lye in my mouth, by affirming, that of all the soft and delicious
functions of our nature, by which the great Author of it, in his bounty,
has been pleased to recompence the sufferings wherewith his justice and his
good pleasure has wearied us--that this is the chiefest (I know pleasures
worth ten of it); or what a happiness it is to man, when the anxieties and
passions of the day are over, and he lies down upon his back, that his soul
shall be so seated within him, that whichever way she turns her eyes, the
heavens shall look calm and sweet above her--no desire--or fear--or doubt
that troubles the air, nor any difficulty past, present, or to come, that
the imagination may not pass over without offence, in that sweet secession.

'God's blessing,' said Sancho Panca, 'be upon the man who first invented
this self-same thing called sleep--it covers a man all over like a cloak.'
Now there is more to me in this, and it speaks warmer to my heart and
affections, than all the dissertations squeez'd out of the heads of the
learned together upon the subject.

--Not that I altogether disapprove of what Montaigne advances upon it--'tis
admirable in its way--(I quote by memory.)

The world enjoys other pleasures, says he, as they do that of sleep,
without tasting or feeling it as it slips and passes by.--We should study
and ruminate upon it, in order to render proper thanks to him who grants it
to us.--For this end I cause myself to be disturbed in my sleep, that I may
the better and more sensibly relish it.--And yet I see few, says he again,
who live with less sleep, when need requires; my body is capable of a firm,
but not of a violent and sudden agitation--I evade of late all violent
exercises--I am never weary with walking--but from my youth, I never looked
to ride upon pavements.  I love to lie hard and alone, and even without my
wife--This last word may stagger the faith of the world--but remember, 'La
Vraisemblance' (as Bayle says in the affair of Liceti) 'n'est pas toujours
du Cote de la Verite.'  And so much for sleep.



Chapter 2.LI.

If my wife will but venture him--brother Toby, Trismegistus shall be
dress'd and brought down to us, whilst you and I are getting our breakfasts
together.--

--Go, tell Susannah, Obadiah, to step here.

She is run up stairs, answered Obadiah, this very instant, sobbing and
crying, and wringing her hands as if her heart would break.

We shall have a rare month of it, said my father, turning his head from
Obadiah, and looking wistfully in my uncle Toby's face for some time--we
shall have a devilish month of it, brother Toby, said my father, setting
his arms a'kimbo, and shaking his head; fire, water, women, wind--brother
Toby!--'Tis some misfortune, quoth my uncle Toby.--That it is, cried my
father--to have so many jarring elements breaking loose, and riding triumph
in every corner of a gentleman's house--Little boots it to the peace of a
family, brother Toby, that you and I possess ourselves, and sit here silent
and unmoved--whilst such a storm is whistling over our heads.--

And what's the matter, Susannah?  They have called the child Tristram--and
my mistress is just got out of an hysterick fit about it--No!--'tis not my
fault, said Susannah--I told him it was Tristram-gistus.

--Make tea for yourself, brother Toby, said my father, taking down his hat-
-but how different from the sallies and agitations of voice and members
which a common reader would imagine!

--For he spake in the sweetest modulation--and took down his hat with the
genteelest movement of limbs, that ever affliction harmonized and attuned
together.

--Go to the bowling-green for corporal Trim, said my uncle Toby, speaking
to Obadiah, as soon as my father left the room.



Chapter 2.LII.

When the misfortune of my Nose fell so heavily upon my father's head;--the
reader remembers that he walked instantly up stairs, and cast himself down
upon his bed; and from hence, unless he has a great insight into human
nature, he will be apt to expect a rotation of the same ascending and
descending movements from him, upon this misfortune of my Name;--no.

The different weight, dear Sir--nay even the different package of two
vexations of the same weight--makes a very wide difference in our manner of
bearing and getting through with them.--It is not half an hour ago, when
(in the great hurry and precipitation of a poor devil's writing for daily
bread) I threw a fair sheet, which I had just finished, and carefully wrote
out, slap into the fire, instead of the foul one.

Instantly I snatch'd off my wig, and threw it perpendicularly, with all
imaginable violence, up to the top of the room--indeed I caught it as it
fell--but there was an end of the matter; nor do I think any think else in
Nature would have given such immediate ease:  She, dear Goddess, by an
instantaneous impulse, in all provoking cases, determines us to a sally of
this or that member--or else she thrusts us into this or that place, or
posture of body, we know not why--But mark, madam, we live amongst riddles
and mysteries--the most obvious things, which come in our way, have dark
sides, which the quickest sight cannot penetrate into; and even the
clearest and most exalted understandings amongst us find ourselves puzzled
and at a loss in almost every cranny of nature's works:  so that this, like
a thousand other things, falls out for us in a way, which tho' we cannot
reason upon it--yet we find the good of it, may it please your reverences
and your worships--and that's enough for us.

