The Sot-Weed Factor (4 page)

"Marry, Henry!" Ebenezer said. "Thy courage brings me nigh to weeping! What did you then?"

"Why, so soon as my belly commenced to rumble I stopped short where I was (which happened to be over by Christ's College) and broke into
Flow My Tears,
it being of all the songs I knew the most plaintive. And when I had done with the last verse of it --

Hark! yon Shadows that in Darkness dwell,

Learn to contemn Light.

Happy, happy they that in Hell

Feel not the World's Despite.

-- when I had done, I say, there appeared at a nearby window a lean frowning don, who enquired of me, What manner of Cainite was I, that I counted them happy who must fry forever in the fires of Hell? And another, who came to the window beside him, a fat wight, asked me. Did I not know where I was? To which I answered, 'I know no more, good masters, than that I am in Cambridge Town and like to perish of my belly!' Then the first don, who all unbeknownst to me was having a merry time at my expense, told me I was in Christ's College, and that he and all his fellows were powerful divines, and that for lesser blasphemies than mine they had caused men to be broke upon the wheel. I was a mere sixteen then, and not a little alarmed, for though I'd read enough scarce to credit their story, yet I knew not but what they could work me some injury or other, e'en were't something short of the wheel. Therefore I humbly craved their pardon, and pled 'twas but an idle song, the words of which I scarce attended; so that were there aught of blasphemy in't, 'twas not the singer should be racked for't but the author Dowland, who being long since dead, must needs already have had the sin rendered out of him in Satan's try-works, and there's an end on't! At this methinks the merry dons had like to laugh aloud, but they put on sterner faces yet and ordered me into their chamber. There they farther chastised me, maintaining that while my first offense had been grievous enough, in its diminution of the torments of Hell, this last remark of mine had on't the very smell of the stake. 'How is that?' I asked them. 'Why,' the lean one cried, 'to hold as you do that they who perpetuate another's sin, albeit witlessly, are themselves blameless, is to deny the doctrine of Original Sin itself, for who are Eve and Adam but the John Dowlands of us all, whose sinful song all humankind must sing willy-nilly and die for't?' 'What is more,' the fat don declared, 'in denying the mystery of Original Sin you scorn as well the mystery of Vicarious Atonement -- for where's the sense of Salvation for them that are not lost?'

" 'Nay, nay!' said I, and commenced to sniffling. 'Marry, masters, 'twas but an idle observation! Prithee take no notice of't!'

" 'An idle observation!' the first replied, and laid hold of my arms. ' 'Swounds, boy! You scoff at the two cardinal mysteries of the Church, which like twin pillars bear the entire edifice of Christendom; you as much as call the Crucifixion a vulgar Mayfair show; and to top all you regard such unspeakable blasphemies as idle observations! 'Tis a more horrendous sin yet! Whence came thee here, anyhow?'

" 'From Bedford,' I replied, frightened near out of my wits, 'with a band of gypsies.' On hearing this the dons feigned consternation, and declared that every year at this time the gypsies passed through Cambridge for the sole purpose, since they are heathen to a man, of working some hurt on the divines. Only the year before, they said, one of my cohorts had sneaked privily into the Trinity brew-house and poisoned a vat of beer, with the result that three Senior Fellows, four Scholars, and a brace of idle Sizars were done to death ere sundown. Then they asked me, What was my design? And when I told them I had hoped to attach myself to one of their number as a serving-boy, the better to improve my mind, they made out I was come to poison the lot of 'em. So saying, they stripped me naked on the spot, despite my protestations of innocence, and on pretext of seeking hidden phials of vitriol they poked and probed every inch of my person, and pinched and tweaked me in alarming places. Nay, I must own they laid lecherous hands upon me, and had soon done me a violence but that their sport was interrupted by another don -- an aging, saintlike gentleman, clearly their superior -- who bade them stand off and rebuked them for molesting me. I flung myself at his feet, and, raising me up and looking at me from top to toe, he enquired, What was the occasion of my being disrobed? I replied, I had but sung a song to please these gentlemen, the which they had called a blasphemy, and had then so diligently searched me for phials of vitriol, that I looked to be costive the week through.

