Essays of Michel de Montaigne

But I am not capable of handling so rich an argument, and shall therefore only set five Latin poets together, contending in the praise of Cato; and, incidentally, for their own too. Now, a well-educated child will judge the two first, in comparison of the others, a little flat and languid; the third more vigorous, but overthrown by the extravagance of his own force; he will then think that there will be room for one or two gradations of invention to come to the fourth, and, mounting to the pitch of that, he will lift up his hands in admiration; coming to the last, the first by some space’ (but a space that he will swear is not to be filled up by any human wit), he will be astounded, he will not know where he is.

I have never known anything of trouble, and have had little to do in anything but the management of my own affairs: or, if I have, it has been upon condition to do it at my own leisure and after my own method; committed to my trust by such as had a confidence in me, who did not importune me, and who knew my humour; for good horsemen will make shift to get service out of a rusty and broken-winded jade.

[“They neither shrank, nor vantage sought of ground, They travers’d not, nor skipt from part to part, Their blows were neither false, nor feigned found: In fight, their rage would let them use no art. Their swords together clash with dreadful sound, Their feet stand fast, and neither stir nor start, They move their hands, steadfast their feet remain. Nor blow nor foin they strook, or thrust in vain.” --Tasso, Gierus. Lib., c. 12, st. 55, Fairfax’s translation.]

Walpole to Sir Horace Mann, June 8, 1774.]--attentive to the minutest details of the cure which he was endeavouring to accomplish: a sort of memorandum book, in which he was noting down everything that he felt and did, for the benefit of his medical man at home, who would have the care of his health on his return, and the attendance on his subsequent infirmities.

Do we desire to be beloved of our children? Will we remove from them all occasion of wishing our death though no occasion of so horrid a wish can either be just or excusable?

[“They sell themselves to death and the circus, and, since the wars are ceased, each for himself a foe prepares.” --Manilius, Astron., iv. 225.]

And yet Vitellius found himself deceived in this way of proceeding; for having to do with Otho, weaker in the valour of his soldiers, long unaccustomed to war and effeminated with the delights of the city, he so nettled them at last with injurious language, reproaching them with cowardice and regret for the mistresses and entertainments they had left behind at Rome, that by this means he inspired them with such resolution as no exhortation had had the power to have done, and himself made them fall upon him, with whom their own captains before could by no means prevail.

‘Tis, doubtless, very remote from the present practice; for there never was so abject and servile prostitution of offers: life, soul, devotion, adoration, vassal, slave, and I cannot tell what, as now; all which expressions are so commonly and so indifferently posted to and fro by every one and to every one, that when they would profess a greater and more respectful inclination upon more just occasions, they have not wherewithal to express it.

“Quis deus hanc mundi temperet arte domum: Qua venit exoriens, qua deficit: unde coactis Cornibus in plenum menstrua luna redit Unde salo superant venti, quid flamine captet Eurus, et in nubes unde perennis aqua; Sit ventura dies mundi quae subruat arces....”

I never seriously settled myself to the reading any book of solid learning but Plutarch and Seneca; and there, like the Danaides, I eternally fill, and it as constantly runs out; something of which drops upon this paper, but little or nothing stays with me.

It is enough that they can, without our instruction, compose the graces of their eyes to gaiety, severity, sweetness, and season a denial with asperity, suspense, or favour: they need not another to interpret what we speak for their service; with this knowledge, they command with a switch, and rule both the tutors and the schools.

[“You may discern the torments of mind lurking in a sick body; you may discern its joys: either expression the face assumes from the mind.”--Juvenal, ix. 18]

There is nothing so unsociable and sociable as man, the one by his vice, the other by his nature. And Antisthenes, in my opinion, did not give him a satisfactory answer, who reproached him with frequenting ill company, by saying that the physicians lived well enough amongst the sick, for if they contribute to the health of the sick, no doubt but by the contagion, continual sight of, and familiarity with diseases, they must of necessity impair their own.

‘Tis for this that the authors of such errors will never depart from proof of the testimony of the interpretation of words.

