I record, therefore, that brother Jack, brimful of this miraculous compound, reflecting with indignation upon Peter’s tyranny, and farther provoked by the despondency of Martin, prefaced his resolutions to this purpose. ‘What,’ said he, ‘a rogue that locked up his drink, turned away our wives, cheated us of our fortunes, palmed his damned crusts upon us for mutton, and at last kicked us out of doors; must we be in his fashions, with a pox? A rascal, besides, that all the street cries out against.’ Having thus kindled and inflamed himself as high as possible, and by consequence, in a delicate temper for beginning a reformation, he set about the work immediately, and in three minutes made more dispatch than Martin had done in as many hours. For (courteous reader) you are given to understand, that zeal is never so highly obliged, as when you set it a-tearing; and Jack, who doated on that quality in himself, allowed it at this time its full swing. Thus it happened, that stripping down a parcel of gold lace a little too hastily, he rent the main body of his coat from top to bottom; and whereas his talent was not of the happiest in taking up a stitch, he knew no better way than to darn it again with packthread and a skewer. But the matter was yet infinitely worse (I record it with tears) when he proceeded to the embroidery: for, being clumsy by nature, and of temper impatient; withal, beholding millions of stitches that required the nicest hand, and sedatest constitutions, to extricate; in a great rage he tore off the whole piece, cloth and all, and flung it into the kennel,[7] and furiously thus continuing his career: ‘Ah, good brother Martin,’ said he, ‘do as I do, for the love of God; strip, tear, pull, rend, flay off all, that we may appear as unlike the rogue Peter as it is possible. I would not for a hundred pounds carry the least mark about me, that might give occasion to the neighbours of suspecting I was related to such a rascal.’ But Martin, who at this time happened to be extremely phlegmatic and sedate, begged his brother, of all love, not to damage his coat by any means; for he never would get such another: desired him to consider, that it was not their business to form their actions by any reflection upon Peter, but by observing the rules prescribed in their father’s will. That he should remember, Peter was still their brother, whatever faults or injuries he had committed; and therefore they should by all means avoid such a thought as that of taking measures for good and evil, from no other rule than of opposition to him. That it was true, the testament of their good father was very exact in what related to the wearing of their coats; yet was it no less penal and strict in prescribing agreement, and friendship, and affection between them. And therefore, if straining a point were at all dispensible, it would certainly be so rather to the advance of unity than increase of contradiction.
Martin had still proceeded as gravely as he began, and doubtless would have delivered an admirable lecture of morality, which might have exceedingly contributed to my reader’s repose, both of body and mind (the true ultimate end of ethics) ; but Jack was already gone a flight-shot beyond his patience. And as in scholastic disputes, nothing serves to rouse the spleen of him that opposes, so much as a kind of pedantic affected calmness in the respondent; disputants being for the most part like unequal scales, where the gravity of one side advances the lightness of the other, and causes it to fly up and kick the beam; so it happened here that the weight of Martin’s argument exalted Jack’s levity, and made him fly out and spurn against his brother’s moderation. In short, Martin’s patience put Jack in a rage; but that which most afflicted him was, to observe his brother’s coat so well reduced into the state of innocence; while his own was either wholly rent to his shirt, or those places which had escaped his cruel clutches, were still in Peter’s livery. So that he looked like a drunken beau, half rifled by bullies; or like a fresh tenant of Newgate, when he has refused the payment of garnish; or like a discovered shoplifter left to the mercy of Exchange women; or like a bawd in her old velvet petticoat, resigned into the secular hands of the mobile. Like any or like all of these, a medley of rags, and lace, and rents, and fringes, unfortunately Jack did now appear: he would have been extremely glad to see his coat in the condition of Martin’s, but infinitely gladder to find that of Martin’s in the same predicament with his. However, since neither of these was likely to come to pass, he thought fit to lend the whole business another turn, and to dress up necessity into a virtue. Therefore, after as many of the fox’s[8] arguments as he could muster up, for bringing Martin to reason, as he called it; or, as he meant it, into his own ragged, bobtailed condition; and observing he said all to little purpose; what, alas, was left for the forlorn Jack to do, but after a million of scurrilities against his brother, to run mad with spleen, and spite, and contradiction. To be short, here began a mortal breach between these two. Jack went immediately to new lodgings, and in a few days it was for certain reported, that he had run out of his wits. In a short time after he appeared abroad, and confirmed the report by falling into the oddest whimseys that ever a sick brain conceived.
