Essays of Michel de Montaigne

Mothers are mightily pleased to see a child writhe off the neck of a chicken, or to please itself with hurting a dog or a cat; and such wise fathers there are in the world, who look upon it as a notable mark of a martial spirit, when they hear a son miscall, or see him domineer over a poor peasant, or a lackey, that dares not reply, nor turn again; and a great sign of wit, when they see him cheat and overreach his playfellow by some malicious treachery and deceit.

My judgment restrains me from kicking against and murmuring at the inconveniences that nature orders me to endure, but it does not take away my feeling them: I, who have no other thing in my aim but to live and be merry, would run from one end of the world to the other to seek out one good year of pleasant and jocund tranquillity. A melancholic and dull tranquillity may be enough for me, but it benumbs and stupefies me; I am not contented with it. If there be any person, any knot of good company in country or city, in France or elsewhere, resident or in motion, who can like my humour, and whose humours I can like, let them but whistle and I will run and furnish them with essays in flesh and bone:

There is a vast difference betwixt the case of one who follows the forms and laws of his country, and of another who will undertake to regulate and change them; of whom the first pleads simplicity, obedience, and example for his excuse, who, whatever he shall do, it cannot be imputed to malice; ‘tis at the worst but misfortune:

For what concerns our affairs and pleasures, it is much more commodious, as the ancients did, to lose one’s dinner, and defer making good cheer till the hour of retirement and repose, without breaking up a day; and so was I formerly used to do. As to health, I since by experience find, on the contrary, that it is better to dine, and that the digestion is better while awake.

Aristotle one while says it is the spirit, and another the world; one while he gives the world another master, and another while makes God the heat of heaven. Zenocrates makes eight, five named amongst the planets; the sixth composed of all the fixed stars, as of so many members; the seventh and eighth, the sun and moon.

A child should not be brought up in his mother’s lap Acquiesce and submit to truth Affect words that are not of current use Anything appears greatest to him that never knew a greater Appetite to read more, than glutted with that we have Applaud his judgment than commend his knowledge Attribute facility of belief to simplicity and ignorance Away with this violence! away with this compulsion!

But we are not, as we nowadays do, to call peevishness and inward discontent, that spring from private interest and passion, duty, nor a treacherous and malicious conduct, courage; they call their proneness to mischief and violence zeal; ‘tis not the cause, but their interest, that inflames them; they kindle and begin a war, not because it is just, but because it is war.

The same pace of a horse seems to me one while hard, and another easy; and the same way one while shorter, and another longer; and the same form one while more, another less agreeable: I am one while for doing every thing, and another for doing nothing at all; and what pleases me now would be a trouble to me at another time.

[“It troubles men as much that they may possibly suffer, as if they really did suffer.”--Idem, ibid., 74.]

