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Updated: May 22, 2025
The union was accomplished by Rabelais. Far outstripping Jean de Meung in the comprehensiveness and vigour of his thought, he at the same time infinitely surpassed him as an artist. At first sight, indeed, his great book hardly conveys such an impression; to a careless reader it might appear to be simply the work of a buffoon or a madman. But such a conception of it would be totally mistaken.
For some reason he had come to the conclusion that the less the settlers knew of pleasure the better, and therefore he laid down the law that all strolling popular entertainers should be forbidden to enter the holy city. No public buffoon ever cracked his jokes at Herrnhut. No tight-rope dancer poised on giddy height. No barrel-dancer rolled his empty barrel.
He therefore applies to A, who is the creature of B, who is the tool of C, who is the flatterer of D, who is the catamite of E, who is the pimp of F, who is the bully of G, who is the buffoon of I, who is the husband of K, who is the whore of L, who is the bastard of M, who is the instrument of the great man.
Ill-fed, dirty, unkempt men as our sailors were, we got to like them all, from the elderly dignified Mohammed, who thought he knew more about navigation than the captain, to Ahmet Faraj, the buffoon who played the tom-tom and made everybody laugh; this worthy individual was the recognised leader of all the festivities with which they regaled us from time to time, consisting of very ugly songs and a yet uglier dance, the chief art in which consisted in wagging their elastic tails with an energy which mortals further removed from monkey origin could never hope to approach.
It was no light thing that on the very eve of the decisive struggle between our Kings and their Parliaments, royalty should be exhibited to the world stammering, slobbering, shedding unmanly tears, trembling at a drawn sword, and talking in the style alternately of a buffoon and of a pedagogue.
He had been a buffoon, and his dress still bore many tokens of his former profession. His big head swayed upon his thin neck; his droll, though emaciated features constantly changed their expression, and even when he was not coughing, his mouth was continually in motion.
For this brutal and brutish buffoon I am speaking of Shakespeare's Thersites has no touch of humour in all his currish composition: Shakespeare had none as nature has none to spare for such dirty dogs as those of his kind or generation.
Valiant in velvet, light in ragged luck, Most vain, most generous, sternly critical, Buffoon and poet, lover and sensualist; A deal of Ariel, just a streak of Puck, Much Antony, of Hamlet most of all, And something of the Shorter Catechist." He was not primarily a moral teacher, like Socrates or Thomas Carlyle; nor did he feel within him the voice of a prophetic mission.
From that time legend has fastened on Rabelais, has completely travestied him, till, bit by bit, it has made of him a buffoon, a veritable clown, a vagrant, a glutton, and a drunkard. The likeness of his person has undergone a similar metamorphosis.
Come; you rejoice at this; let us see what it is that excites your indignation. "That Dolabella should at this time have been pronounced a public enemy because he has slain an assassin; and that the son of a buffoon should appear dearer to the Roman people than Caius Caesar, the father of his country, are circumstances to be lamented."
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