CHAPTER FOUR
I KNOW there are readers in the world, as well as many
other good people in it, who are no readers at all,-who find
themselves ill at ease, unless they are let into the whole
secret from first to last, of everything which concerns you.
It is in pure compliance with this humour of theirs, and
from a backwardness in my nature to disappoint any one
soul living, that I have been so very particular already. As
my life and opinions are likely to make some noise in the
world, and, if I conjecture right, will take in all ranks, pro-
fessions, and denominations of men whatever,-be no less
read than the Pilgrim's Progress itself-and, in the end,
prove the very thing which Montaigne dreaded his essays
should turn out, that is, a book for a parlour-window;-I
find it necessary to consult everyone a little in his turn; and
therefore must beg pardon for going on a little further in
the same way: For which cause, right glad I am, that I have
begun the history of myself in the way I have done; and
that I am able to go on tracing every thing in it, as Horace
says, ab Ovo.
Horace, I know does not recommend this fashion alto-
gether: But that gentleman is speaking only of an epic poem
or a tragedy;- (I forget which)-besides, if it was not so, I
should beg Mr Horace's pardon;-for in writing what I have
set about, I shall confine myself neither to his rules, nor to
any man's rules that ever lived.
To such, however, as do not choose to go so far back into
these things, I can give no better advice, than that they skip
over the remaining part of this chapter; for I declare before-
hand, 'tis wrote only for the curious and inquisitive.
_________________Shut the door______________
I was begot in the night, betwixt the first Sunday and the
first Monday in the month of March, in the year of our Lord
one thousand seven hundred and eighteen. I am positive
I was.-But how I came to be so very particular in my account
of a thing which happened before I was born,is owing to
another small anecdote known only in our own family, but
now made public for the better clearing up this point.
My father, you must know, who was originally a Turkey
merchant, but had left off business for some years, in order
to retire to, and die upon, his paternal estate in the county
of -, was, I believe, one of the most regular men in
everything he did, whether 'twas matter of business, or
matter of amusement, that ever lived. As a small specimen
of this extreme exactness of his, to which he was in truth a
slave,-he had made it a- rule for many years of his life,-
on the first Sunday night of every month throughout the
whole year,-as certain as ever the Sunday night came,-
to wind up a large house-clock, which we had standing upon
the backstairs head, with his own hands: -And being some-
where between fifty and sixty years of age, at the time I have
been speaking of,-he had likewise gradually brought some
other little family concernments to the same period, in
order, as he would often say to my uncle Toby, to get them
all out of the way at one time, and be no more plagued and
pestered with them the rest of the month.
It was attended with but one misfortune, which, in a great
measure, fell upon myself, and the effects of which I fear
I shall carry with me to my grave; namely, that from an
unhappy association of ideas which have no connection in
nature, it so fell out at length, that my poor mother could
never hear the said clock wound up,-but the thoughts of
some other things unavoidably popped into her head-&
vice versa.--which strange combination of ideas, the saga-
cious Locke, who certainly understood the nature of these
things better than most men, affirms to have produced more
wry actions than all other sources of prejudice whatsoever.
But this by the bye.
Now it appears by a memorandum in my father's pocket-
book, which now lies upon the table, 'That on Lady-Day,
which was on the -25th of the same month in which I date
my geniture my father set out upon his journey to Lon-
don with my eldest brother Bobby, to fix him at Westmin-
ster school;' and, as it appears from the same authority,
'That he did not get down to his wife and family till the
second week in May following,!-it brings the thing almost
to a certainty. However, what follows in the beginning of
the next chapter puts it beyond all possibility of doubt.
-But pray, Sir, What was your father doing all
December,-January, and February?-Why, Madam,-he
was all that time afflicted with a Sciatica.