Obedience is never pure nor calm in him who reasons and disputes Obliged to his age for having weaned him from pleasure Observed the laws of marriage, than I either promised or expect Obstinacy and contention are common qualities Obstinacy is the sister of constancy Obstinancy and heat in argument are the surest proofs of folly Obstinate in growing worse Occasion to La Boetie to write his “Voluntary Servitude” Occasions of the least lustre are ever the most dangerous Occupy our thoughts about the general, and about universal cause Of the fleeting years each steals something from me Office of magnanimity openly and professedly to love and hate Oftentimes agitated with divers passions Old age: applaud the past and condemn the present Old men who retain the memory of things past Omit, as incredible, such things as they do not understand On all occasions to contradict and oppose One door into life, but a hundred thousand ways out One may be humble out of pride One may more boldly dare what nobody thinks you dare One may regret better times, but cannot fly from the present One must first know what is his own and what is not Only desire to become more wise, not more learned or eloquent Only secure harbour from the storms and tempests of life Only set the humours they would purge more violently in work Open speaking draws out discoveries, like wine and love Opinions they have of things and not by the things themselves Opinions we have are taken on authority and trust Opposition and contradiction entertain and nourish them Option now of continuing in life or of completing the voyage Order a purge for your brain, it will there be much better Order it so that your virtue may conquer your misfortune Ordinances it (Medicine) foists upon us Ordinary friendships, you are to walk with bridle in your hand Ordinary method of cure is carried on at the expense of life Others adore all of their own side Ought not only to have his hands, but his eyes, too, chaste Ought not to expect much either from his vigilance or power Ought to withdraw and retire his soul from the crowd Our extremest pleasure has some sort of groaning Our fancy does what it will, both with itself and us Our judgments are yet sick Our justice presents to us but one hand Our knowledge, which is a wretched foundation Our qualities have no title but in comparison Our will is more obstinate by being opposed Over-circumspect and wary prudence is a mortal enemy Overvalue things, because they are foreign, absent Owe ourselves chiefly and mostly to ourselves Passion has a more absolute command over us than reason Passion has already confounded his judgment Passion of dandling and caressing infants scarcely born Pay very strict usury who did not in due time pay the principal People are willing to be gulled in what they desire People conceiving they have right and title to be judges Perfect friendship I speak of is indivisible Perfect men as they are, they are yet simply men Perfection: but I will not buy it so dear as it costs Perpetual scolding of his wife (of Socrates) Petulant madness contends with itself Philopoemen: paying the penalty of my ugliness Philosophy Philosophy has discourses proper for childhood Philosophy is nothing but to prepare one’s self to die Philosophy is that which instructs us to live Philosophy looked upon as a vain and fantastic name Phusicians cure by by misery and pain Physic Physician worse physicked Physician: pass through all the diseases he pretends to cure Physician’s “help”, which is very often an obstacle Physicians are not content to deal only with the sick Physicians fear men should at any time escape their authority Physicians were the only men who might lie at pleasure Physicians: earth covers their failures Pinch the secret strings of our imperfections Pitiful ways and expedients to the jugglers of the law Pity is reputed a vice amongst the Stoics Plato angry at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking Plato forbids children wine till eighteen years of age Plato said of the Egyptians, that they were all physicians Plato says, that the gods made man for their sport Plato will have nobody marry before thirty Plato: lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country Plays of children are not performed in play Pleasing all: a mark that can never be aimed at or hit Pleasure of telling (a pleasure little inferior to that of doing Possession begets a contempt of what it holds and rules Practical Jokes: Tis unhandsome to fight in play Preachers very often work more upon their auditory than reasons Preface to bribe the benevolence of the courteous reader Prefer in bed, beauty before goodness Preferring the universal and common tie to all national ties Premeditation of death is the premeditation of liberty Prepare ourselves against the preparations of death Present Him such words as the memory suggests to the tongue Present himself with a halter about his neck to the people Presumptive knowledge by silence Pretending to find out the cause of every accident Priest shall on the wedding-day open the way to the bride Proceed so long as there shall be ink and paper in the world Profession of knowledge and their immeasurable self-conceit Profit made only at the expense of another Prolong his life also prolonged and augmented his pain Prolong your misery an hour or two Prudent and just man may be intemperate and inconsistent Prudent man, when I imagine him in this posture Psalms of King David: promiscuous, indiscreet Public weal requires that men should betray, and lie Puerile simplicities of our children Pure cowardice that makes our belief so pliable Put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties Pyrrho’s hog Quiet repose and a profound sleep without dreams Rage compelled to excuse itself by a pretence of good-will Rage it puts them to oppose silence and coldness to their fury Rash and incessant scolding runs into custom Rather be a less while old than be old before I am really so Rather complain of ill-fortune than be ashamed of victory Rather prating of another man’s province than his own Reading those books, converse with the great and heroic souls Reasons often anticipate the effect Recommendation of strangeness, rarity, and dear purchase Refusin to justify, excuse, or explain myself Regret so honourable a post, where necessity must make them bold Remotest witness knows more about it than those who were nearest Represented her a little too passionate for a married Venus Reputation: most useless, frivolous, and false coin that passes Repute for value in them, not what they bring to us Reserve a backshop, wholly our own and entirely free Resolved to bring nothing to it but expectation and patience Rest satisfied, without desire of prolongation of life or name Restoring what has been lent us, wit usury and accession Revenge more wounds our children than it heals us Revenge, which afterwards produces a series of new cruelties Reverse of truth has a hundred thousand forms Rhetoric: an art to flatter and deceive Rhetoric: to govern a disorderly and tumultuous rabble Richer than we think we are; but we are taught to borrow Ridiculous desire of riches when we have lost the use of them Right of command appertains to the beautiful-Aristotle Rome was more valiant before she grew so learned Rowers who so advance backward Rude and quarrelsome flatly to deny a stated fact Same folly as to be sorry we were not alive a hundred years ago Satisfaction of mind to have only one path to walk in Satisfied and pleased with and in themselves Say of some compositions that they stink of oil and of the lamp Scratching is one of nature’s sweetest gratifications Season a denial with asperity, suspense, or favour See how flexible our reason is Seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives Seeming anger, for the better governing of my house Send us to the better air of some other country Sense: no one who is not contented with his share Setting too great a value upon ourselves Setting too little a value upon others Settled my thoughts to live upon less than I have Sex: To put fools and wise men, beasts and us, on a level Shake the truth of our Church by the vices of her ministers Shame for me to serve, being so near the reach of liberty Sharps and sweets of marriage, are kept secret by the wise She who only refuses, because ‘tis forbidden, consents Shelter my own weakness under these great reputations Short of the foremost, but before the last Should first have mended their breeches Silence, therefore, and modesty are very advantageous qualities Silent mien procured the credit of prudence and capacity Sins that make the least noise are the worst Sitting betwixt two stools Slaves, or exiles, ofttimes live as merrily as other folk Sleep suffocates and suppresses the faculties of the soul Smile upon us whilst we are alive So austere and very wise countenance and carriage--of physicians So many trillions of men, buried before us So much are men enslaved to their miserable being So that I could have said no worse behind their backs So weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him Socrates kept a confounded scolding wife Socrates: According to what a man can Soft, easy, and wholesome pillow is ignorance and incuriosity Solon said that eating was physic against the malady hunger Solon, that none can be said to be happy until he is dead some people rude, by being overcivil in their courtesy Some wives covetous indeed, but very few that are good managers Sometimes the body first submits to age, sometimes the mind Souls that are regular and strong of themselves are rare Sparing and an husband of his knowledge Speak less of one’s self than what one really is is folly Spectators can claim no interest in the honour and pleasure Stilpo lost wife, children, and goods Stilpo: thank God, nothing was lost of his Strangely suspect all this merchandise: medical care Strong memory is commonly coupled with infirm judgment Studied, when young, for ostentation, now for diversion Studies, to teach me to do, and not to write Study makes me sensible how much I have to learn Study of books is a languishing and feeble motion Study to declare what is justice, but never took care to do it Stumble upon a truth amongst an infinite number of lies Stupidity and facility natural to the common people Style wherewith men establish religions and laws Subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doub Such a recipe as they will not take themselves Suffer my judgment to be made captive by prepossession Suffer those inconveniences which are not possibly to be avoided Sufficiently covered by their virtue without any other robe Suicide: a morsel that is to be swallowed without chewing Superstitiously to seek out in the stars the ancient causes Swell and puff up their souls, and their natural way of speaking Swim in troubled waters without fishing in them Take a pleasure in being uninterested in other men’s affairs Take all things at the worst, and to resolve to bear that worst Take my last leave of every place I depart from Take two sorts of grist out of the same sack Taking things upon trust from vulgar opinion Taught to be afraid of professing our ignorance Taught to consider sleep as a resemblance of death Tearing a body limb from limb by racks and torments Testimony of the truth from minds prepossessed by custom?