"The old don then commanded me to sing the song at once, that he might judge of its blasphemy, and so I fetched up my guitar, which the gypsies had taught me the use of, and as best I could (for I was weeping and shivering with fright) I once again sang
Flow My Tears.
Throughout the piece my savior smiled on me sweetly as an angel, and when I was done he spoke not a word about blasphemy, but kissed me upon the forehead, bade me dress, and after reproving again my tormentors, who were mightily ashamed at being thus surprised in their evil prank, he commanded me to go with him to his quarters. What's more, after interrogating me at length concerning my origin and my plight, and expressing surprise and pleasure at the extent of my reading, he then and there made me a member of his household staff, to serve him personally, and allowed me free use of his admirable library."

"I must know who this saintly fellow was," Ebenezer interrupted. "My curiosity leaps its banks!"

Burlingame smiled and raised a finger. "I shall tell thee, Eben; but not a word of't must you repeat, for reasons you'll see presently. Whate'er his failings, 'twas a noble turn he did me, and I'd not see his name besmirched by any man."

"Never fear," Ebenezer assured him. " 'Twill be like whispering it to thyself."

"Very well, then. I shall tell thee only that he was Platonist to the ears, and hated Tom Hobbes as he hated the Devil, and was withal so fixed on things of the spirit -- on
essential spissitude
and
indiscerptibility
and
metaphysical extension
and the like, which were as real to him as rocks and cow-patties -- that he scarce lived in this world at all. And should these be still not sufficient clues, know finally that he was at that time much engrossed in a grand treatise against the materialist philosophy, which treatise he printed the following year under the title
Enchiridion Metaphysicum."

" 'Sheart!" Ebenezer whispered. "My dear friend, was't Henry More himself you sang for? I should think 'twould be thy boast, not an embarrassment!"

"Stay, till I end my tale. Twas in sooth great More himself I lived with! None knows more than I his noble character, and none is more a debtor to his generosity. I was then per- ; haps seventeen: I tried in every way I knew to be a model of intelligence, good manners, and industry, and ere long the old fellow would allow no other servant near him. He took great ' pleasure in conversing with me, at first about my adventures at sea and with the gypsies, but later on matters of philosophy and theology, with which subjects I made special effort to acquaint myself. 'Twas plain he'd conceived a great liking for me."

"Thou'rt a lucky wight, i'faith!" Ebenezer sighed.

"Nay; only hear me out. As time went on he no longer addressed me as 'Dear Henry,' or 'My boy,' but rather 'My son,' and 'My dear'; and after that 'Dearest thing,' and finally 'Thingums,' 'Precious laddikins,' and 'Gypsy mine' in turn. In short, as I soon guessed, his affection for me was Athenian as his philosophy -- dare I tell you he more than once caressed I me, and called me his little Alcibiades?"

"I am amazed!" said Ebenezer. "The scoundrel rescued you from the other blackguards, merely to have you for his own unnatural lusts!"

"Oh la, 'twas not at all the same thing, Eben. The others were men in their thirties, full to bursting (as my master himself put it) with
the filth and unclean tinctures of corporeity.
More, on the other hand, was near sixty, the gentlest of souls, and scarce realized himself, I daresay, the character of his passion: I had no fear of him at all. And here I must confess, Eben, I did a shameful thing: so intent was I on entering the University, that instead of leaving More's service as soon as tact would permit, I lost no opportunity to encourage his shameful doting. I would perch on the arm of his chair like an impudent lass and read over his shoulder, or cover his eyes for a tease, or spring about the room like a monkey, knowing he admired my energy and grace. Most of all I sang and played on my guitar for him: many's the night -- I blush to tell it! -- when I would let him come upon me, as though by accident; I would laugh and blush, and then as if to make a lark of't, take my guitar and sing
Flow My Tears.

"Need I say the poor philosopher was simply ravished? His passion so took governance o'er his other faculties, he grew so entirely enamored of me, that upon my granting him certain trifling favors, which I knew he'd long coveted but scarce hoped for, he spent nearly all his meager savings to outfit me like the son of an earl, and enrolled me in Trinity College."

Here Burlingame lit another pipe, and sighed in remembrance.

"I was, I believe, uncommonly well-read for a boy my age. In the two years with More I'd mastered Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, read all of Plato, Tully, Plotin, and divers other of the ancients, and at least perused most of the standard works of natural philosophy. My benefactor made no secret that he looked for me to become as notable a philosopher as Herbert of Cherbury, John Smith, or himself -- and who knows but what I might have been, had things turned out happily? But alas, Eben, that same shamelessness by virtue of which I reached my goal proved my undoing. 'Twas quite poetic."