And now the little boys in the streets began to salute him with several names. Sometimes they would call him Jack the Bald;[9] sometimes, Jack with a lantern;[10] sometimes, Dutch Jack;[11] sometimes, French Hugh;[12] sometimes, Tom the beggar;[13] and sometimes, Knocking Jack of the north.[14] And it was under one, or some, or all of these appellations (which I leave the learned reader to determine) that he hath given rise to the most illustrious and epidemic sect of ®olists; who with honourable commemoration, do still acknowledge the renowned JACK for their author and founder. Of whose original, as well as principles, I am now advancing to gratify the world with a very particular account.
—-Mellaeo contingens cuncta lepore.
1 Martin Luther.
2 John Calvin.
3 Points tagged with silver are those doctrines that promote the greatness and wealth of the church, which have been therefore woven deepest in the body of Popery.
4 From Sir Walter Scott’s 1824 Edition of Swift: “Alluding to the commencement of the Reformation in England, by seizing on the abbey lands.” (cited in Guthkelch & Smith, p.136). -Singh, 1996.
5 From Sir Walter Scott’s 1824 Edition of Swift: “The dissolution of the monasteries occasioned several insurrections, and much convulsion, during the reign of Edward Vl.” (cited in Guthkelch & Smith, p.136). -Singh, 1996.
6 From Sir Walter Scott’s 1824 Edition of Swift: “The abolition of the worship of saints was the second grand step in English Reformation.” -(cited in Guthkelch & Smith, p.136). -Singh, 1996.
7 From Sir Walter Scott’s 1824 Edition of Swift: “The presbyterians, in discarding forms of prayers, and unnecessary church ceremonies, disused even those founded in scripture.” -(cited in Guthkelch & Smith, p.136). -Singh, 1996.
8 The fox in the fable, who having been caught in a trap and lost his tail, used many arguments to persuade the rest to cut off theirs; that the Irregularity of his deformity might not expose him to derision. H.
9 That is Calvin, from calvus, bald.
10 All those who pretend to inward light.
11 Jack of Leyden, who gave rise to the Anabaptists.
12. The Huguenots.
13. The Gueuses, by which name some Protestants in Flanders were called.
14 John Knox, the reformer of Scotland.
SECTION VII. A DIGRESSION IN PRAISE OF DIGRESSIONS
I HAVE sometimes heard of an Iliad in a nutshell; but it hath been my fortune to have much oftener seen a nutshell in an Iliad. There is no doubt that human life has received most wonderful advantages from both; but to which of the two the world is chiefly indebted, I shall leave among the curious, as a problem worthy of their utmost inquiry. For the invention of the latter, I think the commonwealth of learning is chiefly obliged to the great modern improvement of digressions: the late refinements in knowledge, running parallel to those of diet in our nation, which among men of a judicious taste are dressed up in various compounds, consisting in soups and olios, fricassees, and ragouts.
‘Tis true, there is a sort of morose, detracting, ill-bred people, who pretend utterly to disrelish these polite innovations; and as to the similitude from diet, they allow the parallel, but are so bold to pronounce the example itself, a corruption and degeneracy of taste. They tell us that the fashion of jumbling fifty things together in a dish, was at first introduced in compliance to a depraved and debauched appetite, as well as to a crazy constitution: and to see a man hunting through an olio, after the head and brains of a goose, a widgeon, or a woodcock, is a sign he wants a stomach and digestion for more substantial victuals. Farther, they affirm, that digressions in a book are like foreign troops in a state, which argue the nation to want a heart and hands of its own, and often either subdue the relatives, or drive them into the most unfruitful corners.