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.

Now the steeple of Strasburg being the biggest and the tallest
church-steeple to be seen in the whole world, the Anti-nosarians denied
that a nose of 575 geometrical feet in length could be worn, at least
by a middle-siz'd man--The Popish doctors swore it could--The Lutheran
doctors said No;--it could not.

This at once started a new dispute, which they pursued a great way,
upon the extent and limitation of the moral and natural attributes of
God--That controversy led them naturally into Thomas Aquinas, and Thomas
Aquinas to the devil.

The stranger's nose was no more heard of in the dispute--it just served
as a frigate to launch them into the gulph of school-divinity--and then
they all sailed before the wind.

Heat is in proportion to the want of true knowledge.

The controversy about the attributes, &c. instead of cooling, on the
contrary had inflamed the Strasburgers imaginations to a most inordinate
degree--The less they understood of the matter the greater was their
wonder about it--they were left in all the distresses of desire
unsatisfied--saw their doctors, the Parchmentarians, the Brassarians,
the Turpentarians, on one side--the Popish doctors on the other, like
Pantagruel and his companions in quest of the oracle of the bottle, all
embarked out of sight.

--The poor Strasburgers left upon the beach!

--What was to be done?--No delay--the uproar increased--