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The Consolidator

Daniel Defoe

There was abundance of vast Classes full of the Works of this
wonderful Philosopher: He gave the how, the modus of all the secret
Operations of Nature; and told us, how Sensation is convey'd to and
from the Brain; why Respiration preserves Life; and how Locomotion
is directed to, as well as perform'd by the Parts. There are some
Anatomical Dissections of Thought, and a Mathematical Description of
Nature's strong Box, the Memory, with all its Locks and Keys.

There you have that part of the Head turn'd in-side outward, in which
Nature has placed the Materials of reflecting; and like a Glass
Bee-hive, represents to you all the several Cells in which are lodg'd
things past, even back to Infancy and Conception. There you have the
Repository, with all its Cells, Classically, Annually, Numerically,
and Alphabetically Dispos'd. There you may see how, when the perplext
Animal, on the loss of a Thought or Word, scratches his Pole: Every
Attack of his Invading Fingers knocks at Nature's Door, allarms all
the Register-keepers, and away they run, unlock all the Classes,
search diligently for what he calls for, and immediately deliver
it up to the Brain; if it cannot be found, they intreat a little
Patience, till they step into the Revolvary, where they run over
little Catalogues of the minutest Passages of Life, and so in time
never fail to hand on the thing; if not just when he calls for it,
yet at some other time.

And thus, when a thing lyes very Abstruse, and all the rumaging of
the whole House cannot find it; nay, when all the People in the House
have given it over, they very often find one thing when they are
looking for another.

Next you have the Retentive in the remotest part of the Place, which,
like the Records in the Tower, takes Possession of all Matters, as
they are removed from the Classes in the Repository, for want of
room. These are carefully Lockt, and kept safe, never to be open'd
but upon solemn Occasions, and have swinging great Bars and Bolts
upon them; so that what is kept here, is seldom lost. Here Conscience
has one large Ware-house, and the Devil another; the first is very
seldom open'd, but has a Chink or Till, where all the Follies and
Crimes of Life being minuted are dropt in; but as the Man seldom
cares to look in, the Locks are very Rusty, and not open'd but with
great Difficulty, and on extraordinary Occasions, as Sickness,
Afflictions, Jails, Casualties, and Death; and then the Bars all give
way at once; and being prest from within with a more than ordinary
Weight, burst as a Cask of Wine upon the Fret, which for want of
Vent, makes all the Hoops fly.

As for the Devil's Ware-house, he has two constant Warehouse-keepers,
Pride and Conceit, and these are always at the Door, showing their
Wares, and exposing the pretended Vertues and Accomplishments of the
Man, by way of Ostentation.

In the middle of this curious part of Nature, there is a clear
Thorough-fare, representing the World, through which so many Thousand
People pass so easily, and do so little worth taking notice of,
that 'tis for no manner of Signification to leave Word they have
been here. Thro' this Opening pass Millions of things not worth
remembring, and which the Register-Keepers, who stand at the Doors of
the Classes, as they go by, take no notice of; such as Friendships,
helps in Distress, Kindnesses in Affliction, Voluntary Services, and
all sorts of Importunate Merit; things which being but Trifles in
their own Nature, are made to be forgotten.

In another Angle is to be seen the Memory's Garden, in which her most
pleasant things are not only Deposited, but Planted, Transplanted,
Grafted, Inoculated, and obtain all possible Propagation and
Encrease; these are the most pleasant, delightful, and agreeable
things, call'd Envy, Slander, Revenge, Strife and Malice, with the
Additions of Ill-turns, Reproaches, and all manner of Wrong; these
are caressed in the Cabinet of the Memory, with a World of Pleasure
never let pass, and carefully Cultivated with all imaginable Art.

There are multitudes of Weeds, Toys, Chat, Story, Fiction, and Lying,
which in the great throng of passant Affairs, stop by the way, and
crowding up the Place, leave no room for their Betters that come
behind, which makes many a good Guess be put by, and left to go clear
thro' for want of Entertainment.