"What happened, pray?"

"I was not strong in mathematics," Burlingame said, "and for that reason I devoted much of my study to that subject, and spent as much time as I could with mathematicians -- especially with the brilliant young man who but two years before, in 1669, had taken Barrow's place as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, and holds the office yet. . ."

"Newton!"

"Aye, the wondrous Isaac! He was twenty-nine or thirty then, as I am now, with a face like a pure-bred stallion's. He was thin and strong and marvelous energetic, much given to moods; he had the arrogance that of't goes with great gifts, but was in other ways quite shy, and seldom overbearing. He could be merciless with others' theories, yet was himself inordinately sensitive to criticism. He was so diffident about his talents 'twas with great reluctance he allowed aught of his discoveries to be printed; yet so vain, the slightest suggestion that someone had antedated him would drive him near mad with rage and jealousy. Impossible, splendid fellow!"

"Marry, he frightens me!" Ebenezer said.

"Now you must know that at that time More and Newton had no love whatever for each other, and the cause of their enmity was the French philosopher Renatus Descartes."

"Descartes? How can that be?"

"I know not how well you've heeded your tutors," Burlingame said; "you might know that all these Platonical gentlemen of Christ's and Emmanuel Colleges are wont to sing the praises of Descartes, inasmuch as he makes a great show of pottering about in mathematics and the motions of heavenly bodies, like any Galileo, and yet unlike Tom Hobbes he affirms the real existence of God and the soul, which pleases them no end. The more for that the lot of 'em are Protestants: this much-vaunted rejection of the learning of his time, that Renatus brags of in his
Discourse on Method
: this searching of his innards for his axioms -- is't not the first principle of Protestantism? Thus it is that Descartes' system is taught all over Cambridge, and More, like the rest, praised and swore by him as by a latter-day saint. Tell me, Eben: how is't, d'you think, that the planets are moved in their courses?"

"Why," said Ebenezer, " 'tis that the cosmos is filled with little particles moving in vortices, each of which centers on a star; and 'tis the subtle push and pull of these particles in our solar vortex that slides the planets along their orbs -- is't not?"

"So saith Descartes," Burlingame smiled. "And d'you haply recall what is the nature of light?"

"If I have't right," replied Ebenezer, " 'tis an aspect of the vortices -- of the press of inward and outward forces in 'em. The celestial fire is sent through space from the vortices by this pressure, which imparts a transitional motion to little light globules --"

"Which Renatus kindly hatched for that occasion," Burlingame interrupted. "And what's more he allows his globules both a rectilinear and a rotatory motion. If only the first occurs when the globules smite our retinae, we see white light; if both, we see color. And as if this were not magical enough --
mirabile dictu!
-- when the rotatory motion surpasseth the rectilinear, we see blue; when the reverse, we see red; and when the twain are equal, we see yellow. What fantastical drivel!"

"You mean 'tis not the truth? I must say, Henry, it sounds reasonable to me. In sooth, there is a seed of poetry in it; it hath an elegance."

"Aye, it hath every virtue and but one small defect, which is, that the universe doth not operate in that wise. Marry, 'tis no crime, methinks, to teach the man's skeptical philosophy or his analytical geometry -- both have much of merit in 'em. But his cosmology is purely fanciful, his optics right bizarre; and the first man to prove it is Isaac Newton."

"Hence their enmity?" asked Ebenezer.

Burlingame nodded. "By the time Newton became Lucasian Professor he had already spoilt Cartesian optics with his prism experiments -- and well do I recall them from his lectures! -- and he was refuting the theory of vortices by mathematics, though he hadn't as yet published his own cosmical hypotheses. But his loathing for Descartes goes deeper yet: it hath its origin in a difference betwixt their temperaments. Descartes, you know, is a clever writer, and hath a sort of genius for illustration that lends force to the wildest hypotheses. He is a great hand for twisting the cosmos to fit his theory. Newton, on the other hand, is a patient and brilliant experimenter, with a sacred regard for the facts of nature. Then again, since the lectures
De Motu Corporum
and his papers on the nature of light have been available, the man always held up to him by his critics is Descartes.