Indulgence

BABOO-JABBERGEE, B.A. Chapter 3.

Mr. Jabberjee Gives His Views Concerning the Laureateship it is selon les regles and rerum natura that the queen's most excellent majesty being constitutionally partial to poetry should desire to have constant private supply from respectable tip-top genius to be kept snug on royal premises and ready at momentary notice to oblige with song or dirge according as high jinks or dolorousness are the court orders of the day but how far more satisfactory if right hon'ble marquis salisbury instead of arbitrarily decorating some already notorious bard with this cordon bleu and thus gilding a lily should throw the office open to competition by public exam and after carefully weighing such considerations as the applicants res angusta domi the fluency of his imagination his nationality and so on should award the itching palm of fame to the poet who succeeded best in tickling his fancy had some such method been adopted the whole indian empire might to-day have been pleased as punch by the selection of a hindoo gentleman to do the job for i should infallibly have entered myself for the running unfortunately such unparalleled opportunity of throwing soup to cerberus and exhibiting color-blindness has been given the slip though the door is perhaps still open even at past eleven o'clock p m for retracing the false step and webb of penelope for i would respectfully submit to her imperial majesty that in her duplicate capacity of queen of england and empress of india she has urgent necessity for a court poet for each department who would be arcadis ambo and two of a trade and share the duties with their proportionate pickings or if she would be unwilling to pay the piper to such a tune i alone would work the oracle in both indian and anglo-saxon departments and wave the annual tub of sherry for equivalent in cash down and if i may make the suggestion i would strongly advise that this question of my joint or several appointment should be severely taken up by london press as a matter of simple justice to india this is without prejudice to the already appointed laureate as a swan and singing bird of the first water all i desire is that the public should know of another and perchance even rarer avis who is nigroque similema chigno and could be obtained dog-cheap for a mere song or a drug in the market-place if only there is made a national appeal to the sovereign that he should be promoted to such a sinecure and ere as a specimen of the authenticity of my divine flatulence please find enclosed herewith copy of complimentary verses written by myself on hearing of poet austen's selection Indulgence is kindly requested for very hasty composition, and circumstance of being greatly harrowed and impeded at time of writing, by an excruciating full-sized boil on back of neck, infuriated by collar of shirt, poulticings, and so forth.

congratulatory ode to hon poet laureate alfred austin esq hail you full-blown tulip oh when the wheezing zephyr brought glad news of your judicious appointment no hearts who did peruse such a long desiderated slice of good luck were sorry at to a most prolific and pollacious poet laureate for no poeta nascitur who is fitter to greet royal progeny with melodious twitter seated on the resplendent cloud of official elysium far away far away from fuliginous busy hum you are now perched with phenomenal velocity on vertiginous pinnacle of poetic pomposity yet deign to cock thy indulgent eye at the petition of one consumed by corresponding ambition and lend the helping hand to lift pulley holly to parnassian peak this poor perspiring bengali whose ars poetica as per sample lyric is fully competent to turn out panegyric what if some time to come perhaps not distant you were in urgent need of deputy assistant for two princesses might be confined simultaneously then how to homage the pair extemporaneously or with nuptial ode like a daisy what a fix if with influenza raging like cat on hot bricks in such a wrong box you will please remember yours truly who can do the needful satisfactorily and duly by an epithalamium or what not to inflame your credit with every coronated head that will have read it and the quid pro quo magnificent and grand sur would be at the rate of four annas for every stanza now thou who scale sidereal paths afar dost deign from thy brilliant boots to cast the superfluous stardust upon the head of him whose fate depends on thee signed babu huri bungsho jabberjee the above was forwarded post paid to anvil austin's official address at poet's corner westminster abbey opposite the royal aquarium but hoity-toity and mirabile dictu no answer has yet been vouchsafed to yours truly save the cold shoulder of contemptuous inattention what a pity well-a-day that we should find such passions of envy and jealousy in bosom of a distinguished poet whose lucubrated productions may for all that is known to the present writer be no great shakes after all and mere food for powder the british public is an ardent lover of the scintillating jewellery of fair play and so i confidently submit my claims and poetical compositions to be arbitrated by the unanimous voice of all who understand such articles let us remember that it is never too late to pull down the fallen idol out of the gilded shrine in which it has established itself with the egotistical isolation of a dog with the mange chapter three

Chapter 4 Containing Mr. Jabberjee's Impressions at the Old Masters I have the honour to report that the Phantom of Delight has recently recommenced to dance before me.

That's why when Martin Luther did the Protestant Reformation back in the 16th century, he was trying to get the Catholic Church to go back to just focusing on using the Bible.

The Protestant Reformation was a reaction to the Indulgences and the Inquisitions.

Are you familiar with either of those things? Okay.

Imagine this, like in the Bible you read that Jesus came, he was born divine, died, rose again and ascended to heaven and he's coming back.

I guess that middle strand of Protestant Christianity, that's when Martin Luther came about in the 16th century and basically said, we need like a reformation.

We need the Catholic Church to go back to its original sort of roots and stop doing indulgences.

Indulgences is where you could pay money to go to heaven or pray for someone to go to heaven that might be in purgatory or something like that.

So an indulgence, you'd pay money.

Crowley uttered Thelema in 1904.

LeVay uttered Indulgence in 1966.

Aquino uttered Kefir in 1975.

Each of these words addressed a specific limitation, a specific blockage in the development of human potential.

Crowley's Thelema was about breaking free from the moral constraints of the Christian age.

It was the assertion that every individual has a true will, a unique purpose, and that following that will is the highest good.

LaVey's Indulgence was about embracing the physical, the sensual, the material.

It was a reaction to the guilt-ridden spirituality that dominated Western culture.