“Profecto fortuna in omni re dominatur: ea res cunctas ex libidine magis, quhm ex vero, celebrat, obscuratque.”

And even to this day the idols of Themixtitan are cemented with the blood of little children, and they delight in no sacrifice but of these pure and infantine souls; a justice thirsty of innocent blood:--

The keeper of an elephant in a private house of Syria robbed him every meal of the half of his allowance. One day his master would himself feed him, and poured the full measure of barley he had ordered for his allowance into his manger which the elephant, casting an angry look at the keeper, with his trunk separated the one-half from the other, and thrust it aside, by that declaring the wrong was done him.

That Pomponius Atticus, to whom Cicero writes so often, being sick, caused Agrippa, his son-in-law, and two or three more of his friends, to be called to him, and told them, that having found all means practised upon him for his recovery to be in vain, and that all he did to prolong his life also prolonged and augmented his pain, he was resolved to put an end both to the one and the other, desiring them to approve of his determination, or at least not to lose their labour in endeavouring to dissuade him.

When King Pyrrhus prepared for his expedition into Italy, his wise counsellor Cyneas, to make him sensible of the vanity of his ambition: “Well, sir,” said he, “to what end do you make all this mighty preparation?”--“To make myself master of Italy,” replied the king. “And what after that is done?” said Cyneas. “I will pass over into Gaul and Spain,” said the other. “And what then?”--“I will then go to subdue Africa; and lastly, when I have brought the whole world to my subjection, I will sit down and rest content at my own ease.”

“O earth-born souls! by earth-born passions led, To every spark of heav’nly influence dead! Think ye that what man values will inspire In minds celestial the same base desire?”

