My father knew the weakness of this prop to his hypothesis, as well as the best logician could shew him——yet so strange is the weakness of man at the same time, as it fell in his way, he could not for his life but make use of it; and it was certainly for this reason, that though there are many stories in _Hafen Slawkenbergius_’s Decades full as entertaining as this I am translating, yet there is not one amongst them which my father read over with half the delight——it flattered two of his strangest hypotheses together——his NAMES and his NOSES.——I will be bold to say, he might have read all the books in the _Alexandrian_ Library, had not fate taken other care of them, and not have met with a book or passage in one, which hit two such nails as these upon the head at one stroke.] The two universities of _Strasburg_ were hard tugging at this affair of _Luther_’s navigation. The Protestant doctors had demonstrated, that he had not sailed right before the wind, as the Popish doctors had pretended; and as every one knew there was no sailing full in the teeth of it—they were going to settle, in case he had sailed, how many points he was off; whether _Martin_ had doubled the cape, or had fallen upon a lee-shore; and no doubt, as it was an enquiry of much edification, at least to those who understood this sort of NAVIGATION, they had gone on with it in spite of the size of the stranger’s nose, had not the size of the stranger’s nose drawn off the attention of the world from what they were about—it was their business to follow. The abbess of _Quedlingberg_ and her four dignitaries was no stop; for the enormity of the stranger’s nose running full as much in their fancies as their case of conscience——the affair of their placket-holes kept cold—in a word, the printers were ordered to distribute their types——all controversies dropp’d. ’Twas a square cap with a silver tassel upon the crown of it—to a nut-shell—to have guessed on which side of the nose the two universities would split. ’Tis above reason, cried the doctors on one side. ’Tis below reason, cried the others. ’Tis faith, cried one. ’Tis a fiddle-stick, said the other. ’Tis possible, cried the one. ’Tis impossible, said the other. God’s power is infinite, cried the Nosarians, he can do any thing. He can do nothing, replied the Anti-nosarians, which implies contradictions. He can make matter think, said the Nosarians. As certainly as you can make a velvet cap out of a sow’s ear, replied the Anti-nosarians. He cannot make two and two five, replied the Popish doctors.——’Tis false, said their other opponents.—— Infinite power is infinite power, said the doctors who maintained the _reality_ of the nose.—It extends only to all possible things, replied the _Lutherans._ By God in heaven, cried the Popish doctors, he can make a nose, if he thinks fit, as big as the steeple of _Strasburg._