Was it this? or tell me, Nature, what else it was that made this morsel so sweet, - and to what magic I owe it, that the draught I took of their flagon was so delicious with it, that they remain upon my palate to this hour?
If the supper was to my taste, - the grace which followed it was much more so.
THE GRACE.
When supper was over, the old man gave a knock upon the table with the haft of his knife, to bid them prepare for the dance: the moment the signal was given, the women and girls ran altogether into a back apartment to tie up their hair, - and the young men to the door to wash their faces, and change their sabots; and in three minutes every soul was ready upon a little esplanade before the house to begin. - The old man and his wife came out last, and placing me betwixt them, sat down upon a sofa of turf by the door.
The old man had some fifty years ago been no mean performer upon the vielle, - and at the age he was then of, touch’d it well enough for the purpose. His wife sung now and then a little to the tune, - then intermitted, - and join’d her old man again, as their children and grand-children danced before them.
It was not till the middle of the second dance, when, from some pauses in the movements, wherein they all seemed to look up, I fancied I could distinguish an elevation of spirit different from that which is the cause or the effect of simple jollity. In a word, I thought I beheld Religion mixing in the dance: - but, as I had never seen her so engaged, I should have look’d upon it now as one of the illusions of an imagination which is eternally misleading me, had not the old man, as soon as the dance ended, said, that this was their constant way; and that all his life long he had made it a rule, after supper was over, to call out his family to dance and rejoice; believing, he said, that a cheerful and contented mind was the best sort of thanks to heaven that an illiterate peasant could pay, -
Or a learned prelate either, said I.
THE CASE OF DELICACY.
When you have gained the top of Mount Taurira, you run presently down to Lyons: - adieu, then, to all rapid movements! ’Tis a journey of caution; and it fares better with sentiments, not to be in a hurry with them; so I contracted with a voiturin to take his time with a couple of mules, and convoy me in my own chaise safe to Turin, through Savoy.
Poor, patient, quiet, honest people! fear not: your poverty, the treasury of your simple virtues, will not be envied you by the world, nor will your valleys be invaded by it. - Nature! in the midst of thy disorders, thou art still friendly to the scantiness thou hast created: with all thy great works about thee, little hast thou left to give, either to the scythe or to the sickle; - but to that little thou grantest safety and protection; and sweet are the dwellings which stand so shelter’d.
Let the way-worn traveller vent his complaints upon the sudden turns and dangers of your roads, - your rocks, - your precipices; - the difficulties of getting up, - the horrors of getting down, - mountains impracticable, - and cataracts, which roll down great stones from their summits, and block his road up. - The peasants had been all day at work in removing a fragment of this kind between St. Michael and Madane; and, by the time my voiturin got to the place, it wanted full two hours of completing before a passage could any how be gain’d: there was nothing but to wait with patience; - ’twas a wet and tempestuous night; so that by the delay, and that together, the voiturin found himself obliged to put up five miles short of his stage at a little decent kind of an inn by the roadside.
I forthwith took possession of my bedchamber - got a good fire - order’d supper; and was thanking heaven it was no worse, when a voiture arrived with a lady in it and her servant maid.
As there was no other bed-chamber in the house, the hostess, - without much nicety, led them into mine, telling them, as she usher’d them in, that there was nobody in it but an English gentleman; - that there were two good beds in it, and a closet within the room which held another. The accent in which she spoke of this third bed, did not say much for it; - however, she said there were three beds and but three people, and she durst say, the gentleman would do anything to accommodate matters. - I left not the lady a moment to make a conjecture about it - so instantly made a declaration that I would do anything in my power.
As this did not amount to an absolute surrender of my bed-chamber, I still felt myself so much the proprietor, as to have a right to do the honours of it; - so I desired the lady to sit down, - pressed her into the warmest seat, - called for more wood, - desired the hostess to enlarge the plan of the supper, and to favour us with the very best wine.
