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diff --git a/old/mn19v10.txt b/old/mn19v10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f9fa386 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mn19v10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2829 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Essays of Montaigne, V19 +#19 in our series by Michel de Montaigne + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the laws for your country before redistributing these files!!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. + +Please do not remove this. + +This should be the first thing seen when anyone opens the book. +Do not change or edit it without written permission. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.08.01*END** +[Portions of this header are copyright (C) 2001 by Michael S. Hart +and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.] +[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales +of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or +software or any other related product without express permission.] + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +ESSAYS OF MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE + +Translated by Charles Cotton + +Edited by William Carew Hazilitt + +1877 + + + + +[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the +file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an +entire meal of them. D.W.] + + + +CONTENTS OF VOLUME 19. + +XIII. Of Experience. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +OF EXPERIENCE + +There is no desire more natural than that of knowledge. We try all ways +that can lead us to it; where reason is wanting, we therein employ +experience, + + "Per varios usus artem experientia fecit, + Exemplo monstrante viam," + + ["By various trials experience created art, example shewing the + way."--Manilius, i. 59.] + +which is a means much more weak and cheap; but truth is so great a thing +that we ought not to disdain any mediation that will guide us to it. +Reason has so many forms that we know not to which to take; experience +has no fewer; the consequence we would draw from the comparison of events +is unsure, by reason they are always unlike. There is no quality so +universal in this image of things as diversity and variety. Both the +Greeks and the Latins and we, for the most express example of similitude, +employ that of eggs; and yet there have been men, particularly one at +Delphos, who could distinguish marks of difference amongst eggs so well +that he never mistook one for another, and having many hens, could tell +which had laid it. + +Dissimilitude intrudes itself of itself in our works; no art can arrive +at perfect similitude: neither Perrozet nor any other can so carefully +polish and blanch the backs of his cards that some gamesters will not +distinguish them by seeing them only shuffled by another. Resemblance +does not so much make one as difference makes another. Nature has +obliged herself to make nothing other that was not unlike. + +And yet I am not much pleased with his opinion, who thought by the +multitude of laws to curb the authority of judges in cutting out for them +their several parcels; he was not aware that there is as much liberty and +latitude in the interpretation of laws as in their form; and they but +fool themselves, who think to lessen and stop our disputes by recalling +us to the express words of the Bible: forasmuch as our mind does not find +the field less spacious wherein to controvert the sense of another than +to deliver his own; and as if there were less animosity and tartness in +commentary than in invention. We see how much he was mistaken, for we +have more laws in France than all the rest of the world put together, and +more than would be necessary for the government of all the worlds of +Epicurus: + + "Ut olim flagitiis, sic nunc legibus, laboramus." + + ["As we were formerly by crimes, so we are now overburdened by + laws."--Tacitus, Annal., iii. 25.] + +and yet we have left so much to the opinions and decisions of our judges +that there never was so full a liberty or so full a license. What have +our legislators gained by culling out a hundred thousand particular +cases, and by applying to these a hundred thousand laws? This number +holds no manner of proportion with the infinite diversity of human +actions; the multiplication of our inventions will never arrive at the +variety of examples; add to these a hundred times as many more, it will +still not happen that, of events to come, there shall one be found that, +in this vast number of millions of events so chosen and recorded, shall +so tally with any other one, and be so exactly coupled and matched with +it that there will not remain some circumstance and diversity which will +require a diverse judgment. There is little relation betwixt our +actions, which are in perpetual mutation, and fixed and immutable laws; +the most to be desired are those that are the most rare, the most simple +and general; and I am even of opinion that we had better have none at all +than to have them in so prodigious a number as we have. + +Nature always gives them better and happier than those we make ourselves; +witness the picture of the Golden