Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 16.djvu/719

* RABELAIS. 631 RABELAIS. by Marliani in September, 1.534, as a Topographie de Rome, preceded by a dedicatory letter from Rabelais to the Cardinal du Bellay in which he speaks of travels in Italy. He was in Rome again from July, 1535, to March, 1536, and lo.st his place in the Lyons hospital in consequence of his absence. He corresponded diligently during this second Italian sojourn with the Bishop of Maillezais on matters of horticulture, politics, and Roman gossip, but chiefly concerning his ef- forts to secure from the Pope an indulgence to resiune the Benedictine dress and to practice medicine, excluding surgery. This indulgence was granted him by Paul III. on January 18, 1536, in view of his "zeal for religion, knowledge of literature, and probity of life and morals," grounds on which Rabelais dwells with much complacency. It was on this visit to Italy that Rabelais procured seeds of the melon artichoke and carnation which he was first to introduce to France and so to England. There seems reason to place at about this time the death of Theo- doule Rabelais, '"a cliild of two months," of whom Francois seems to have been the father. On his return from Italy Rabelais visited Paris and shared in a banquet in honor of the printer and humanist Dolet, who afterwards (1540) suffered •death for his freethinking. On May 22, 1537, Rabelais took his doctorate at Montpellier and lectured there later in that year on Hippocrates. In 1540 he was granted a further indulgence by Paul 111., passed a brief time with the canons of Saint-Maur-les-Fosses, but soon took up a wan- dering life again, for we find him in .July. 1541, at Turin. A work by him on military art writ- ten in Latin about this time was translated into French by Massuau and published in 1542 as istratagcmcs. Neither original nor translation exists. His protector, Guillaume du Bellay, Seigneur de Langey and brother of the Cardinal du Bellay, dying in 1543, bequeathed him "fifty livres tournois a year until his lieirs shall have provided him or caused him to receive prefer- ment in the Church to the value of 300 livres tournois annually." On September 19, 1545, Francis I. granted Rabelais a permit for the third book (properly the second) of Pantagruel, showing that Gargantua was then accounted the first and the original Pantagruel the second book. Dolet's death in the next year seems to have frightened Rabelais. He took refuge at Metz, where in 1547 we find him employed as a physician by the city. In 1548 Cardinal du Bel- lay sent for him to come to Rome, where Rabelais wrote a description of the great fete organized by the Cardinal to celebrate the birth of Louis, Duke of Orleans. This was published in 1549 as La sciomachie et festins faits a Rome, etc. Soon after Du Bellay's return to France (January 18, 1550) Rabelais was nominated Cure of Meudon, and being assured of royal favor, he published the fourth book of his romance, taking the precau- tion, however, first to resign (.lanuary 9, 1552) his curacies at Meudon and Jambet. The book fell, however, under the censorship of the Parle- nient. The brief remainder of Rabelais's life is wholl}' obscure. He probably died in 1553 in Paris (others say Meudon). An early biog- rajiher, Colletet. says he was buried in the cemetery of Saint Paul's Pari.sh. Paris. What purported to be a continuation of (largantiin et Pantagruel appeared in 1562 separately as L'lle Bonnante, and in 1567 was incorporated with the rest as a fifth book. A recension of this fifth book, differing considerably from the others and bearing the date 1549, was discovered in 1900. Some regard it as genuine. Others recall that about that time Rabelais obtained a royal injunc- tion against spurious works issued in his name and think this may be one of them. Parts of it are worthy of him. In Vargantua and Pantagruel frank fooling is mingled with keen social satire, political insight, and pedagogic wisdom, but the work is conspicu- ously lacking in continuity. It may be noted, however, that in the first book, Gargantua, will be found, together with the farcical adventures of that giant, the notable deeds of Friar John, the founding of the Abbey of Thelema, and the quintessence of Rabelaisian social and pedagogi- cal philosophy. The second had for its original descriptive title "Pantagruel, King of the Drunk- ards, Portrayed According to Life, with His Amazing Deeds and Feats of Prowess." The title of the third, fourth, and fifth books is "Of the Heroic Sayings and Doings of the Good (or Noble) Pantagruel." In both second and third books the central figure is Panurge, an original creation, accomplished, shrewd, but quite without moral character. His debate with him- self and his counsel-taking with others as to whether he shall marry, in the third book, is perhaps the most famous pas- sage of the romance. It is finally deter- mined to consult the oracle of the Dive Bouteille. The voyage in search of this furnishes occasion for the fourth and fifth books. The oracle is 'Trinq.' As nearly as may be Panta- gruel is Rabelais. Most of his writing is pure fooling, though always the sport of a philosoplier and a scholar, satirizing what he professed to believe, not because he was insincere, but because he saw an essential antinomy in all apprehension of truth — no uncommon attitude of mind during the Renaissance. In him antique rea.son is op- posed to modern faith. He is not an innovator, but a restorer of enlightened paganism, first in that series of Pantagruelists that counts Des- cartes, Courier, Balzac, and Lemaltre. His very uncleanness of speech is the expression of a lusty animalism in revolt against mediaeval asceticism, of a militant faith in nature and instinct, in whose sturdy humor and destructive satire is to be found the spirit of eighteenth-centurj' ethics and of modern realism. Rabelais does not direct- ly attack the Christian, or even the Roman Cath- olic faith. He ■as a freethinker, who clung to the skirts of Catholic faith, a cautious heretic, and no Protestant, a stout defender of free thought in France. Rabelais's influence on the development of fiction was small, but Panta- gruel, Panurge, and Friar John are imperishable creations. The first annotated edition of Rabelais was by Le Ducliat and Bernard de la Monnaye (1711). There are subsequent annotated editions by Esmangart (Paris. 1823-26) ; Burgaud des Marets and Rath^ry (Paris, 1857-58) : A. de Mon- taiglon and Louis Lacaud ( ib.. 1868-73) ; Marty- Laveaux (4 vols., ib., 1870-81), the best; Pierre Jannet (ib., 1873); Moland (ib., 1881); and Jouart (ib., 1885). There is a very remarkable English translation by Urquhart and ilotteux (London 1653-94; often reprinted). Consult the bibliography appended to Marty-Laveaux's study of Rabelais; Petit de Julleville Histoire de la