Knowledge, style, and such parts as we see in others’ works, we are soon aware of, if they excel our own: but for the simple products of the understanding, every one thinks he could have found out the like in himself, and is hardly sensible of the weight and difficulty, if not (and then with much ado) in an extreme and incomparable distance. And whoever should be able clearly to discern the height of another’s judgment, would be also able to raise his own to the same pitch.

They are savages at the same rate that we say fruits are wild, which nature produces of herself and by her own ordinary progress; whereas, in truth, we ought rather to call those wild whose natures we have changed by our artifice and diverted from the common order. In those, the genuine, most useful, and natural virtues and properties are vigorous and sprightly, which we have helped to degenerate in these, by accommodating them to the pleasure of our own corrupted palate.

I saw the other day, at my own house, a little fellow, a native of Nantes, born without arms, who has so well taught his feet to perform the services his hands should have done him, that truly these have half forgotten their natural office; and, indeed, the fellow calls them his hands; with them he cuts anything, charges and discharges a pistol, threads a needle, sews, writes, puts off his hat, combs his head, plays at cards and dice, and all this with as much dexterity as any other could do who had more, and more proper limbs to assist him.

But he had not thoroughly examined their debauches; for Diogenes, playing the beast with himself in public, wished, in the presence of all that saw him, that he could fill his belly by that exercise.

I have been present when, whilst they at the upper end of the chamber have been only commenting the beauty of the arras, or the flavour of the wine, many things that have been very finely said at the lower end of the table have been lost and thrown away.

[“Not the menacing look of a tyrant shakes her well-settled soul, nor turbulent Auster, the prince of the stormy Adriatic, nor yet the strong hand of thundering Jove, such a temper moves.” --Hor., Od., iii. 3, 3.]

That good man, though terrified with this dreadful sentence, yet replied, “I am then a dead man.” But God soon after made the prognostic false.

[“So great a power of reminiscence resides in places; and that truly in this city infinite, for which way soever we go, we find the traces of some story.”--Cicero, De Fin., v. I, 2.]

Here is one step back, and a very manifest one; I shall retire another: from the second to the third, and so to the fourth, so gently, that I shall be stark blind before I shall be sensible of the age and decay of my sight: so artificially do the Fatal Sisters untwist our lives. And so I doubt whether my hearing begins to grow thick; and you will see I shall have half lost it, when I shall still lay the fault on the voices of those who speak to me.

I have formerly attempted to withstand and repel it; for I am so far from being one of those that invite vices, that I do not so much as follow them, if they do not haul me along; I perceived it to spring, grow, and increase, in spite of my resistance; and at last, living and seeing as I was, wholly to seize and possess me.

Plutarch’s writings, if well understood, sufficiently bespeak their author, and so that I think I know him even into his soul; and yet I could wish that we had some fuller account of his life. And I am thus far wandered from my subject, upon the account of the obligation I have to Aulus Gellius, for having left us in writing this story of his manners, that brings me back to my subject of anger.

Thales, once inveighing in discourse against the pains and care men put themselves to to become rich, was answered by one in the company, that he did like the fox, who found fault with what he could not obtain.

[“Things grow familiar to men’s minds by being often seen; so that they neither admire nor are they inquisitive about things they daily see.”--Cicero, De Natura Deor., lib. ii. 38.]

Alcibiades, to divert the inclination of common rumours, cut off the ears and tail of his beautiful dog, and turned him out into the public place, to the end that, giving the people this occasion to prate, they might let his other actions alone.

At the death of their king, his wives and concubines, his favourites, all his officers, and domestic servants, who make up a whole people, present themselves so gaily to the fire where his body is burnt, that they seem to take it for a singular honour to accompany their master in death.

And, as to the philosophers, a sort of men remote from all public affairs, they have been sometimes also despised by the comic liberty of their times; their opinions and manners making them appear, to men of another sort, ridiculous. Would you make them judges of a lawsuit, of the actions of men?

Thomas d’Aquin; for that, in truth, his mind, so full of infinite erudition and admirable subtlety, was alone capable of such thoughts.” Be this as it may, whoever was the author and inventor (and ‘tis not reasonable, without greater certainty, to deprive Sebond of that title), he was a man of great judgment and most admirable parts.

Permit, reader, this essay its course also, and this third sitting to finish the rest of my picture: I add, but I correct not. First, because I conceive that a man having once parted with his labours to the world, he has no further right to them; let him do better if he can, in some new undertaking, but not adulterate what he has already sold. Of such dealers nothing should be bought till after they are dead.

