Chips from a German Workshop, Volume 4: Essays Chiefly on the Science of LanguageMüller, F. Max (Friedrich Max)
Religion
Chips from a German Workshop, Volume 4: Essays Chiefly on the Science of Language
Müller, F. Max (Friedrich Max)
Comparative linguistics; Folklore; Literature -- History and criticism; Mythology; Religions
“El Conde Lucanor, compuesto por el excelentissimo Principe don Iuan
Manuel, hijo del Infante don Manuel, y nieto del Santo Rey don
Fernando,” Madrid, 1642; cap. 29, p. 96. He tells the story as follows:
“There was a woman called Dona Truhana (Gertrude), rather poor than
rich. One day she went to the market carrying a pot of honey on her
head. On her way she began to think that she would sell the pot of
honey, and buy a quantity of eggs, that from those eggs she would have
chickens, that she would sell them and buy sheep; that the sheep would
give her lambs, and thus calculating all her gains, she began to think
herself much richer than her neighbors. With the riches which she
imagined she possessed, she thought how she would marry her sons and
daughters, and how she would walk in the street surrounded by her sons
and daughters-in-law; and how people would consider her happy for having
amassed so large a fortune, though she had been so poor. While she was
thinking over all this, she began to laugh for joy, and struck her head
and forehead with her hand. The pot of honey fell down, was broken, and
she shed hot tears because she had lost all that she would have
possessed if the pot of honey had not been broken.”
NOTE K.
Bonaventure des Periers, “Les Contes ou les Nouvelles.” Amsterdam, 1735.
Nouvelle XIV. (vol. i. p. 141). (First edition, Lyon, 1558): “Et ne les
(les Alquemistes) sçauroiton mieux comparer qu’à une bonne femme qui
portoit une potée de laict au marché, faisant son compte ainsi: qu’elle
la vendroit deux liards: de ces deux liards elle en achepteroit une
douzaine d’œufs, lesquelz elle mettroit couver, et en auroit une
douzaine de poussins: ces poussins deviendroient grands, et les feroit
chaponner: ces chapons vaudroient cinq solz la piece, ce seroit un escu
et plus, dont elle achepteroit deux cochons, masle et femelle: qui
deviendroient grands et en feroient une douzaine d’autres, qu’elle
vendroit vingt solz la piece; apres les avoir nourris quelque temps, ce
seroient douze francs, dont elle achepteroit une iument, qui porteroit
un beau poulain, lequel croistroit et deviendroit tant gentil: il
sauteroit et feroit _Hin_. Et en disant _Hin_, la bonne femme, de l’aise
qu’elle avoit en son compte, se print à faire la ruade que feroit son
poulain: et en ce faisant sa potée de laict va tomber, et se respandit
toute. Et voila ses œufs, ses poussins, ses chappons, ses cochons, sa
jument, et son poulain, tous par terre.”
[Footnote 1: La Fontaine, _Fables_, livre vii., fable 10.]
[Footnote 2: Phædon, 61, 5: Μετὰ δὲ τὸν θεὸν, ἐννοήσας, ὅτι τὸν
ποιητὴν δέοι, εἶπερ μέλλοι ποιητὴς εἶναι, ποιεῖν μύθους, ἀλλ’ οὐ
λόγους, καὶ αὐτὸς οὐκ ἦ μυθολογικός, διὰ ταῦτα δὴ οὓς προχείρους
εἶχον καὶ ἠπιστάμην μύθους τοὺς Αἰσώπου, τούτων ἐποίησα οἷς
πρώτοις ἐνέτυχον.]
[Footnote 3: Robert, _Fables Inédites_, des XIIe, XIIIe, et XIVe
Siècles; Paris, 1825; vol. i. p. ccxxvii.]
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