Thornhill; and whether I was called
abruptly from my afternoon amusement to prepare myself for the
business on the next day, or from what other cause, I do not pretend
to determine; but that unlucky kind of fit seized me which you know
I am never able to resist, and a very unlucky text did come into my
head." The text referred to was 2 Kings XX. 15--Hezekiah's admission
of that ostentatious display of the treasures of his palace to the
ambassadors of Babylon for which Isaiah rebuked him by prophesying the
Babylonian captivity of Judah. Nothing, indeed, as Sterne protests,
could have been more innocent than the discourse which he founded
upon the _mal-a-propos_ text; but still it was unquestionably a fair
subject for "chaff," and the preacher was rallied upon it by no less
a person than David Hume. Gossip having magnified this into a dispute
between the parson and the philosopher, Sterne disposes of the idle
story in a passage deriving an additional interest from its tribute to
that sweet disposition which had an equal charm for two men so utterly
unlike as the author of _Tristram Shandy_ and the author of the
_Wealth of Nations_.
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