There are a multitude of things very curious and observable,
concerning this little, but very accurate thing, called Memory; but
above all, I see nothing so very curious, as the wonderful Art of
Wilful Forgetfulness; and as 'tis a thing, indeed, I never could find
any Person compleatly Master of, it pleased me very much, to find
this Author has made a large Essay, to prove there is really no such
Power in Nature; and that the Pretenders to it are all Impostors, and
put a Banter upon the World; for that it is impossible for any Man to
oblige himself to forget a thing, since he that can remember to
forget, and at the same time forget to remember, has an Art above
the Devil.

In his Laboratory you see a Fancy preserv'd a la Mummy, several
Thousand Years old; by examining which you may perfectly discern,
how Nature makes a Poet: Another you have taken from a meer Natural,
which discovers the Reasons of Nature's Negative in the Case of
humane Understanding; what Deprivation of Parts She suffers, in the
Composition of a Coxcomb; and with what wonderful Art She prepares a
Man to be a Fool.

Here being the product of this Author's wonderful Skill, you have the
Skeleton of a Wit, with all the Readings of Philosophy and Chyrurgery
upon the Parts: Here you see all the Lines Nature has drawn to form a
Genius, how it performs, and from what Principles.

Also you are Instructed to know the true reason of the Affinity
between Poetry and Poverty; and that it is equally derived from
what's Natural and Intrinsick, as from Accident and Circumstance; how
the World being always full of Fools and Knaves, Wit is sure to miss
of a good Market; especially, if Wit and Truth happen to come in
Company; for the Fools don't understand it, and the Knaves can't bear
it.

But still 'tis own'd, and is most apparent, there is something also
Natural in the Case too, since there are some particular Vessels
Nature thinks necessary, to the more exact Composition of this nice
thing call'd a Wit, which as they are, or are not Interrupted in the
peculiar Offices for which they are appointed, are subject to various
Distempers, and more particularly to Effluxions and Vapour, Diliriums
Giddiness of the Brain, and Lapsa, or Looseness of the Tongue; and as
these Distempers, occasion'd by the exceeding quantity of Volatiles,
Nature is obliged to make use of in the Composition, are hardly to
be avoided, the Disasters which generally they push the Animal into,
are as necessarily consequent to them as Night is to the Setting of
the Sun; and these are very many, as disobliging Parents, who have
frequently in this Country whipt their Sons for making Verses; and
here I could not but reflect how useful a Discipline early Correction
must be to a Poet; and how easy the Town had been had N---t, E---w,
T. B--- P---s, D-- S-- D---fy, and an Hundred more of the jingling
Train of our modern Rhymers, been Whipt young, very young, for
Poetasting, they had never perhaps suckt in that Venome of Ribaldry,
which all the Satyr of the Age has never been able to scourge out of
them to this Day.

The further fatal Consequences of these unhappy Defects in Nature,
where she has damn'd a Man to Wit and Rhyme, has been loss of
Inheritance, Parents being aggravated by the obstinate young Beaus,
resolving to be Wits in spight of Nature, the wiser Head has been
obliged to Confederate with Nature, and with-hold the Birth-right
of Brains, which otherwise the young Gentleman might have enjoy'd,
to the great support of his Family and Posterity. Thus the famous
Waller, Denham, Dryden, and sundry Others, were oblig'd to condemn
their Race to Lunacy and Blockheadism, only to prevent the fatal
Destruction of their Families, and entailing the Plague of Wit and
Weathercocks upon their Posterity.

The yet farther Extravagancies which naturally attend the Mischief of
Wit, are Beau-ism, Dogmaticality, Whimsification, Impudensity, and
various kinds of Fopperosities (according to Mr. Boyl,) which issuing
out of the Brain, descend into all the Faculties, and branch
themselves by infinite Variety, into all the Actions of Life.