The constitution of maladies is formed by the pattern of the constitution of animals; they have their fortune and their days limited from their birth; he who attempts imperiously to cut them short by force in the middle of their course, lengthens and multiplies them, and incenses instead of appeasing them.

But whether he be grown better or more discreet, which are qualities of principal concern, these are never thought of. We should rather examine, who is better learned, than who is more learned.

I have a thousand things to desire and to fear. To give them quite over, is very easy for me to do: but to look after them without trouble, is very hard. ‘Tis a miserable thing to be in a place where everything you see employs and concerns you; and I fancy that I more cheerfully enjoy the pleasures of another man’s house, and with greater and a purer relish, than those of my own. Diogenes answered according to my humour him who asked him what sort of wine he liked the best: “That of another,” said he.--[Diogenes Laertius, vi. 54.]

Whence it comes to pass, that him whom the judge has racked that he may not die innocent, he makes him die both innocent and racked. A thousand and a thousand have charged their own heads by false confessions, amongst whom I place Philotas, considering the circumstances of the trial Alexander put upon him and the progress of his torture. But so it is that some say it is the least evil human weakness could invent; very inhumanly, notwithstanding, and to very little purpose, in my opinion.

“Four sons of Sulmo, four whom Ufens bred, He took in flight, and living victims led, To please the ghost of Pallas, and expire In sacrifice before his fun’ral pyre.”

Let them still fly before us, even those who have most mind to be overtaken: they better conquer us by flying, as the Scythians did.

I do the contrary; and amongst so many borrowed things, am glad if I can steal one, disguising and altering it for some new service; at the hazard of having it said that ‘tis for want of understanding its natural use; I give it some particular touch of my own hand, to the end it may not be so absolutely foreign.

The confidence in another man’s virtue is no light evidence of a man’s own, and God willingly favours such a confidence. As to what concerns him of whom I am speaking, I see nowhere a better governed house, more nobly and constantly maintained than his. Happy to have regulated his affairs to so just a proportion that his estate is sufficient to do it without his care or trouble, and without any hindrance, either in the spending or laying it up, to his other more quiet employments, and more suitable both to his place and liking.

Fulgur ibi ad coelum se tollit, totaque circum Ære renidescit tellus, subterque virûm vi Excitur pedibus sonitus, clamoreque montes Icti rejectant voces ad sidera mundi;

When the city of Nola was ruined by the barbarians, Paulinus, who was bishop of that place, having there lost all he had, himself a prisoner, prayed after this manner: “O Lord, defend me from being sensible of this loss; for Thou knowest they have yet touched nothing of that which is mine.”--[St. Augustin, De Civit. Dei, i. 10.]--The riches that made him rich and the goods that made him good, were still kept entire.

“Hanc amplissimam omnium artium bene vivendi disciplinam, vita magis quam literis, persequuti sunt.”

Thus have I, by the grace of God, preserved myself entire, without anxiety or trouble of conscience, in the ancient faith of our religion, amidst so many sects and divisions as our age has produced. The writings of the ancients, the best authors I mean, being full and solid, tempt and carry me which way almost they will; he that I am reading seems always to have the most force; and I find that every one in his turn is in the right, though they contradict one another.

You are to judge him by himself and not by what he wears; and, as one of the ancients very pleasantly said: “Do you know why you repute him tall? You reckon withal the height of his pattens.”--[Seneca, Ep. 76.]--The pedestal is no part of the statue. Measure him without his stilts; let him lay aside his revenues and his titles; let him present himself in his shirt. Then examine if his body be sound and sprightly, active and disposed to perform its functions. What soul has he?

Then he addressed all three of us. He blessed God that in his extremity he had the happiness to be surrounded by those whom he held dearest in the world, and he looked upon it as a fine spectacle, where four persons were together, so unanimous in their feelings, and loving each other for each other’s sake. He commended us one to the other; and proceeded thus: “My worldly matters being arranged, I must now think of the welfare of my soul. I am a Christian; I am a Catholic.