The lady had scarce warm’d herself five minutes at the fire, before she began to turn her head back, and give a look at the beds; and the oftener she cast her eyes that way, the more they return’d perplexd; - I felt for her - and for myself: for in a few minutes, what by her looks, and the case itself, I found myself as much embarrassed as it was possible the lady could be herself.
That the beds we were to lie in were in one and the same room, was enough simply by itself to have excited all this; - but the position of them, for they stood parallel, and so very close to each other as only to allow space for a small wicker chair betwixt them, rendered the affair still more oppressive to us; - they were fixed up moreover near the fire; and the projection of the chimney on one side, and a large beam which cross’d the room on the other, formed a kind of recess for them that was no way favourable to the nicety of our sensations: - if anything could have added to it, it was that the two beds were both of them so very small, as to cut us off from every idea of the lady and the maid lying together; which in either of them, could it have been feasible, my lying beside them, though a thing not to be wish’d, yet there was nothing in it so terrible which the imagination might not have pass’d over without torment.
As for the little room within, it offer’d little or no consolation to us: ’twas a damp, cold closet, with a half dismantled window-shutter, and with a window which had neither glass nor oil paper in it to keep out the tempest of the night. I did not endeavour to stifle my cough when the lady gave a peep into it; so it reduced the case in course to this alternative - That the lady should sacrifice her health to her feelings, and take up with the closet herself, and abandon the bed next mine to her maid, - or that the girl should take the closet, &c., &c.
The lady was a Piedmontese of about thirty, with a glow of health in her cheeks. The maid was a Lyonoise of twenty, and as brisk and lively a French girl as ever moved. - There were difficulties every way, - and the obstacle of the stone in the road, which brought us into the distress, great as it appeared whilst the peasants were removing it, was but a pebble to what lay in our ways now. - I have only to add, that it did not lessen the weight which hung upon our spirits, that we were both too delicate to communicate what we felt to each other upon the occasion.
We sat down to supper; and had we not had more generous wine to it than a little inn in Savoy could have furnish’d, our tongues had been tied up, till necessity herself had set them at liberty; - but the lady having a few bottles of Burgundy in her voiture, sent down her fille de chambre for a couple of them; so that by the time supper was over, and we were left alone, we felt ourselves inspired with a strength of mind sufficient to talk, at least, without reserve upon our situation. We turn’d it every way, and debated and considered it in all kinds of lights in the course of a two hours’ negotiation; at the end of which the articles were settled finally betwixt us, and stipulated for in form and manner of a treaty of peace, - and I believe with as much religion and good faith on both sides as in any treaty which has yet had the honour of being handed down to posterity.
They were as follow: -
First, as the right of the bed-chamber is in Monsieur, - and he thinking the bed next to the fire to be the warmest, he insists upon the concession on the lady’s side of taking up with it.
Granted, on the part of Madame; with a proviso, That as the curtains of that bed are of a flimsy transparent cotton, and appear likewise too scanty to draw close, that the fille de cha
mbre shall fasten up the opening, either by corking pins, or needle and thread, in such manner as shall be deem’d a sufficient barrier on the side of Monsieur.
2dly. It is required on the part of Madame, that Monsieur shall lie the whole night through in his robe de chambre.
Rejected: inasmuch as Monsieur is not worth a robe de chambre; he having nothing in his portmanteau but six shirts and a black silk pair of breeches.
The mentioning the silk pair of breeches made an entire change of the article, - for the breeches were accepted as an equivalent for the robe de chambre; and so it was stipulated and agreed upon, that I should lie in my black silk breeches all night.
3dly. It was insisted upon and stipulated for by the lady, that after Monsieur was got to bed, and the candle and fire extinguished, that Monsieur should not speak one single word the whole night.
Granted; provided Monsieur’s saying his prayers might not be deemed an infraction of the treaty.