Age of the Poets and the state wherein +we see nations live who have no other. Some there are, who for their +only judge take the first passer-by that travels along their mountains, +to determine their cause; and others who, on their market day, choose out +some one amongst them upon the spot to decide their controversies. What +danger would there be that the wisest amongst us should so determine +ours, according to occurrences and at sight, without obligation of +example and consequence? For every foot its own shoe. King Ferdinand, +sending colonies to the Indies, wisely provided that they should not +carry along with them any students of jurisprudence, for fear lest suits +should get footing in that new world, as being a science in its own +nature, breeder of altercation and division; judging with Plato, "that +lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country." + +Whence does it come to pass that our common language, so easy for all +other uses, becomes obscure and unintelligible in wills and contracts? +and that he who so clearly expresses himself in whatever else he speaks +or writes, cannot find in these any way of declaring himself that does +not fall into doubt and contradiction? if it be not that the princes of +that art, applying themselves with a peculiar attention to cull out +portentous words and to contrive artificial sentences, have so weighed +every syllable, and so thoroughly sifted every sort of quirking +connection that they are now confounded and entangled in the infinity of +figures and minute divisions, and can no more fall within any rule or +prescription, nor any certain intelligence: + + "Confusum est, quidquid usque in pulverem sectum est." + + ["Whatever is beaten into powder is undistinguishable (confused)." + --Seneca, Ep., 89.] + +As you see children trying to bring a mass of quicksilver to a certain +number of parts, the more they press and work it and endeavour to reduce +it to their own will, the more they irritate the liberty of this generous +metal; it evades their endeavour and sprinkles itself into so many +separate bodies as frustrate all reckoning; so is it here, for in +subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doubts; they +put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties, and +lengthen and disperse them. In sowing and retailing questions they make +the world fructify and increase in uncertainties and disputes, as the +earth is made fertile by being crumbled and dug deep. + + "Difficultatem facit doctrina." + + ["Learning (Doctrine) begets difficulty." + --Quintilian, Insat. Orat., x. 3.] + +We doubted of Ulpian, and are still now more perplexed with Bartolus and +Baldus. We should efface the trace of this innumerable diversity of +opinions; not adorn ourselves with it, and fill posterity with crotchets. +I know not what to say to it; but experience makes it manifest, that so +many interpretations dissipate truth and break it. Aristotle wrote to be +understood; if he could not do this, much less will another that is not +so good at it; and a third than he, who expressed his own thoughts. We +open the matter, and spill it in pouring out: of one subject we make a +thousand, and in multiplying and subdividing them, fall again into the +infinity of atoms of Epicurus. Never did two men make the same judgment +of the same thing; and 'tis impossible to find two opinions exactly +alike, not only in several men, but in the same man, at diverse hours. +I often find matter of doubt in things of which the commentary has +disdained to take notice; I am most apt to stumble in an even country, +like some horses that I have known, that make most trips in the smoothest +way. + +Who will not say that glosses augment doubts and ignorance, since there's +no book to be found, either human or divine, which the world busies +itself about, whereof the difficulties are cleared by interpretation. +The hundredth commentator passes it on to the next, still more knotty and +perplexed than he found it. When were we ever agreed amongst ourselves: +"This book has enough; there is now no more to be said about it"? This +is most apparent in the law; we give the authority of law to infinite +doctors, infinite decrees, and as many interpretations; yet do we find +any end of the need of interpretating? is there, for all that, any +progress or advancement towards peace, or do we stand in need of any +fewer advocates and judges than when this great mass of law was yet in +its first infancy? On the contrary, we darken and bury intelligence; we +can no longer discover it, but at the mercy of so many fences and +barriers. Men do not know the natural disease of the mind; it does +nothing but ferret and inquire, and is eternally wheeling, juggling, and +perplexing itself like silkworms, and then suffocates itself in its work; +"Mus in pice." --[" A mouse in a pitch barrel."]-- It thinks it discovers +at a great distance, I know not what glimpses of light and imaginary +truth: but whilst running to it, so many difficulties, hindrances, and +new inquisitions cross it, that it loses its way, and is made drunk with +the motion: not much unlike AEsop's dogs, that seeing something like a +dead body floating in the sea, and not being able to approach it, set to +work to drink the water and lay the passage dry, and so choked +themselves. To which what one Crates' said of the writings of Heraclitus +falls pat enough, "that they required a reader who could swim well," so +that the depth and weight of his learning might not overwhelm and stifle +him. 