302 HOW TO AND HOW NOT TO EDUCATE A PRINCE.
HOW TO AND HOW NOT TO EDUCATE A PRINCE.
[FRANCOIS RABELAIS, French satirist and humanist, was born at Chinon, 1483 or 1495. He was a Benedictine monk, left the order in a quarrel, became
a physician, and finally rector of Meudon.
He was a disinterested and chari
table man, and a zealous teacher, and his house was the resort of the learned.
He died at Paris, 1553 or 1559. His one remembered work is the extravaganza,
"The Lives, Heroic Deeds, and Sayings of Gargantua and Pantagruel," in which
deep thoughts and ideas of enlarged common sense are imbedded in masses of
fantastic romance, horse-play, and other matter.]
GARGANTUA with all his heart submitted his study to the dis-
cretion of Ponocrates; who first of all appointed that he should
do as he was accustomed, to the end it might be understood by
what means, in so long time, his old masters had made him such
a sot and puppy. He disposed, therefore, of his time in such
Then did he tumble and toss, wag
fashion that ordinarily he did awake betwixt eight or nine
o'clock, whether it was day or night (for so had his ancient
governors ordained), alleging that which David saith: Vanum
est vobis ante lucem surgere.
his legs, and wallow in the bed some time, the better to stir up
and rouse his vital spirits, and appareled himself according to
the season; but willingly he would wear a great long gown of
thick frieze, furred with fox-skins. Afterward he combed his
head with a comb de al-main, which is the four fingers and the
thumb, for his preceptors had said that to comb himself other-
ways, to wash and make himself neat, was to lose time in this
world. Then he . . . to fortify against the fog and bad air,
went to breakfast, having some good fried tripes, fair rashers on
the coals, good gammons of bacon, store of good minced meat,
and a great deal of sippet-brewis, made up of the fat of the
beef-pot, laid upon bread, cheese, and chopped parsley strewed
together.
Ponocrates shewed him that he ought not to eat so soon after
rising out of his bed, unless he had performed some exercise
beforehand. Gargantua answered: "What! have not I suffi-
ciently well exercised myself? I have wallowed and rolled
myself six or seven turns in my bed, before I rose; is not that
enough? Pope Alexander did so, by the advice of a Jew, his
physician, and lived till his dying day in despite of his enemies.
My first masters have used me to it, saying, that to eat break-
fast made a good memory; and therefore they drank first. I
am very well after it, and dine but the better. And Master