There was but one point forgot in this treaty, and that was the manner in which the lady and myself should be obliged to undress and get to bed; - there was but one way of doing it, and that I leave to the reader to devise; protesting as I do it, that if it is not the most delicate in nature, ’tis the fault of his own imagination, - against which this is not my first complaint.
Now, when we were got to bed, whether it was the novelty of the situation, or what it was, I know not; but so it was, I could not shut my eyes; I tried this side, and that, and turn’d and turn’d again, till a full hour after midnight; when Nature and patience both wearing out, - O, my God! said I.
- You have broke the treaty, Monsieur, said the lady, who had no more slept than myself. - I begg’d a thousand pardons - but insisted it was no more than an ejaculation. She maintained ’twas an entire infraction of the treaty - I maintained it was provided for in the clause of the third article.
The lady would by no means give up her point, though she weaken’d her barrier by it; for in the warmth of the dispute, I could hear two or three corking pins fall out of the curtain to the ground.
Upon my word and honour, Madame, said I, - stretching my arm out of bed by way of asseveration. -
(I was going to have added, that I would not have trespassed against the remotest idea of decorum for the world); -
But the fille de chambre hearing there were words between us, and fearing that hostilities would ensue in course, had crept silently out of her closet, and it being totally dark, had stolen so close to our beds, that she had got herself into the narrow passage which separated them, and had advanced so far up as to be in a line betwixt her mistress and me: -
So that when I stretch’d out my hand I caught hold of the fille de chambre’s -
The Sermons
Jesus College, Cambridge, where Sterne studied for his Bachelor of Arts degree from 1733 to 1737
THE SERMONS OF LAURENCE STERNE
Sterne’s career as an Anglican clergyman began almost immediately after he had completed his Bachelor of Arts degree at Jesus College, Cambridge in 1737. That same year, he was made Deacon of St Ives in Huntingdonshire (now Cambridgeshire). Soon afterwards, he was made Vicar of Sutton-on-the-Forest in his native North Yorkshire, later performing the same duties at nearby Stillington as well. He was also a prebendary of York Minster – an honorary title, which entitled him to a small income and a role in Church administration. Following the success of the first two volumes of Tristram Shandy, Baron Faunconberg made him the perpetual curate of Coxwold, also in North Yorkshire, a post he retained until his death in 1768.
Sterne’s religious calling might seem at odds with his bawdy sense of humour, which was encouraged by his close friend John Hall-Stevenson and bore fruit in his fiction. Indeed, the banning by the church of Sterne’s Political Romance in 1759 put an end to any serious ambitions Sterne might have had to rise through the ranks of the ecclesiastical establishment, whilst at the same time awakening him to his own abilities as a writer. Yet the sermons, which Sterne personally selected for publication, attest to the sincerity of his religious beliefs and their success during his lifetime actually surpassed his fame as the writer of satiric novels, with his sermons outselling all his other work.
The two volumes of sermons that Sterne published in 1760 were ascribed to ‘Mr. Yorick’, the alter ego he adopts in Tristram Shandy and the Sentimental Journey. As one might expect, however, the sermons do not follow the subversive example of his novels. Instead, they follow the standard sermon framework of presenting in full one or two verses from the Bible, followed by a detailed explanation of these verses’ religious moral, which the congregation can take away as an aid to living their lives in a manner befitting orthodox Anglican Christians. By all accounts, Sterne was a popular preacher despite the controversies that surrounded his literary and personal life (as well as his bawdy writing, his numerous love affairs were also cause for concern). In general, the sermons could be said to argue the case that human beings are basically good, or at least have the potential to be so – a sentiment that befits a man of Sterne’s Whiggish political affiliation, in contrast to the more pessimistic outlook of the rival Tory party. His outlook is also typical of eighteenth-century latitudinarianism, which emphasised a ‘low Church’ focus on individual conscience and belief and tolerated a broad interpretation of Church practice, liturgy and doctrine. At the same time, the sermons are traditional in their insistence that the Bible and God must be consulted as the last word in moral authority, even while they retain a humane tolerance for human weakness.
