“This proverb,” says Mr. Ray, “is used when an absurd and ridiculous reason is given of any thing in question; an account of the original whereof, I find in one of Bishop Latimer’s sermons in these words--‘Mr. Moore was once sent with commission into Kent to try out, if it might be, what was the cause of Goodwin sands, and the shelf which stopped up Sandwich haven. Thither cometh Mr. Moore, and calleth all the country before him, such as were thought to be men of experience, and men that could, of all likelihood, best satisfy him of the matter concerning the stopping of Sandwich haven. Among the rest came in before him an old man with a white head, and one that was thought to be little less than a hundred years old. When Mr. Moore saw this aged man, he thought it expedient to hear him say his mind in this matter (for being so old a man, it was likely that he knew the most in that presence or company); so Mr. Moore called this old aged man unto him and said, ‘Father,’ said he, ‘tell me, if you can, what is the cause of the great arising of the sands and shelves here about this haven, which stop it up so that no ships can arrive here. You are the oldest man I can espy in all the company, so that if any man can tell any cause of it, you, of all likelihood, can say most to it, or, at leastwise, more than any man here assembled.’ “‘Yea, forsooth, good Mr. Moore,’ quoth this old man, ‘for I am well nigh a hundred years old, and no man here in this company any thing near my age.’ “‘Well then,’ quoth Mr. Moore, ‘how say you to this matter? What think you to be the cause of these shelves and sands which stop up Sandwich haven?’ “‘Forsooth, sir,’ quoth he, ‘I am an old man; I think that, Tenterden steeple is the cause of Goodwin sands. For I am an old man, sir,’ quoth he, ‘I may remember the building of Tenterden steeple, and I may remember when there was no steeple at all there; and before that Tenterden or _Totterden_ steeple was in building, there was no manner of talking of any flats or sands that stopped up the haven, and therefore I think that Tenterden steeple is the cause of the decay and destroying of Sandwich haven.’” [50]--Thus far the bishop. The prolix pertinacity with which this _old aged_ man adheres to the opinion that he had formed, without any intelligible reason, is characteristic of an English peasant; but however absurd his mode of judging may be, and however confused and incongruous his ideas, his species of absurdity surely bears no resemblance to an Hibernian blunder. We cannot even suspect it to be possible that a man of this slow, circumspect character could be in any danger of making an Irish bull; and we congratulate the English peasantry and populace, as a body, upon their possessing that temper which “Wisely rests content with sober sense, Nor makes to dangerous wit a vain pretence.”