‘Cannotunderstand’ and the Idea of Memento Mori
Reading time: 4 minutes
The following story was written by J.P. Hebel (1760-1826) in 1811 and is set at the end of the 18th century when German craftsmen were traveling abroad to find work. I first met it in a book written in 1927 by B.W. Willemsen. The orignal story can be found in the German Wikipedia under the lemma Hebel.
A German craftsman arrived at Amsterdam. There he saw an enormous house. He had never seen such a large building in his life. As he could not speak Dutch, he stopped a pedestrian and asked him in German who owned the house. The pedestrian did not know any German, he was in a hurry and answered briefly: “Can not understand!” ‘Well, I never’, the German thought, ‘Mr. Cannotunderstand must be a very wealthy person!’
After a while he arrived at the docks. Again he was greatly surprised to see the countless ships anchored there. There were so many he didn’t know where to look first. Soon he noticed a large ship that had just arrived from the East Indies. The ship was being unloaded. Crate after crate was lifted from the vessel, as were bales of cotton and barrels of sugar, coffee, rice and pepper. The quay was soon covered by all the merchandise. The craftsman was curious and wanted to know who owned all those goods. He asked a fellow observer on the quay. And again the answer was: “Cannot understand”. “Well, well!” he thought, “No wonder the man lives in such a beautiful house.”
His felt a bit sad as he walked on. So much wealth, and he, just a poor tramp! If only he could become as wealthy as this rich man. When he turned a corner he saw a funeral procession. It was a solemn procession: four horses, covered in heavy mourning robes, pulled the beautiful hearse. A long and distinguished procession of friends and acquaintances followed the hearse. In the distance bells tolled. The sight of the funeral procession instilled in everyone, including our crafsman, the idea of memento mori. Our hero was looking on gravely, uncovered his head, and let the procession pass by.
At the very end of the procession, someone stood thinking, perhaps how much he would earn if the price of cotton were up by 10 guilders a bale. The craftsman asked him: “You must have been a good friend of the deceased, because you look so sad and thoughtful. What’s your friend’s name? “Cannotunderstand” was the answer.
The crafsman’s eyes brimmed with tears. “Poor Cannotunderstand” he exclaimed. “What has remained of all your wealth now? The same as when I die: nothing but a shroud.”
With this thought he followed the procession to the grave and watched the coffin of the alleged ‘Cannotunderstand’ being lowered into his final resting place. He was deeply moved by the eulogy, even though he did not understand a word of it. In Germany he had heard many similar speeches, but he had never listened to them properly.
Finally he went back into town feeling relieved. He ate a piece of tastful Dutch cheese at an inn, where, fortunately, German was both spoken and understood.
The author concludes with the moral of the story: “Whenever he fell on hard times and got dissatisfied because so many people were rich and he was so poor, the crafsman was reminded of ‘Cannotunderstand’ and his large house, his colossal ship and his cramped final resting place.” Actually, Hebel started his story with the moral: according to him, you must be content with your fate. Then, he went on to describe the roundabout way in which our craftsman learnt the truth of this.
Willemsen, who introduced the story in the Netherlands, was a Poor Law official and used this story for his own purposes. Willemse was strongly opposed to socialist ideas which, according to him, often ascribed poverty to external conditions. In his opinion these circumstances played an important, but not a decisive role in the lives of the poor, and neither in the lives of the rich for that matter. According to him the most important thing was to try to lead a good life. In this way the idea of memento mori was used to justify the existing capitalist order.
Sources: B.W. Willemsen, Van menschenwee en van menschenbaat, Arnhem 1927. German Wikipedia – lemma J.P. Hebel.
Translated by Ite Wierenga