522 Memoirs and Writings of Rabelais. CNoy. 
own cowardice, such amusing .profligacy—hesides, a ohundred, other 
minuter traits, so equally far-fetched, yet,congenial—that, the, rese) 
blance could scarcely have been the mere result, of . chance.,. Added .t 
this, the very-contrast.of their persons (well, known, to those ARABRINERS 
with the two characters) is, in Shakespeare’s case, the.contrast,, of ,mi- 
tation. Panurge is a miracle of leanness—Falstaff of fat ;, the;one.in 
every page perpetually jests upon, his ghost-like, tenuity; the, other 
upon his corpulence. Panurge, in the storm at, sea, is the,counterpart of 
Falstaff at. Shrewsbury—drawing arguments, in) fayour of his courage 
from the very, fact. of his cowardice; and. discussing honour cateche- 
tically like the “ fat knight.” To make. our, assertion less apochryphal, 
we must remind the reader that a short time previous to, the, appearance 
of Shakspeare as an author, and indeed long afterwards, when, in. his 
eagerness to cater for the public, he ransacked. almost, all extant ac- 
cessible documents, both at home and abroad, Rabelais was.,the;.one 
great name on the Continent, and Panurge his most popular character, so 
that his name would naturally have found its way (in some shape or other) 
to England. Now our “ immortal bard,” we know, was neyer very, scru- 
pulous in the means by which he gained plots, and persons for his dramas; 
and nothing therefore is more likely, judging at least from the same 
sort of evidence that, in criminal cases, is deemed good enough to hang 
a man—than that he had met with some garbled translation of Rabelais ; 
and finding the dramatic capabilities of Panurge, had dressed, him 
afresh in fat and frolic (as being more likely by contrast. to. appear 
original), and re-baptized him Falstaff. Mazs revenons a nos moutons: 
the next character of importance is the jolly friar, John of the Funnels : 
an ecclesiastic who wields the bludgeon as ably as the glass, and knocks 
down whole bumpers with the. same facility that he knocks down whole 
regiments. He is in fact a French Friar Tuck,, with a vivacity. and 
rapidity of observation as unequalled as it is peculiar, , Nothing is, more 
easy than to describe a character common-place,and generally, intelli- 
gible ; but. to. give such a character shades that may. distinguish it 
(without destroying the verisimilitude) from, others, ofthe same class, 
thus individualizing it, as it were, can be achieved , only ;by, genius ;. and 
this was Rabelais’ inspiration. In the delineation of his Queen Whims— 
that beau-idéal of female coquetry, he has shown his intimate acquain- 
tance with the sex. Her Majesty is the finest representation on record 
of a blue-stocking and a prude: she lives solely on mathematics, which 
she takes by way of dinner, washed down with. two, wine-glasses of 
distilled muslin. All this of course is allegorical; but, the reflective 
reader will not fail to make his own comments. Indeed, throughout his 
works, Rabelais must be taken as an allegorical satirist. The times in 
which he wrote were too bigotted to allow of vice. being reproved 
without a mask to conceal the offender; so he was compelled to assume 
a strange fanciful disguise, and may be considered, at least among the 
moderns, as the father of this species of romance... His Limousin 
University Scholar, who has immortalized himself by a profound dis- 
covery that “ nothing is so injurious to the sight.as bad eyes,” would tell 
well at either University: almost as much so as Master Janotus )de 
Bragmardo, another of his dramatis persone, whom we take too bea 
model-for modern pedants. -The good Bishop Homenas_with his hand- 
maid Clerica, who was never heard to say more. than ‘ the Decretals, 
the Decretals ; we are all lost without the Decretals ;” is an exemplary 