Now, my father could not lie down with this affliction for his life--nor
could he carry it up stairs like the other--he walked composedly out with
it to the fish-pond.

Had my father leaned his head upon his hand, and reasoned an hour which way
to have gone--reason, with all her force, could not have directed him to
any think like it:  there is something, Sir, in fish-ponds--but what it is,
I leave to system-builders and fish-pond-diggers betwixt 'em to find out--
but there is something, under the first disorderly transport of the
humours, so unaccountably becalming in an orderly and a sober walk towards
one of them, that I have often wondered that neither Pythagoras, nor Plato,
nor Solon, nor Lycurgus, nor Mahomet, nor any one of your noted lawgivers,
ever gave order about them.



Chapter 2.LIII.

Your honour, said Trim, shutting the parlour-door before he began to speak,
has heard, I imagine, of this unlucky accident--O yes, Trim, said my uncle
Toby, and it gives me great concern.--I am heartily concerned too, but I
hope your honour, replied Trim, will do me the justice to believe, that it
was not in the least owing to me.--To thee--Trim?--cried my uncle Toby,
looking kindly in his face--'twas Susannah's and the curate's folly betwixt
them.--What business could they have together, an' please your honour, in
the garden?--In the gallery thou meanest, replied my uncle Toby.

Trim found he was upon a wrong scent, and stopped short with a low bow--Two
misfortunes, quoth the corporal to himself, are twice as many at least as
are needful to be talked over at one time;--the mischief the cow has done
in breaking into the fortifications, may be told his honour hereafter.--
Trim's casuistry and address, under the cover of his low bow, prevented all
suspicion in my uncle Toby, so he went on with what he had to say to Trim
as follows:

--For my own part, Trim, though I can see little or no difference betwixt
my nephew's being called Tristram or Trismegistus--yet as the thing sits so
near my brother's heart, Trim--I would freely have given a hundred pounds
rather than it should have happened.--A hundred pounds, an' please your
honour! replied Trim,--I would not give a cherry-stone to boot.--Nor would
I, Trim, upon my own account, quoth my uncle Toby--but my brother, whom
there is no arguing with in this case--maintains that a great deal more
depends, Trim, upon christian-names, than what ignorant people imagine--for
he says there never was a great or heroic action performed since the world
began by one called Tristram--nay, he will have it, Trim, that a man can
neither be learned, or wise, or brave.--'Tis all fancy, an' please your
honour--I fought just as well, replied the corporal, when the regiment
called me Trim, as when they called me James Butler.--And for my own part,
said my uncle Toby, though I should blush to boast of myself, Trim--yet had
my name been Alexander, I could have done no more at Namur than my duty.--
Bless your honour! cried Trim, advancing three steps as he spoke, does a
man think of his christian-name when he goes upon the attack?--Or when he
stands in the trench, Trim? cried my uncle Toby, looking firm.--Or when he
enters a breach? said Trim, pushing in between two chairs.--Or forces the
lines? cried my uncle, rising up, and pushing his crutch like a pike.--Or
facing a platoon? cried Trim, presenting his stick like a firelock.--Or
when he marches up the glacis? cried my uncle Toby, looking warm and
setting his foot upon his stool.--



Chapter 2.LIV.

My father was returned from his walk to the fish-pond--and opened the
parlour-door in the very height of the attack, just as my uncle Toby was
marching up the glacis--Trim recovered his arms--never was my uncle Toby
caught in riding at such a desperate rate in his life! Alas! my uncle Toby!
had not a weightier matter called forth all the ready eloquence of my
father--how hadst thou then and thy poor Hobby-Horse too been insulted!

My father hung up his hat with the same air he took it down; and after
giving a slight look at the disorder of the room, he took hold of one of
the chairs which had formed the corporal's breach, and placing it over-
against my uncle Toby, he sat down in it, and as soon as the tea-things
were taken away, and the door shut, he broke out in a lamentation as
follows:



My Father's Lamentation.

