Although the main work was done by Cromwell and 
Napoleon, “ordnance” (or cannon) and gunpowder had at least 
begun the levelling of castles, classes, and feudal distinctions. 
So print, says Rabelais, has begun the homogenizing of 
individuals and of talents. Later in the same century Francis 
Bacon was prophesying that his scientific method would level 
all talents and enable a child to make scientific discoveries of 
consequence. And Bacon’s “method” we shall see was the 
extension of the idea of the new printed page to the whole 
encyclopedia of natural phenomena. That is, Bacon’s method 
literally puts the whole of nature in Pantagruel’s mouth.

     Albert Guérard’s comment on this aspect of Rabelais in 
The Life and Death of an Ideal  (p. 39) is as follows:

          This triumphant Pantagruelism inspires the