There is nothing, in my opinion, more illustrious in the life of Socrates, than that he had thirty whole days wherein to ruminate upon the sentence of his death, to have digested it all that time with a most assured hope, without care, and without alteration, and with a series of words and actions rather careless and indifferent than any way stirred or discomposed by the weight of such a thought.

I myself have seen Henry II., when he could not for his heart hit of a gentleman’s name of our country of Gascony, and moreover was fain to call one of the queen’s maids of honour by the general name of her race, her own family name being so difficult to pronounce or remember; and Socrates thinks it worthy a father’s care to give fine names to his children.

Metrocles somewhat indiscreetly broke wind backwards while in disputation, in the presence of a great auditory in his school, and kept himself hid in his own house for shame, till Crates coming to visit him, and adding to his consolations and reasons the example of his own liberty, by falling to try with him who should sound most, cured him of that scruple, and withal drew him to his own stoical sect, more free than that more reserved one of the Peripatetics, of which he had been till then.

As to strength, there is no creature in the world exposed to so many injuries as man. We need not a whale, elephant, or a crocodile, nor any such-like animals, of which one alone is sufficient to dispatch a great number of men, to do our business; lice are sufficient to vacate Sylla’s dictatorship; and the heart and life of a great and triumphant emperor is the breakfast of a little contemptible worm!

The philosophers, Chrysippus and Epicurus, were in this of two quite contrary humours: the first not only in his books mixed passages and sayings of other authors, but entire pieces, and, in one, the whole Medea of Euripides; which gave Apollodorus occasion to say, that should a man pick out of his writings all that was none of his, he would leave him nothing but blank paper: whereas the latter, quite on the contrary, in three hundred volumes that he left behind him, has not so much as one quotation.--[Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Chyysippus, vii. 181, and Epicurus, x. 26.]

Of so many thousands of biases that she has at her disposal, let us give her one proper to our repose and conversation, and then we shall not only be sheltered and secured from all manner of injury and offence, but moreover gratified and obliged, if she will, with evils and offences. She makes her profit indifferently of all things; error, dreams, serve her to good use, as loyal matter to lodge us in safety and contentment.

“Sapere aude; Incipe; Qui recte vivendi prorogat horam, Rusticus exspectat, dum defluat amnis; at ille Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis oevum.”

Secondly (they have a way of speaking in their language to call men the half of one another), that they had observed that there were amongst us men full and crammed with all manner of commodities, whilst, in the meantime, their halves were begging at their doors, lean and half-starved with hunger and poverty; and they thought it strange that these necessitous halves were able to suffer so great an inequality and injustice, and that they did not take the others by the throats, or set fire to their houses.

Carneades was head of the contrary opinion, and maintained that glory was to be desired for itself, even as we embrace our posthumous issue for themselves, having no knowledge nor enjoyment of them. This opinion has not failed to be the more universally followed, as those commonly are that are most suitable to our inclinations. Aristotle gives it the first place amongst external goods; and avoids, as too extreme vices, the immoderate either seeking or evading it.

I have my ears battered with a thousand such tales as these: “Three persons saw him such a day in the east three, the next day in the west: at such an hour, in such a place, and in such habit”; assuredly I should not believe it myself. How much more natural and likely do I find it that two men should lie than that one man in twelve hours’ time should fly with the wind from east to west?

I have neither faculty nor relish for those tedious tenders of service and affection; I believe little in them from others, and I should not forgive myself should I say to others more than I myself believe.

[“Come hither to us, O admirable Ulysses, come hither, thou greatest ornament and pride of Greece.”--Homer, Odysseus, xii. 184.]