These by Conseqence, Beggar the Head, the Tail, the Purse, and the
whole Man, till he becomes as poor and despicable as Negative Nature
can leave him, abandon'd of his Sense, his Manners, his Modesty, and
what's worse, his Money, having nothing left but his Poetry, dies in
a Ditch, or a Garret, A-la-mode de Tom Brown, uttering Rhymes and
Nonsence to the last Moment.

In Pity to all my unhappy Brethren, who suffer under these
Inconveniencies, I cannot but leave it on Record, that they may not
be reproached with being Agents of their own Misfortunes, since I
assure them, Nature has form'd them with the very Necessity of acting
like Coxcombs, fixt upon them by the force of Organick Consequences,
and placed down at the very Original Effusion of that fatal thing
call'd Wit.

Nor is the Discovery less wonderful than edifying, and no humane Art
on our side the World ever found out such a Sympathetick Influence,
between the Extreams of Wit and Folly, till this great Lunarian
Naturalist furnisht us with such unheard-of Demonstrations.

Nor is this all I learnt from him, tho' I cannot part with this, till
I have publisht a Memento Mori, and told 'em what I had discovered
of Nature in these remote Parts of the World, from whence I take
the Freedom to tell these Gentlemen, That if they please to Travel
to these distant Parts, and examine this great Master of Nature's
Secrets, they may every Man see what cross Strokes Nature has struck,
to finish and form every extravagant Species of that Heterogenious
Kind we call Wit.

There C--- S--- may be inform'd how he comes to be very Witty, and
a Mad-man all at once; and P---r may see, That with less Brains and
more P--x he is more a Wit and more a Mad-man than the Coll. Ad---son
may tell his Master my Lord ---- the reason from Nature, why he would
not take the Court's Word, nor write the Poem call'd, The Campaign,
till he had 200 l. per Annum secur'd to him; since 'tis known they
have but one Author in the Nation that writes for 'em for nothing,
and he is labouring very hard to obtain the Title of Blockhead, and
not be paid for it: Here D. might understand, how he came to be able
to banter all Mankind, and yet all Mankind be able to banter him; at
the fame time our numerous throng of Parnassians may see Reasons for
the variety of the Negative and Positive Blessings they enjoy; some
for having Wit and no Verse, some Verse and no Wit, some Mirth
without Jest, some Jest without Fore-cast, some Rhyme and no Jingle,
some all Jingle and no Rhyme, some Language without measure; some all
Quantity and no Cudence, some all Wit and no Sence, some all Sence
and no Flame, some Preach in Rhyme, some sing when they Preach,
some all Song and no Tune, some all Tune and no Song; all these
Unaccountables have their Originals, and can be answer'd for in
unerring Nature, tho' in our out-side Guesses we can say little to
it. Here is to be seen, why some are all Nature, some all Art; some
beat Verse out of the Twenty-four rough Letters, with Ten Hammers
and Anvils to every Line, and maul the Language as a Swede beats
Stock-Fish; Others buff Nature, and bully her out of whole Stanza's
of ready-made Lines at a time, carry all before them, and rumble like
distant Thunder in a black Cloud: Thus Degrees and Capacities are
fitted by Nature, according to Organick Efficacy; and the Reason and
Nature of Things are found in themselves: Had D---y seen his own
Draft by this Light of Chinese Knowledge, he might have known he
should be a Coxcomb without writing Twenty-two Plays, to stand as so
many Records against him. Dryden might have told his Fate, that
having his extraordinary Genius flung and pitcht upon a Swivle, it
would certainly turn round as fast as the Times, and instruct him how
to write Elegies to O. C. and King C. the Second, with all the
Coherence imaginable; how to write Religio Laicy, and the Hind and
Panther, and yet be the same Man, every Day to change his Principle,
change his Religion, change his Coat, change his Master, and yet
never change his Nature.

There are abundance of other Secrets in Nature discover'd in relation
to these things, too many to repeat, and yet too useful to omit, as
the reason why Phisicians are generally Atheists; and why Atheists
are universally Fools, and generally live to know it themselves, the
real Obstructions, which prevent fools being mad, all the Natural
Causes of Love, abundance of Demonstrations of the Synonimous Nature
of Love and Leachery, especially consider'd a la Modern, with an
absolute Specifick for the Frenzy of Love, found out in the
Constitution, Anglice, a Halter.

