partium:  just so the heart with excessive joy is inwardly dilated, and suffereth a manifest resolution of the vital spirits, which may go so far on that it may thereby be deprived of its nourishment, and by consequence of life itself, by this perichary or extremity of gladness, as Galen saith, lib. 12, method, lib. 5, de locis affectis, and lib. 2, de symptomatum causis.  And as it hath come to pass in former times, witness Marcus Tullius, lib. 1, Quaest.  Tuscul., Verrius, Aristotle, Titus Livius, in his relation of the battle of Cannae, Plinius, lib. 7, cap. 32 and 34, A. Gellius, lib. 3, c. 15, and many other writers,—­to Diagoras the Rhodian, Chilon, Sophocles, Dionysius the tyrant of Sicily, Philippides, Philemon, Polycrates, Philistion, M. Juventi, and others who died with joy.  And as Avicen speaketh, in 2 canon et lib. de virib. cordis, of the saffron, that it doth so rejoice the heart that, if you take of it excessively, it will by a superfluous resolution and dilation deprive it altogether of life.  Here peruse Alex.  Aphrodiseus, lib. 1, Probl., cap. 19, and that for a cause.  But what?  It seems I am entered further into this point than I intended at the first.  Here, therefore, will I strike sail, referring the rest to that book of mine which handleth this matter to the full.  Meanwhile, in a word I will tell you, that blue doth certainly signify heaven and heavenly things, by the same very tokens and symbols that white signifieth joy and pleasure.

Chapter 1.XI.

Of the youthful age of Gargantua.

Gargantua, from three years upwards unto five, was brought up and instructed in all convenient discipline by the commandment of his father; and spent that time like the other little children of the country, that is, in drinking, eating, and sleeping:  in eating, sleeping, and drinking:  and in sleeping, drinking, and eating.  Still he wallowed and rolled up and down himself in the mire and dirt—­he blurred and sullied his nose with filth—­he blotted and smutched his face with any kind of scurvy stuff—­he trod down his shoes in the heel—­at the flies he did oftentimes yawn, and ran very heartily after the butterflies, the empire whereof belonged to his father.  He pissed in his shoes, shit in his shirt, and wiped his nose on his sleeve—­he did let his snot and snivel fall in his pottage, and dabbled, paddled, and slobbered everywhere—­he would drink in his slipper, and ordinarily rub his belly against a pannier.  He sharpened his teeth with a top, washed his hands with his broth, and combed his head with a bowl.  He would sit down betwixt two stools, and his arse to the ground —­would cover himself with a wet sack, and drink in eating of his soup.  He did eat his cake sometimes without bread, would bite in laughing, and laugh in biting.  Oftentimes did he spit in the basin, and fart for fatness, piss against the sun, and hide himself in the water for fear of rain.  He would strike