'Tis nothing but particular weakness that makes us content with +what others or ourselves have found out in this chase after knowledge: +one of better understanding will not rest so content; there is always +room for one to follow, nay, even for ourselves; and another road; there +is no end of our inquisitions; our end is in the other world. 'Tis a +sign either that the mind has grown shortsighted when it is satisfied, or +that it has got weary. No generous mind can stop in itself; it will +still tend further and beyond its power; it has sallies beyond its +effects; if it do not advance and press forward, and retire, and rush and +wheel about, 'tis but half alive; its pursuits are without bound or +method; its aliment is admiration, the chase, ambiguity, which Apollo +sufficiently declared in always speaking to us in a double, obscure, and +oblique sense: not feeding, but amusing and puzzling us. 'Tis an +irregular and perpetual motion, without model and without aim; its +inventions heat, pursue, and interproduce one another: + +Estienne de la Boetie; thus translated by Cotton: + + "So in a running stream one wave we see + After another roll incessantly, + And as they glide, each does successively + Pursue the other, each the other fly + By this that's evermore pushed on, and this + By that continually preceded is: + The water still does into water swill, + Still the same brook, but different water still." + +There is more ado to interpret interpretations than to interpret things, +and more books upon books than upon any other subject; we do nothing but +comment upon one another. Every place swarms with commentaries; of +authors there is great scarcity. Is it not the principal and most +reputed knowledge of our later ages to understand the learned? Is it not +the common and final end of all studies? Our opinions are grafted upon +one another; the first serves as a stock to the second, the second to the +third, and so forth; thus step by step we climb the ladder; whence it +comes to pass that he who is mounted highest has often more honour than +merit, for he is got up but an inch upon the shoulders of the last, but +one. + +How often, and, peradventure, how foolishly, have I extended my book to +make it speak of itself; foolishly, if for no other reason but this, that +it should remind me of what I say of others who do the same: that the +frequent amorous glances they cast upon their work witness that their +hearts pant with self-love, and that even the disdainful severity +wherewith they scourge them are but the dandlings and caressings of +maternal love; as Aristotle, whose valuing and undervaluing himself often +spring from the same air of arrogance. My own excuse is, that I ought in +this to have more liberty than others, forasmuch as I write specifically +of myself and of my writings, as I do of my other actions; that my theme +turns upon itself; but I know not whether others will accept this excuse. + +I observed in Germany that Luther has left as many divisions and disputes +about the doubt of his opinions, and more, than he himself raised upon +the Holy Scriptures. Our contest is verbal: I ask what nature is, what +pleasure, circle, and substitution are? the question is about words, and +is answered accordingly. A stone is a body; but if a man should further +urge: "And what is a body?"--"Substance"; "And what is substance?" and +so on, he would drive the respondent to the end of his Calepin. + + [Calepin (Ambrogio da Calepio), a famous lexicographer of the + fifteenth century. His Polyglot Dictionary became so famous, that + Calepin became a common appellation for a lexicon] + +We exchange one word for another, and often for one less understood. +I better know what man is than I know what Animal is, or Mortal, or +Rational. To satisfy one doubt, they give me three; 'tis the Hydra's +head. Socrates asked Menon, "What virtue was." "There is," says Menon, +"the virtue of a man and of a woman, of a magistrate and of a private +person, of an old man and of a child." Very fine," cried Socrates, +"we were in quest of one virtue, and thou hast brought us a whole +swarm." We put one question, and they return us a whole hive. As no +event, no face, entirely resembles another, so do they not entirely +differ: an ingenious mixture of nature. If our faces were not alike, we +could not distinguish man from beast; if they were not unlike, we could +not distinguish one man from another; all things hold by some similitude; +every example halts, and the relation which is drawn from experience is +always faulty and imperfect. Comparisons are ever-coupled at one end or +other: so do the laws serve, and are fitted to every one of our affairs, +by some wrested, biassed, and forced interpretation. + +Since the ethic laws, that concern the particular duty of every one in +himself, are so hard to be framed, as we see they are, 'tis no wonder if +those which govern so many particulars are