All Hallows’ Church, Sutton-on-the-Forest, North Yorkshire, where Sterne received his first post as a Vicar
CONTENTS
PREFACE.
SERMON I. INQUIRY AFTER HAPPINESS.
SERMON II. THE HOUSE OF FEASTING AND THE HOUSE OF MOURNING DESCRIBED.
SERMON III. PHILANTROPY RECOMMENDED.
SERMON IV. SELF KNOWLEDGE.
SERMON V. A CHARITY SERMON.
SERMON VI. PHARISEE AND PUBLICAN IN THE TEMPLE.
SERMON VII. VINDICATION OF HUMAN NATURE.
SERMON VIII. TIME AND CHANCE.
SERMON IX. THE CHARACTER OF HEROD. PREACHED ON INNOCENTS DAY.
SERMON X. JOB’S ACCOUNT OF THE SHORTNESS AND TROUBLES OF LIFE, CONSIDERED.
SERMON XI. EVIL-SPEAKING.
SERMON XII. JOSEPH’S HISTORY CONSIDERED. FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES.
SERMON XIII. DUTY OF SETTING BOUNDS TO OUR DESIRES.
SERMON XIV. SELF-EXAMINATION.
SERMON XV. JOB’S EXPOSTULATION WITH HIS WIFE.
St Michael’s Church, Coxwold, where Sterne was curate from 1860 until his death
PREFACE.
THE sermon which gave rise to the publication of these, having been offer’d to the world as a sermon of Yorick’s, I hope the most serious reader will find nothing to offend him, in my continuing these two volumes under the same title: lest it should be otherwise, I have added a second title page with the real name of the author: — the first will serve the bookseller’s purpose, as Yorick’s name is possibly of the two the more known; — and the second will ease the minds of those who see a jest, and the danger which lurks under it, where no jest was meant.
I suppose it is needless to inform the publick, that the reason of printing these sermons, arises altogether from the favourable reception, which the sermon given as a sample of them in TRISTRAM SHANDY, met with from the world; — That sermon was printed by itself some years ago, but could find neither purchasers or readers, so that I apprehended little hazard from a promise I made upon its republication,
“That if the sermon was liked, these should be also at the world’s service;”
which, to be as good as my word, they here are, and I pray to GOD, they may do the service I wish it. I have little to say in their behalf, except this, that not one of them was composed with any thoughts of being printed, — they have been hastily wrote, and carry the marks of it along with them. — This may be no recommendation; — I mean it h
owever as such; for as the sermons turn chiefly upon philanthropy, and those kindred virtues to it, upon which hang all the law and the prophets, I trust they will be no less felt, or worse received, for the evidence they bear, of proceeding more from the heart than the head. I have nothing to add, but that the reader, upon old and beaten subjects, must not look for many new thoughts,— ’tis well if he has new language; in three or four passages, where he has neither the one or the other, I have quoted the author I made free with — there are some other passages, where I suspect I may have taken the same liberty, — but ’tis only suspicion, for I do not remember it is so, otherwise I should have restored them to their proper owners, so that I put it in here more as a general saving, than from a consciousness of having much to answer for upon that score: in this however, and every thing else, which I offer, or shall offer to the world, I rest, with a heart much at ease, upon the protection of the humane and candid, from whom I have received many favours, for which I beg leave to return them thanks — thanks.
SERMON I. INQUIRY AFTER HAPPINESS.
PSALM IV. 5, 6.
There be many that say, who will shew us any good? — Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us.
THE great pursuit of man is after happiness: it is the first and strongest desire of his nature — in every stage of his life, he searches for it, as for hid treasure — courts it under a thousand different shapes — and though perpetually disappointed, — still persists — runs after and enquires for it afresh — asks every passenger who comes in his way — Who will shew him any good? — who will assist him in the attainment of it, or direct him to the discovery of this great end of all his wishes?
Complete Works of Laurence Sterne Page 75