It is in vain longer, said my father, addressing himself as much to
Ernulphus's curse, which was laid upon the corner of the chimney-piece--as
to my uncle Toby who sat under it--it is in vain longer, said my father, in
the most querulous monotony imaginable, to struggle as I have done against
this most uncomfortable of human persuasions--I see it plainly, that either
for my own sins, brother Toby, or the sins and follies of the Shandy
family, Heaven has thought fit to draw forth the heaviest of its artillery
against me; and that the prosperity of my child is the point upon which the
whole force of it is directed to play.--Such a thing would batter the whole
universe about our ears, brother Shandy, said my uncle Toby--if it was so-
Unhappy Tristram! child of wrath! child of decrepitude! interruption!
mistake! and discontent!  What one misfortune or disaster in the book of
embryotic evils, that could unmechanize thy frame, or entangle thy
filaments! which has not fallen upon thy head, or ever thou camest into the
world--what evils in thy passage into it!--what evils since!--produced into
being, in the decline of thy father's days--when the powers of his
imagination and of his body were waxing feeble--when radical heat and
radical moisture, the elements which should have temper'd thine, were
drying up; and nothing left to found thy stamina in, but negations--'tis
pitiful--brother Toby, at the best, and called out for all the little helps
that care and attention on both sides could give it.  But how were we
defeated!  You know the event, brother Toby--'tis too melancholy a one to
be repeated now--when the few animal spirits I was worth in the world, and
with which memory, fancy, and quick parts should have been convey'd--were
all dispersed, confused, confounded, scattered, and sent to the devil.--

Here then was the time to have put a stop to this persecution against him;-
-and tried an experiment at least--whether calmness and serenity of mind in
your sister, with a due attention, brother Toby, to her evacuations and
repletions--and the rest of her non-naturals, might not, in a course of
nine months gestation, have set all things to rights.--My child was bereft
of these!--What a teazing life did she lead herself, and consequently her
foetus too, with that nonsensical anxiety of hers about lying-in in town?
I thought my sister submitted with the greatest patience, replied my uncle
Toby--I never heard her utter one fretful word about it.--She fumed
inwardly, cried my father; and that, let me tell you, brother, was ten
times worse for the child--and then! what battles did she fight with me,
and what perpetual storms about the midwife.--There she gave vent, said my
uncle Toby.--Vent! cried my father, looking up.

But what was all this, my dear Toby, to the injuries done us by my child's
coming head foremost into the world, when all I wished, in this general
wreck of his frame, was to have saved this little casket unbroke,
unrifled.--

With all my precautions, how was my system turned topside-turvy in the womb
with my child! his head exposed to the hand of violence, and a pressure of
470 pounds avoirdupois weight acting so perpendicularly upon its apex--that
at this hour 'tis ninety per Cent. insurance, that the fine net-work of the
intellectual web be not rent and torn to a thousand tatters.

--Still we could have done.--Fool, coxcomb, puppy--give him but a Nose--
Cripple, Dwarf, Driveller, Goosecap--(shape him as you will) the door of
fortune stands open--O Licetus! Licetus! had I been blest with a foetus
five inches long and a half, like thee--Fate might have done her worst.

Still, brother Toby, there was one cast of the dye left for our child after
all--O Tristram! Tristram! Tristram!

We will send for Mr. Yorick, said my uncle Toby.

--You may send for whom you will, replied my father.



Chapter 2.LV.

What a rate have I gone on at, curvetting and striking it away, two up and
two down for three volumes (According to the preceding Editions.) together,
without looking once behind, or even on one side of me, to see whom I trod
upon!--I'll tread upon no one--quoth I to myself when I mounted--I'll take
a good rattling gallop; but I'll not hurt the poorest jack-ass upon the
road.--So off I set--up one lane--down another, through this turnpike--over
that, as if the arch-jockey of jockeys had got behind me.

Now ride at this rate with what good intention and resolution you may--'tis
a million to one you'll do some one a mischief, if not yourself--He's
flung--he's off--he's lost his hat--he's down--he'll break his neck--see!--
if he has not galloped full among the scaffolding of the undertaking
criticks!--he'll knock his brains out against some of their posts--he's
bounced out!--look--he's now riding like a mad-cap full tilt through a
whole crowd of painters, fiddlers, poets, biographers, physicians, lawyers,
logicians, players, school-men, churchmen, statesmen, soldiers, casuists,
connoisseurs, prelates, popes, and engineers.--Don't fear, said I--I'll not
hurt the poorest jack-ass upon the king's highway.--But your horse throws
dirt; see you've splash'd a bishop--I hope in God, 'twas only Ernulphus,
said I.--But you have squirted full in the faces of Mess. Le Moyne, De
Romigny, and De Marcilly, doctors of the Sorbonne.--That was last year,
replied I.--But you have trod this moment upon a king.--Kings have bad
times on't, said I, to be trod upon by such people as me.

You have done it, replied my accuser.

I deny it, quoth I, and so have got off, and here am I standing with my
bridle in one hand, and with my cap in the other, to tell my story.--And
what in it?  You shall hear in the next chapter.



Chapter 2.LVI.