A little thing will turn and divert us Abominate that incidental repentance which old age brings Age imprints more wrinkles in the mind than it does on the face Always be parading their pedantic science Am as jealous of my repose as of my authority Anger and hatred are beyond the duty of justice Beast of company, as the ancient said, but not of the herd Books go side by side with me in my whole course Books have many charming qualities to such as know how to choose But ill proves the honour and beauty of an action by its utility Childish ignorance of many very ordinary things Common consolation, discourages and softens me Consoles himself upon the utility and eternity of his writings Deceit maintains and supplies most men’s employment Diverting the opinions and conjectures of the people Dying appears to him a natural and indifferent accident Every place of retirement requires a walk Fault will be theirs for having consulted me Few men have been admired by their own domestics Follies do not make me laugh, it is our wisdom which does Folly to put out their own light and shine by a borrowed lustre For fear of the laws and report of men Gently to bear the inconstancy of a lover Give but the rind of my attention Grief provokes itself He may employ his passion, who can make no use of his reason He may well go a foot, they say, who leads his horse in his hand I do not consider what it is now, but what it was then I find no quality so easy to counterfeit as devotion I lay no great stress upon my opinions; or of others I look upon death carelessly when I look upon it universally I receive but little advice, I also give but little I speak truth, not so much as I would, but as much as I dare I understand my men even by their silence and smiles Idleness is to me a very painful labour Imagne the mighty will not abase themselves so much as to live In ordinary friendships I am somewhat cold and shy Leaving nothing unsaid, how home and bitter soever Library: Tis there that I am in my kingdom Malice sucks up the greatest part of its own venom Malicious kind of justice Miserable kind of remedy, to owe one’s health to one’s disease!

Let them not take me now at a disadvantage; let them not threaten me in the subdued condition wherein I now am; that were treachery. In truth, I have enough the better of them by these domestic examples, that they should rest satisfied. Human things are not usually so constant; it has been two hundred years, save eighteen, that this trial has lasted, for the first of them was born in the year 1402: ‘tis now, indeed, very good reason that this experience should begin to fail us.

[“And pressed her naked body to mine” (Or:) “My body I applied even to her naked side”--Ovid, Amor., i. 5, 24.]

“Virtus, repulsaa nescia sordidx Intaminatis fulget honoribus Nec sumit, aut ponit secures Arbitrio popularis aura.”

This body of mine avoids disorder and dreads it; ‘tis now my body’s turn to guide my mind towards reformation; it governs, in turn, and more rudely and imperiously than the other; it lets me not an hour alone, sleeping or waking, but is always preaching to me death, patience, and repentance. I now defend myself from temperance, as I have formerly done from pleasure; it draws me too much back, and even to stupidity.

“Nisi purgatum est pectus, quae praelia nobis Atque pericula tunc ingratis insinuandum? Quantae connscindunt hominem cupedinis acres Sollicitum curae? quantique perinde timores? Quidve superbia, spurcitia, ac petulantia, quantas Efficiunt clades? quid luxus desidiesque?”

When Laelius,--[Cicero, De Amicit., c. II.]--in the presence of the Roman consuls, who after thay had sentenced Tiberius Gracchus, prosecuted all those who had had any familiarity with him also; came to ask Caius Blosius, who was his chiefest friend, how much he would have done for him, and that he made answer: “All things.”--“How! All things!” said Laelius.

You are not to consider if your word or action may admit of another interpretation; ‘tis your own true and sincere interpretation, your real meaning in what you said or did, that you are thenceforward to maintain, whatever it cost you. Men speak to your virtue and conscience, which are not things to be put under a mask; let us leave these pitiful ways and expedients to the jugglers of the law.

His enemies, after their victory, not finding so much gold as they expected, when they had searched and rifled with their utmost diligence, they went about to procure discoveries by the most cruel torments they could invent upon the prisoners they had taken: but having profited nothing by these, their courage being greater than their torments, they arrived at last to such a degree of fury, as, contrary to their faith and the law of nations, to condemn the king himself, and one of the principal noblemen of his court, to the rack, in the presence of one another.

[“O Janus, whom no crooked fingers, simulating a stork, peck at behind your back, whom no quick hands deride behind you, by imitating the motion of the white ears of the ass, against whom no mocking tongue is thrust out, as the tongue of the thirsty Apulian dog.”--Persius, i. 58.]