It would be endless to reckon up the numerous Improvements, and
wonderful Discoveries this extraordinary Person has brought down, and
which are to be seen in his curious Chamber of Rarities.

Particularly, a Map of Parnassus, with an exact Delineation of
all the Cells, Apartments, Palaces and Dungeons, of that most
famous Mountain; with a Description of its Heighth, and a learned
Dissertation, proving it to be the properest Place next to the P---e
House to take a Rise at, for a flight to the World in the Moon.

Also some Enquiries, whether Noah's Ark did not first rest upon
it; and this might be one of the Summits of Ararat, with some
Confutations of the gross and palpable Errors, which place this
extraordinary Skill among the Mountains of the Moon in Africa.

Also you have here a Muse calcin'd, a little of the Powder of which
given to a Woman big with Child, if it be a Boy it will be a Poet, if
a Girl she'll be a Whore, if an Hermaphrodite it will be Lunatick.

Strange things, they tell us, have been done with this calcin'd Womb
of Imagination; if the Body it came from was a Lyrick Poet, the Child
will be a Beau, or a Beauty; if an Heroick Poet, he will be a Bulley;
if his Talent was Satyr, he'll be a Philosopher.

Another Muse they tell us, they have dissolv'd into a Liquid, and
kept with wondrous Art, the Vertues of which are Soveraign against
Ideotism, Dullness, and all sorts of Lethargick Diseases; but if
given in too great a quantity, creates Poesy, Poverty, Lunacy, and
the Devil in the Head ever after.

I confess, I always thought these Muses strange intoxicating things,
and have heard much talk of their Original, but never was acquainted
with their Vertue a la Simple before; however, I would always advise
People against too large a Dose of Wit, and think the Physician must
be a Mad-man that will venture to prescribe it.

As all these noble Acquirements came down with this wonderful Man
from the World in the Moon, it furnisht me with these useful
Observations.

1. That Country must needs be a Place of strange Perfection, in all
parts of extraordinary Knowledge.

2. How useful a thing it would be for most sorts of our People,
especially Statesmen, P----t-men, Convocation-men, Phylosophers,
Physicians, Quacks, Mountebanks, Stock-jobbers, and all the Mob of
the Nation's Civil or Ecclesiastical Bone-setters, together with some
Men of the Law, some of the Sword, and all of the Pen: I say, how
useful and improving a thing it must be to them, to take a Journey up
to the World in the Moon; but above all, how much more beneficial it
would be to them that stay'd behind.

3. That it is not to be wonder'd at, why the Chinese excell so much
all these Parts of the World, since but for that Knowledge which
comes down to them from the World in the Moon, they would be like
other People.

4. No Man need to Wonder at my exceeding desire to go up to the World
in the Moon, having heard of such extraordinary Knowledge to be
obtained there, since in the search of Knowledge and Truth, wiser Men
than I have taken as unwarrantable Flights, and gone a great deal
higher than the Moon, into a strange Abbyss of dark Phanomena, which
they neither could make other People understand, nor ever rightly
understood themselves, witness Malbranch, Mr. Lock, Hobbs, the
Honourable Boyle and a great many others, besides Messieurs Norris,
Asgil, Coward, and the Tale of a Tub.

This great Searcher into Nature has, besides all this, left wonderful
Discoveries and Experiments behind him; but I was with nothing more
exceedingly diverted, than with his various Engines, and curious
Contrivances, to go to and from his own Native Country the Moon. All
our Mechanick Motions of Bishop Wilkins, or the artificial Wings of
the Learned Spaniard, who could have taught God Almighty how to have
mended the Creation, are Fools to this Gentleman; and because no
Man in China has made more Voyages up into the Moon than my self, I
cannot but give you some Account of the easyness of the Passage, as
well as of the Country.
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