As Francis the first of France was one winterly night warming himself over
the embers of a wood fire, and talking with his first minister of sundry
things for the good of the state (Vide Menagiana, Vol. I.)--It would not be
amiss, said the king, stirring up the embers with his cane, if this good
understanding betwixt ourselves and Switzerland was a little strengthened.-
-There is no end, Sire, replied the minister, in giving money to these
people--they would swallow up the treasury of France.--Poo! poo! answered
the king--there are more ways, Mons. le Premier, of bribing states, besides
that of giving money--I'll pay Switzerland the honour of standing godfather
for my next child.--Your majesty, said the minister, in so doing, would
have all the grammarians in Europe upon your back;--Switzerland, as a
republic, being a female, can in no construction be godfather.--She may be
godmother, replied Francis hastily--so announce my intentions by a courier
to-morrow morning.

I am astonished, said Francis the First, (that day fortnight) speaking to
his minister as he entered the closet, that we have had no answer from
Switzerland.--Sire, I wait upon you this moment, said Mons. le Premier, to
lay before you my dispatches upon that business.--They take it kindly, said
the king.--They do, Sire, replied the minister, and have the highest sense
of the honour your majesty has done them--but the republick, as godmother,
claims her right, in this case, of naming the child.

In all reason, quoth the king--she will christen him Francis, or Henry, or
Lewis, or some name that she knows will be agreeable to us.  Your majesty
is deceived, replied the minister--I have this hour received a dispatch
from our resident, with the determination of the republic on that point
also.--And what name has the republick fixed upon for the Dauphin?--
Shadrach, Mesech, Abed-nego, replied the minister.--By Saint Peter's
girdle, I will have nothing to do with the Swiss, cried Francis the First,
pulling up his breeches and walking hastily across the floor.

Your majesty, replied the minister calmly, cannot bring yourself off.

We'll pay them in money--said the king.

Sire, there are not sixty thousand crowns in the treasury, answered the
minister.--I'll pawn the best jewel in my crown, quoth Francis the First.

Your honour stands pawn'd already in this matter, answered Monsieur le
Premier.

Then, Mons. le Premier, said the king, by. . .we'll go to war with 'em.



Chapter 2.LVII.

Albeit, gentle reader, I have lusted earnestly, and endeavoured carefully
(according to the measure of such a slender skill as God has vouchsafed me,
and as convenient leisure from other occasions of needful profit and
healthful pastime have permitted) that these little books which I here put
into thy hands, might stand instead of many bigger books--yet have I
carried myself towards thee in such fanciful guise of careless disport,
that right sore am I ashamed now to intreat thy lenity seriously--in
beseeching thee to believe it of me, that in the story of my father and his
christian-names--I have no thoughts of treading upon Francis the First--nor
in the affair of the nose--upon Francis the Ninth--nor in the character of
my uncle Toby--of characterizing the militiating spirits of my country--the
wound upon his groin, is a wound to every comparison of that kind--nor by
Trim--that I meant the duke of Ormond--or that my book is wrote against
predestination, or free-will, or taxes--If 'tis wrote against any thing,--
'tis wrote, an' please your worships, against the spleen! in order, by a
more frequent and a more convulsive elevation and depression of the
diaphragm, and the succussations of the intercostal and abdominal muscles
in laughter, to drive the gall and other bitter juices from the gall-
bladder, liver, and sweet-bread of his majesty's subjects, with all the
inimicitious passions which belong to them, down into their duodenums.



Chapter 2.LVIII.

--But can the thing be undone, Yorick? said my father--for in my opinion,
continued he, it cannot.  I am a vile canonist, replied Yorick--but of all
evils, holding suspence to be the most tormenting, we shall at least know
the worst of this matter.  I hate these great dinners--said my father--The
size of the dinner is not the point, answered Yorick--we want, Mr. Shandy,
to dive into the bottom of this doubt, whether the name can be changed or
not--and as the beards of so many commissaries, officials, advocates,
proctors, registers, and of the most eminent of our school-divines, and
others, are all to meet in the middle of one table, and Didius has so
pressingly invited you--who in your distress would miss such an occasion?
All that is requisite, continued Yorick, is to apprize Didius, and let him
manage a conversation after dinner so as to introduce the subject.--Then my
brother Toby, cried my father, clapping his two hands together, shall go
with us.

--Let my old tye-wig, quoth my uncle Toby, and my laced regimentals, be
hung to the fire all night, Trim.



(page numbering skips ten pages)
Prev Next All
Printer Friendly Version | Send this page to a friend | Discuss this Book
Your email address is safe with us. View our Privacy policy.

A Little Princess Frances Hodgson Burnett Category: Fiction Sections: 24 What's this? Table of Contents		Non Fiction Short Stories Poetry Plays Sci Fi Philosophy Religion Biography