much more so. Do but consider +the form of this justice that governs us; 'tis a true testimony of human +weakness, so full is it of error and contradiction. What we find to be +favour and severity in justice--and we find so much of them both, that I +know not whether the medium is as often met with are sickly and unjust +members of the very body and essence of justice. Some country people +have just brought me news in great haste, that they presently left in a +forest of mine a man with a hundred wounds upon him, who was yet +breathing, and begged of them water for pity's sake, and help to carry +him to some place of relief; they tell me they durst not go near him, but +have run away, lest the officers of justice should catch them there; and +as happens to those who are found near a murdered person, they should be +called in question about this accident, to their utter ruin, having +neither money nor friends to defend their innocence. What could I have +said to these people? 'Tis certain that this office of humanity would +have brought them into trouble. + +How many innocent people have we known that have been punished, and this +without the judge's fault; and how many that have not arrived at our +knowledge? This happened in my time: certain men were condemned to die +for a murder committed; their sentence, if not pronounced, at least +determined and concluded on. The judges, just in the nick, are informed +by the officers of an inferior court hard by, that they have some men in +custody, who have directly confessed the murder, and made an indubitable +discovery of all the particulars of the fact. Yet it was gravely +deliberated whether or not they ought to suspend the execution of the +sentence already passed upon the first accused: they considered the +novelty of the example judicially, and the consequence of reversing +judgments; that the sentence was passed, and the judges deprived of +repentance; and in the result, these poor devils were sacrificed by the +forms of justice. Philip, or some other, provided against a like +inconvenience after this manner. He had condemned a man in a great fine +towards another by an absolute judgment. The truth some time after being +discovered, he found that he had passed an unjust sentence. On one side +was the reason of the cause; on the other side, the reason of the +judicial forms: he in some sort satisfied both, leaving the sentence in +the state it was, and out of his own purse recompensing the condemned +party. But he had to do with a reparable affair; my men were irreparably +hanged. How many condemnations have I seen more criminal than the crimes +themselves? + +All which makes me remember the ancient opinions, "That 'tis of necessity +a man must do wrong by retail who will do right in gross; and injustice +in little things, who would come to do justice in great: that human +justice is formed after the model of physic, according to which, all that +is useful is also just and honest: and of what is held by the Stoics, +that Nature herself proceeds contrary to justice in most of her works: +and of what is received by the Cyrenaics, that there is nothing just of +itself, but that customs and laws make justice: and what the Theodorians +held that theft, sacrilege, and all sorts of uncleanness, are just in a +sage, if he knows them to be profitable to him." There is no remedy: I +am in the same case that Alcibiades was, that I will never, if I can help +it, put myself into the hands of a man who may determine as to my head, +where my life and honour shall more depend upon the skill and diligence +of my attorney than on my own innocence. I would venture myself with +such justice as would take notice of my good deeds, as well as my ill; +where I had as much to hope as to fear: indemnity is not sufficient pay +to a man who does better than not to do amiss. Our justice presents to +us but one hand, and that the left hand, too; let him be who he may, he +shall be sure to come off with loss. + +In China, of which kingdom the government and arts, without commerce with +or knowledge of ours, surpass our examples in several excellent features, +and of which the history teaches me how much greater and more various the +world is than either the ancients or we have been able to penetrate, the +officers deputed by the prince to visit the state of his provinces, as +they punish those who behave themselves ill in their charge, so do they +liberally reward those who have conducted themselves better than the +common sort, and beyond the necessity of their duty; these there present +themselves, not only to be approved but to get; not simply to be paid, +but to have a present made to them. + +No judge, thank God, has ever yet spoken to me in the quality of a judge, +upon any account whatever, whether my own or that of a third party, +whether criminal or civil; nor no prison has ever received me, not even +to walk there. Imagination renders the very outside of a jail +displeasing to me; I am so enamoured of liberty, that should I be +interdicted the access to some corner of the Indies, I should live a +little less at my ease; and whilst I can find earth or air open +elsewhere, I shall never lurk in any place where I must hide myself. +My God! how ill