[“I am of opinion, that though a thing be not foul in itself, yet it cannot but become so when commended by the multitude.” --Cicero, De Finib., ii. 15.]

“One day,” says he, “at Rome, they entertained the people with the sight of the fighting of several strange beasts, and principally of lions of an unusual size; there was one amongst the rest who, by his furious deportment, by the strength and largeness of his limbs, and by his loud and dreadful roaring, attracted the eyes of all the spectators.

I continued some years in this hoarding humour, when I know not what good demon fortunately put me out of it, as he did the Syracusan, and made me throw abroad all my reserve at random, the pleasure of a certain journey I took at very great expense having made me spurn this fond love of money underfoot; by which means I am now fallen into a third way of living (I speak what I think of it), doubtless much more pleasant and regular, which is, that I live at the height of my revenue; sometimes the one, sometimes the other may perhaps exceed, but ‘tis very little and but rarely that they differ.

Amongst so many garrisoned houses, myself alone amongst those of my rank, so far as I know, in France, have trusted purely to Heaven for the protection of mine, and have never removed plate, deeds, or hangings. I will neither fear nor save myself by halves. If a full acknowledgment acquires the Divine favour, it will stay with me to the end: if not, I have still continued long enough to render my continuance remarkable and fit to be recorded. How?

nor beauty neither; for whereas Homer extends it so far as to the budding of the beard, Plato himself has remarked this as rare: and the reason why the sophist Bion so pleasantly called the first appearing hairs of adolescence ‘Aristogitons’ and ‘Harmodiuses’--[Plutarch, On Love, c.34.]-- is sufficiently known. I find it in virility already in some sort a little out of date, though not so much as in old age;

In the estimate of this work I have reckoned the difficulty which is especially considerable in that place; they did not build with any stones less than ten feet square, and had no other conveniency of carriage but by drawing their load themselves by force of arm, and knew not so much as the art of scaffolding, nor any other way of standing to their work, but by throwing up earth against the building as it rose higher, taking it away again when they had done.

I was not an hour about it: I have never looked at it since.” Well, then, say I, lay these aside, and give me a perfect one, such as you would be measured by. And then, what do you think is the best thing in your work? is it this part or that? is it grace or the matter, the invention, the judgment, or the learning?

Is there any so fantastic opinion (omitting the gross impostures of religions, with which we see so many great nations, and so many understanding men, so strangely besotted; for this being beyond the reach of human reason, any error is more excusable in such as are not endued, through the divine bounty, with an extraordinary illumination from above), but, of other opinions, are there any so extravagant, that she has not planted and established for laws in those parts of the world upon which she has been pleased to exercise her power?

Whoever will take upon him to maintain that ‘tis better for a prince to carry on his wars by others, than in his own person, fortune will furnish him with examples enough of those whose lieutenants have brought great enterprises to a happy issue, and of those also whose presence has done more hurt than good: but no virtuous and valiant prince can with patience endure so dishonourable councils.

But the other had his soul so bent upon what he had a mind to do, and so little disturbed with fumes by reason of his singular abstinence, that he had no need of any such invention.

Let no one, therefore, rank other common friendships with such a one as this. I have had as much experience of these as another, and of the most perfect of their kind: but I do not advise that any should confound the rules of the one and the other, for they would find themselves much deceived. In those other ordinary friendships, you are to walk with bridle in your hand, with prudence and circumspection, for in them the knot is not so sure that a man may not half suspect it will slip.

[“The Phalarica, launched like lightning, flies through the air with a loud rushing sound.”--AEneid, ix. 705.]

And Copernicus has in our times so grounded this doctrine that it very regularly serves to all astrological consequences; what use can we make of this, if not that we ought not much to care which is the true opinion? And who knows but that a third, a thousand years hence, may over throw the two former.

Such a one may have a sight clear enough who looks asquint, and consequently sees what is good, but does not follow it, and sees knowledge, but makes no use of it. Plato’s principal institution in his Republic is to fit his citizens with employments suitable to their nature. Nature can do all, and does all. Cripples are very unfit for exercises of the body, and lame souls for exercises of the mind. Degenerate and vulgar souls are unworthy of philosophy.

“Come segue la lepre il cacciatore Al freddo, al caldo, alla montagna, al lito; Ne piu l’estima poi the presa vede; E sol dietro a chi fugge affretta il piede”

And to say the truth, of all this diversity and confusion of prescriptions, what other end and effect is there after all, but to purge the belly?