Book Plunge: Napoleon's Hemorrhoids.

[Apologiaphoenix]

What does it matter what Napoleon's health was?

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What do I think of Phil Mason’s book published by Skyhorse publishing? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

I will get back to Simplicity soon, but for now, I wanted to review this book I finished over the weekend. I enjoy reading about little oddities in history and this book is full of them. It’s my goal then to tell some that I really liked and give some thoughts from a Christian perspective.

At the start, Mason says that the reason we have civilization today is beer. We have an old Sumerian recipe for beer and that recipe caused people to stop and work on agriculture instead of being hunters and gatherers. After all, they wanted more beer. If this theory is accurate, then the reason we are on the internet today and I am writing and you are reading is because some people once wanted to drink beer. Incredible.

It has also been theorized that another drink helped save civilization. That is the sacred drink of tea. The Industrial Revolution took off in Britain according to this because people had to gather together and often, the water wasn’t the best, but tea contains enough health benefits that it could be used. No other nation had the Industrial Revolution take off so if this is so, tea has done our world a great service.

Now with many of these, from a Christian perspective, you could argue that God was orchestrating some events. That could be so, but I hesitate to say such a thing. After all, I have presented some positive events. What happens if I present negative events, and there are several of those.

Let’s start with the fact that starlings are in America because Shakespeare wrote Henry the IV. Yes. There was a man in America who wanted to bring every bird mentioned in Shakespeare to America and since Shakespeare referred to the starling one time in that play, 100 starlings were brought over and they have been a problem to our American ecosystem ever since. The same happened in Australia as a man wanted to hunt rabbits so he brought some over and now Australia has a problem with the rabbit population.

At Lincoln’s second inauguration, there was a young man who broke through the ranks and almost got to the president. He was stopped and restrained because the police thought he was really harmless and so they let him go. Want to know what happened to him? I’ll just tell you his name was John Wilkes Booth.

Why did the Battle of Gettysburg take place in the Civil War? It wasn’t planned, but one army leader heard a story about shoes being on sale in a town and his troops needed shoes. The journey to get them was seen as hostile by the other side and thus began a major battle that took place and could have changed the tide of the war, all because someone wanted shoes for his troops.

One example that should definitely give us pause in saying God is behind some events is Hitler. Mason lists numerous times that there were assassination plots against Hitler and at the last moment, something changed in Hitler’s plans and he avoided assassination every time. It was also through a quirk circumstance he describes that Mengele avoided capture as well.

This is the danger of many of my fellow Christians when we often try to read into history, including our personal history. We often like to try to read what we think God is doing in every situation in our lives. I have said before that it would be awesome if we Christians spent as much time trying to interpret Scripture rightly as we do trying to interpret our experiences rightly.

On the other hand, this book is informative, but it’s also fun. You can read about how some actors in Hollywood got big breaks through chance events. About the only topic I didn’t really get into was the one on sports since I didn’t understand a lot of the analogies.

People who like history should get this book and go through it. Each chapter contains several bite-sized section that would take at the most a couple of minutes to read. These will also be great conversation pieces to make any group gathering interesting and leave you looking really informed as well.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

[rogue06]

At the start, Mason says that the reason we have civilization today is beer. We have an old Sumerian recipe for beer and that recipe caused people to stop and work on agriculture instead of being hunters and gatherers. After all, they wanted more beer. If this theory is accurate, then the reason we are on the internet today and I am writing and you are reading is because some people once wanted to drink beer. Incredible.

Skipping over the obvious jokes that come to mind concerning the thread's title, it could be argued that the initial manufacturing of beer had far more to do with basic survival than just wanting a buzz after a hard day's work.

Beer is essentially liquid bread with a kick. It is rich in energy, portable and is far less susceptible to spoilage than the grains that they were made from. Moreover, it has a far lower pathogenic load than water in a pre-modern environments.

All of this means is that drinking beer allowed people to get nutritional value from food stuffs subject to spoiling or more difficult to transport which was incredibly invaluable back in the times of regular food shortages.

[NorrinRadd]

I'm not one to skip the obvious jokes: It is apparently safe to assume Nappy was fueled by 'rhoid rage. (Well, that and all the jokes about his last name.)

[rogue06]

I'm not one to skip the obvious jokes: It is apparently safe to assume Nappy was fueled by 'rhoid rage. (Well, that and all the jokes about his last name.)

You just gotta be a real pain in the butt dontcha?

[NorrinRadd]

You just gotta be a real pain in the butt dontcha?

Just can't resist a good wise-crack.

[rogue06]

Just can't resist a good wise-crack.

I understand that it didn't sit well with you, but that's no reason to get butt-hurt over it.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Actually, Napoleon could have lost at Waterloo because he had hemorrhoids that day. It was very difficult for him to get on his horse and give out orders and he even started the battle late that day.

[rogue06]

Actually, Napoleon could have lost at Waterloo because he had hemorrhoids that day. It was very difficult for him to get on his horse and give out orders and he even started the battle late that day.

I'll bet you were just itching to post that.


Napoleon lost at Waterloo for a number of reasons without ever having to add hemorrhoids to the list.

[3 Resurrections]

Fascinating!!! Gotta get a copy of that book, Nick.

Here’s a few personal family additions that could well have been added to that book. My husband is a direct descendent of a soldier that was in the original Jamestown settlement. A street in that original site was named after him. I’ve seen a copy of the map with the layout of the original Jamestown. He went with Captain John Smith (of Pocahontas fame) during two trips up the river from Jamestown, to explore the various Native American camps. Unfortunately, he also became the first one to shoot an Indian on one of those trips. One could say that my husband’s relative could be blamed for the beginning of the extinction of many Native American tribes.

Another one of my husband’s direct male ancestors was a personal physician to Thomas Jefferson, and treated that man’s case of syphilis (probably after his stay in France). Guess that male relative of my husband’s preserved the health of Thomas Jefferson so that his contributions to the establishment of America as a nation could go forward. How many living today could say that their ancestor, quite literally, (ahem, cough cough) held the future of America in their hands?

[rogue06]

Fascinating!!! Gotta get a copy of that book, Nick.

Here’s a few personal family additions that could well have been added to that book. My husband is a direct descendent of a soldier that was in the original Jamestown settlement. A street in that original site was named after him. I’ve seen a copy of the map with the layout of the original Jamestown. He went with Captain John Smith (of Pocahontas fame) during two trips up the river from Jamestown, to explore the various Native American camps. Unfortunately, he also became the first one to shoot an Indian on one of those trips. One could say that my husband’s relative could be blamed for the beginning of the extinction of many Native American tribes.

Another one of my husband’s direct male ancestors was a personal physician to Thomas Jefferson, and treated that man’s case of syphilis (probably after his stay in France). Guess that male relative of my husband’s preserved the health of Thomas Jefferson so that his contributions to the establishment of America as a nation could go forward. How many living today could say that their ancestor, quite literally, (ahem, cough cough) held the future of America in their hands?

Don't blame your husband's ancestor. Diseases that people in the Americas had no immunity for wiped out far more indigenous people than bullets ever even came close to doing.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Don't blame your husband's ancestor. Diseases that people in the Americas had no immunity for wiped out far more indigenous people than bullets ever even came close to doing.

I blame Jaltus instead.

[rogue06]

I blame Jaltus instead.

In honor of this thread maybe we should blame only a particular part of him (assuming he has/had em)