Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete - The Original Classic Edition. Rabelais François
said Gargantua. Yea, said the monk, and to make shirts and smocks. Therefore was it ordained that into this religious order should be admitted no women that were not fair, well-featured, and of a sweet disposition; nor
men that were not comely, personable, and well conditioned.
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Item, Because in the convents of women men come not but underhand, privily, and by stealth, it was therefore enacted that in this house there shall be
no women in case there be not men, nor men in case there be not women.
Item, Because both men and women that are received into religious orders after the expiring of their noviciate or probation year were constrained
and forced perpetually to stay there all the days of their life, it was therefore ordered that all whatever, men or women, admitted within this abbey, should have full leave to depart with peace and contentment whensoever it should seem good to them so to do.
Item, for that the religious men and women did ordinarily make three vows, to wit, those of chastity, poverty, and obedience, it was therefore
constituted and appointed that in this convent they might be honourably married, that they might be rich, and live at liberty. In regard of the legitimate time of the persons to be initiated, and years under and above which they were not capable of reception, the women were to be admitted from ten till fifteen, and the men from twelve till eighteen.
Chapter 1.LIII.
How the abbey of the Thelemites was built and endowed.
For the fabric and furniture of the abbey Gargantua caused to be delivered out in ready money seven-and-twenty hundred thousand, eight hundred and one-and-thirty of those golden rams of Berry which have a sheep stamped on the one side and a flowered cross on the other; and for every year, until
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the whole work were completed, he allotted threescore nine thousand crowns of the sun, and as many of the seven stars, to be charged all upon the
receipt of the custom. For the foundation and maintenance thereof for ever, he settled a perpetual fee-farm-rent of three-and-twenty hundred, three score and nine thousand, five hundred and fourteen rose nobles, exempted from all homage, fealty, service, or burden whatsoever, and payable every year at the gate of the abbey; and of this by letters patent passed a very good grant. The architecture was in a figure hexagonal, and in such a fashion that in every one of the six corners there was built a great round tower of threescore foot in diameter, and were all of a like
form and bigness. Upon the north side ran along the river of Loire, on the bank whereof was situated the tower called Arctic. Going towards the east, there was another called Calaer,--the next following Anatole,--the next Mesembrine,--the next Hesperia, and the last Criere. Every tower was distant from other the space of three hundred and twelve paces. The whole edifice was everywhere six storeys high, reckoning the cellars underground for one. The second was arched after the fashion of a basket-handle; the rest were ceiled with pure wainscot, flourished with Flanders fretwork, in the form of the foot of a lamp, and covered above with fine slates, with an endorsement of lead, carrying the antique figures of little puppets and animals of all sorts, notably well suited to one another, and gilt,
together with the gutters, which, jutting without the walls from betwixt the crossbars in a diagonal figure, painted with gold and azure, reached to the very ground, where they ended into great conduit-pipes, which carried all away unto the river from under the house.
This same building was a hundred times more sumptuous and magnificent than ever was Bonnivet, Chambourg, or Chantilly; for there were in it nine
thousand, three hundred and two-and-thirty chambers, every one whereof had
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a withdrawing-room, a handsome closet, a wardrobe, an oratory, and neat passage, leading into a great and spacious hall. Between every tower in
the midst of the said body of building there was a pair of winding, such as we now call lantern stairs, whereof the steps were part of porphyry, which is a dark red marble spotted with white, part of Numidian stone, which is a kind of yellowishly-streaked marble upon various colours, and part of serpentine marble, with light spots on a dark green ground, each of those steps being two-and-twenty foot in length and three fingers thick, and the just number of twelve betwixt every rest, or, as we now term it,
landing-place. In every resting-place were two fair antique arches where the light came in: and by those they went into a cabinet, made even with
and of the breadth of the said winding, and the reascending above the roofs of the house ended conically in a pavilion. By that vise or winding they entered on every side into a great hall, and from the halls into the
chambers. From the Arctic tower unto the Criere were the fair great libraries in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, French, Italian, and Spanish, respectively distributed in their several cantons, according to the
diversity of these languages. In the midst there was a wonderful scalier or winding-stair, the entry whereof was without the house, in a vault or arch six fathom broad. It was made in such symmetry and largeness that six men-at-arms with their lances in their rests might together in a breast ride all up to the very top of all the palace. From the tower Anatole to the
Mesembrine were fair spacious galleries, all coloured over and painted with the ancient prowesses, histories, and descriptions of the world. In the
midst thereof there was likewise such another ascent and gate as we said there was on the river-side. Upon that gate was written in great antique
letters that which followeth.
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Chapter 1.LIV.
The inscription set upon the great gate of Theleme.
Here enter not vile bigots, hypocrites, Externally devoted apes, base snites,
Puffed-up, wrynecked beasts, worse than the Huns, Or Ostrogoths, forerunners of baboons:
Cursed snakes, dissembled varlets, seeming sancts, Slipshod caffards, beggars pretending wants,
Fat chuffcats, smell-feast knockers, doltish gulls, Out-strouting cluster-fists, contentious bulls, Fomenters of divisions and debates,
Elsewhere, not here, make sale of your deceits.
Your filthy trumperies Stuffed with pernicious lies (Not worth a bubble), Would do but trouble
Our earthly paradise,
Your filthy trumperies.
Here enter not attorneys, barristers, Nor bridle-champing law-practitioners: Clerks, commissaries, scribes, nor pharisees, Wilful disturbers of the people's ease: Judges, destroyers, with an unjust breath,
Of honest men, like dogs, even unto death.
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Your salary is at the gibbet-foot:
Go drink there! for we do not here fly out On those excessive courses, which may draw A waiting on your courts by suits in law.
Lawsuits, debates, and wrangling Hence are exiled, and jangling. Here we are very
Frolic and merry,
And free from all entangling, Lawsuits, debates, and wrangling.
Here enter not base pinching usurers, Pelf-lickers, everlasting gatherers,
Gold-graspers, coin-gripers, gulpers of mists, Niggish deformed sots, who, though your chests Vast sums of money should to you afford, Would ne'ertheless add more unto that hoard,
And yet not be content,--you clunchfist dastards, Insatiable fiends, and Pluto's bastards,
Greedy devourers, chichy sneakbill rogues,
Hell-mastiffs gnaw your bones, you ravenous dogs.
You beastly-looking fellows, Reason doth plainly tell us That we should not
To you allot
Room here, but at the gallows,
You beastly-looking fellows.
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