should I endure the condition wherein I see so many +people, nailed to a corner of the kingdom, deprived of the right to enter +the principal cities and courts, and the liberty of the public roads, +for having quarrelled with our laws. If those under which I live should +shake a finger at me by way of menace, I would immediately go seek out +others, let them be where they would. All my little prudence in the +civil wars wherein we are now engaged is employed that they may not +hinder my liberty of going and coming. + +Now, the laws keep up their credit, not for being just, but because they +are laws; 'tis the mystic foundation of their authority; they have no +other, and it well answers their purpose. They are often made by fools, +still oftener by men who, out of hatred to equality, fail in equity, but +always by men, vain and irresolute authors. There is nothing so much, +nor so grossly, nor so ordinarily faulty, as the laws. Whoever obeys +them because they are just, does not justly obey them as he ought. Our +French laws, by their irregularity and deformity, lend, in some sort, a +helping hand to the disorder and corruption that all manifest in their +dispensation and execution: the command is so perplexed and inconstant, +that it in some sort excuses alike disobedience and defect in the +interpretation, the administration and the observation of it. What fruit +then soever we may extract from experience, that will little advantage +our institution, which we draw from foreign examples, if we make so +little profit of that we have of our own, which is more familiar to us, +and, doubtless, sufficient to instruct us in that whereof we have need. +I study myself more than any other subject; 'tis my metaphysic, my +physic: + + "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...." + + + ["What god may govern with skill this dwelling of the world? whence + rises the monthly moon, whither wanes she? how is it that her horns + are contracted and reopen? whence do winds prevail on the main? + what does the east wind court with its blasts? and whence are the + clouds perpetually supplied with water? is a day to come which may + undermine the world?"--Propertius, iii. 5, 26.] + + "Quaerite, quos agitat mundi labor." + + ["Ask whom the cares of the world trouble"--Lucan, i. 417.] + +In this universality, I suffer myself to be ignorantly and negligently +led by the general law of the world: I shall know it well enough when I +feel it; my learning cannot make it alter its course; it will not change +itself for me; 'tis folly to hope it, and a greater folly to concern +one's self about it, seeing it is necessarily alike public and common. +The goodness and capacity of the governor ought absolutely to discharge +us of all care of the government: philosophical inquisitions and +contemplations serve for no other use but to increase our curiosity. +The philosophers; with great reason, send us back to the rules of nature; +but they have nothing to do with so sublime a knowledge; they falsify +them, and present us her face painted with too high and too adulterate a +complexion, whence spring so many different pictures of so uniform a +subject. As she has given us feet to walk with, so has she given us +prudence to guide us in life: not so ingenious, robust, and pompous a +prudence as that of their invention; but yet one that is easy, quiet, and +salutary, and that very well performs what the other promises, in him who +has the good luck to know how to employ it sincerely and regularly, that +is to say, according to nature. The most simply to commit one's self to +nature is to do it most wisely. Oh, what a soft, easy, and wholesome +pillow is ignorance and incuriosity, whereon to repose a well-ordered +head! + +I had rather understand myself well in myself, than in Cicero. Of the +experience I have of myself, I find enough to make me wise, if I were but +a good scholar: whoever will call to mind the excess of his past anger, +and to what a degree that fever transported him, will see the deformity +of this passion better than in Aristotle, and conceive a more just hatred +against it; whoever will remember the ills he has undergone, those that +have threatened him, and the light occasions that have removed him from +one state to another, will by that prepare himself for future changes, +and the knowledge of his condition. The life of Caesar has no greater +example for us than our own: though popular and of command, 'tis still a +life subject to all human accidents. Let us but listen to it; we apply +to ourselves all whereof we have principal need; whoever shall call to +memory how many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment, +is he not a great fool if he does not ever after suspect it? When I find +myself convinced, by the reason of another, of a false opinion, I do not +so much learn what he has said to me that is new and the particular +ignorance--that would be no great acquisition--as, in general, I learn my +own debility and the treachery of my understanding, whence I extract the +reformation of the whole mass. In all my other errors I do the same, and +find from this rule great utility to life; I regard not the species and +individual as a stone that I have stumbled