CHAPTER XXVIII

Dear _Yorick_, said my father, smiling (for _Yorick_ had broke his rank with my uncle _Toby_ in coming through the narrow entry, and so had stept first into the parlour)--this _Tristram_ of ours, I find, comes very hardly by all his religious rites. --Never was the son of _Jew_, _Christian_, _Turk_, or _Infidel_ initiated into them in so oblique and slovenly a manner. --But he is no worse, I trust, said _Yorick_. --There has been certainly, continued my father, the deuce and all to do in some part or other of the ecliptic, when this offspring of mine was formed. --That, you are a better judge of than I, replied _Yorick_. --Astrologers, quoth my father, know better than us both: --the trine and sextil aspects have jumped awry, --or the opposite of their ascendants have not hit it, as they should, --or the lords of the genitures (as they call them) have been at _bo-peep_, --or something has been wrong above, or below with us.

’Tis possible, answered _Yorick_. --But is the child, cried my uncle _Toby_, the worse? --The _Troglodytes_ say not, replied my father. And your theologists, _Yorick_, tell us --Theologically? said _Yorick_, --or speaking after the manner of apothecaries?[5.3]--statesmen?[5.4]--or washer-women?[5.5]

----I’m not sure, replied my father, --but they tell us, brother _Toby_, he’s the better for it. ----Provided, said _Yorick_, you travel him into _Egypt_. ----Of that, answered my father, he will have the advantage, when he sees the _Pyramids_.----

Now every word of this, quoth my uncle _Toby_, is _Arabick_ to me. ----I wish, said _Yorick_, ’twas so, to half the world.

----ILUS,[5.6] continued my father, circumcised his whole army one morning. --Not without a court martial? cried my uncle _Toby_. ----Though the learned, continued he, taking no notice of my uncle _Toby’s_ remark, but turning to _Yorick_, --are greatly divided still who _Ilus_ was; --some say _Saturn_; --some the Supreme Being; --others, no more than a brigadier general under _Pharaoh-neco_. ----Let him be who he will, said my uncle _Toby_, I know not by what article of war he could justify it.

The controvertists, answered my father, assign two-and-twenty different reasons for it: --others, indeed, who have drawn their pens on the opposite side of the question, have shewn the world the futility of the greatest part of them. --But then again, our best polemic divines --I wish there was not a polemic divine, said _Yorick_, in the kingdom; --one ounce of practical divinity--is worth a painted ship-load of all their reverences have imported these fifty years. --Pray, Mr. _Yorick_, quoth my uncle _Toby_, --do tell me what a polemic divine is? ----The best description, captain _Shandy_, I have ever read, is of a couple of ’em, replied _Yorick_, in the account of the battle fought single hands betwixt _Gymnast_ and captain _Tripet_; which I have in my pocket. ----I beg I may hear it, quoth my uncle _Toby_ earnestly. --You shall, said _Yorick_. --And as the corporal is waiting for me at the door, --and I know the description of a battle will do the poor fellow more good than his supper, --I beg, brother, you’ll give him leave to come in. --With all my soul, said my father. ----_Trim_ came in, erect and happy as an emperor; and having shut the door, _Yorick_ took a book from his right-hand coat-pocket, and read, or pretended to read, as follows.

[Footnote 5.3: Χαλεπῆς νόσου, καὶ δυσιάτου ἀπαλλαγὴν, ἣν ἄνθρακα καλοῦσιν. --PHILO.]

[Footnote 5.4: Τὰ τεμνόμενα τῶν ἐθνῶν τολυγονώτατα, καὶ πολυανθρωπότατα εἶναι.]

[Footnote 5.5: Καθαριότητος εἵνεκεν. --BOCHART.]

[Footnote 5.6: Ὁ Ἶλος, τὰ αἰδοῖα περιτέμνεται, ταὐτὸ ποιῆσαι καὶ τοὺς ἅμ’ αυτῷ συμμάχους καταναγκάσας. --SANCHUNIATHO.]

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