at; I learn to suspect my +steps throughout, and am careful to place them right. To learn that a +man has said or done a foolish thing is nothing: a man must learn that he +is nothing but a fool, a much more ample, and important instruction. The +false steps that my memory has so often made, even then when it was most +secure and confident of itself, are not idly thrown away; it vainly +swears and assures me I shake my ears; the first opposition that is made +to its testimony puts me into suspense, and I durst not rely upon it in +anything of moment, nor warrant it in another person's concerns: and were +it not that what I do for want of memory, others do more often for want +of good faith, I should always, in matter of fact, rather choose to take +the truth from another's mouth than from my own. If every one would pry +into the effects and circumstances of the passions that sway him, as I +have done into those which I am most subject to, he would see them +coming, and would a little break their impetuosity and career; they do +not always seize us on a sudden; there is threatening and degrees + + "Fluctus uti primo coepit cum albescere vento, + Paulatim sese tollit mare, et altius undas + Erigit, inde imo consurgit ad aethera fundo." + + ["As with the first wind the sea begins to foam, and swells, thence + higher swells, and higher raises the waves, till the ocean rises + from its depths to the sky."--AEneid, vii. 528.] + +Judgment holds in me a magisterial seat; at least it carefully endeavours +to make it so: it leaves my appetites to take their own course, hatred +and friendship, nay, even that I bear to myself, without change or +corruption; if it cannot reform the other parts according to its own +model, at least it suffers not itself to be corrupted by them, but plays +its game apart. + +The advice to every one, "to know themselves," should be of important +effect, since that god of wisdom and light' caused it to be written on +the front of his temple,--[At Delphi]-- as comprehending all he had to +advise us. Plato says also, that prudence is no other thing than the +execution of this ordinance; and Socrates minutely verifies it in +Xenophon. The difficulties and obscurity are not discerned in any +science but by those who are got into it; for a certain degree of +intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not, and we +must push against a door to know whether it be bolted against us or no: +whence this Platonic subtlety springs, that "neither they who know are to +enquire, forasmuch as they know; nor they who do not know, forasmuch as +to inquire they must know what they inquire of. So in this, "of knowing +a man's self," that every man is seen so resolved and satisfied with +himself, that every man thinks himself sufficiently intelligent, +signifies that every one knows nothing about the matter; as Socrates +gives Euthydemus to understand. I, who profess nothing else, therein +find so infinite a depth and variety, that all the fruit I have reaped +from my learning serves only to make me sensible how much I have to +learn. To my weakness, so often confessed, I owe the propension I have +to modesty, to the obedience of belief prescribed me, to a constant +coldness and moderation of opinions, and a hatred of that troublesome and +wrangling arrogance, wholly believing and trusting in itself, the capital +enemy of discipline and truth. Do but hear them domineer; the first +fopperies they utter, 'tis in the style wherewith men establish religions +and laws: + + "Nihil est turpius, quam cognitioni et perceptions + assertionem approbationemque praecurrere." + + ["Nothing is worse than that assertion and decision should precede + knowledge and perception."--Cicero, Acad., i. 13.] + +Aristarchus said that anciently there were scarce seven sages to be found +in the world, and in his time scarce so many fools: have not we more +reason than he to say so in this age of ours? Affirmation and obstinacy +are express signs of want of wit. This fellow may have knocked his nose +against the ground a hundred times in a day, yet he will be at his Ergo's +as resolute and sturdy as before. You would say he had had some new soul +and vigour of understanding infused into him since, and that it happened +to him, as to that ancient son of the earth, who took fresh courage and +vigour by his fall; + + "Cui cum tetigere parentem, + jam defecta vigent renovata robore membra:" + + ["Whose broken limbs, when they touched his mother earth, + immediately new force acquired."--Lucan, iv. 599.] + +does not this incorrigible coxcomb think that he assumes a new +understanding by undertaking a new dispute? 'Tis by my own experience +that I accuse human ignorance, which is, in my opinion, the surest part +of the world's school. Such as will not conclude it in themselves, by so +vain an example as mine, or their own, let them believe it from Socrates, +the master of masters; for the philosopher Antisthenes said to his +disciples, "Let us go and hear Socrates; there I will be a pupil with you"; +and, maintaining this doctrine of the Stoic sect, "that virtue was +sufficient to make a life completely happy, having no need of any other +thing whatever"; except of the force of Socrates, added he. + +That long attention that I employ in considering myself, also fits rile +to judge tolerably enough of others; and there are few things whereof I +speak better and with better excuse. I happen very often more exactly to +see and distinguish the qualities of my friends than they do themselves: +I have astonished some with the pertinence of my description, and have +given them warning of themselves. By having from my infancy been +accustomed to contemplate my own life in those of others, I have acquired +a complexion studious in that particular; and when I am once interit upon +it, I let few things about me, whether countenances, humours, +or discourses, that serve to that purpose, escape me. I study all, +both what I am to avoid and what I am to follow. Also in my friends, +I discover by their productions their inward inclinations; not by +arranging this infinite variety of so diverse and unconnected actions +into certain species and chapters, and distinctly distributing my parcels +and divisions under known heads and classes; + + "Sed neque quam multae species, nec nomina quae sint, + Est numerus." + + ["But neither can we enumerate how many kinds there what are their + names."--Virgil, Georg., ii. 103.] + +The wise speak and deliver their fancies more specifically, and piece by +piece; I, who see no further into things than as use informs me, present +mine generally without rule and experimentally: I pronounce my opinion by +disjointed articles, as a thing that cannot be spoken at once and in +gross; relation and conformity are not to be found in such low and common +souls as ours. Wisdom is a solid and entire building, of which every +piece keeps its place and bears its mark: + + "Sola sapientia in se tota conversa est." + + ["Wisdom only is wholly within itself"--Cicero, De Fin., iii. 7.] + +I leave it to artists, and I know not whether or no they will be able to +bring it about, in so perplexed, minute, and fortuitous a thing, to +marshal into distinct bodies this infinite diversity of faces, to settle +our inconstancy, and set it in order. I do not only find it hard to +piece our actions to one another, but I moreover find it hard properly to +design each by itself by any principal quality, so ambiguous and variform +they are with diverse lights. That which is remarked for rare in +Perseus, king of Macedon, "that his mind, fixing itself to no one +condition, wandered in all sorts of living, and represented manners so +wild and erratic that it was neither known to himself or any other what +kind of man he was," seems almost to fit all the world; and, especially, +I have seen another of his make, to whom I think this conclusion might +more properly be applied; no moderate settledness, still running headlong +from one extreme to another, upon occasions not to be guessed at; no line +of path without traverse and wonderful contrariety: no one quality simple +and unmixed; so that the best guess men can one day make will be, that he +affected and studied to make himself known by being not to be known. A +man had need have sound ears to hear himself frankly criticised; and as +there are few who can endure to hear it without being nettled, those who +hazard the undertaking it to us manifest a singular effect of friendship; +for 'tis to love sincerely indeed, to venture to wound and offend us, for +our own good. I think it harsh to judge a man whose ill qualities are +more than his good ones: Plato requires three things in him who will +examine the soul of another: knowledge, benevolence, boldness. + +I was sometimes asked, what I should have thought myself fit for, had any +one designed to make use of me, while I was of suitable years: + + "Dum melior vires sanguis dabat, aemula necdum + Temporibus geminis canebat sparsa senectus:" + + ["Whilst better blood gave me vigour, and before envious old age + whitened and thinned my temples."--AEneid, V. 415.] + +"for nothing," said I; and I willingly excuse myself from knowing +anything which enslaves me to others. But I had told the truth to my +master,--[Was this Henri VI.? D.W.]-- and had regulated his manners, if +he had so pleased, not in gross, by scholastic lessons, which I +understand not, and from which I see no true reformation spring in those +that do; but by observing them by leisure, at all opportunities, and +simply and naturally judging them as an eye-witness, distinctly one by +one; giving him to understand upon what terms he was in the common +opinion, in opposition to his flatterers. There is none of us who would +not be worse than kings, if so continually corrupted as they are with +that sort of canaille. How, if Alexander, that great king and +philosopher, cannot defend himself from them! + +I should have had fidelity, judgment, and freedom enough for that +purpose. It would be a nameless office, otherwise it would lose its +grace and its effect; and 'tis a part that is not indifferently fit for +all men; for truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times +and indiscriminately; its use, noble as it is, has its circumspections +and limits. It often falls out, as the world goes, that a man lets it +slip into the ear of a prince, not only to no purpose, but moreover +injuriously and unjustly; and no man shall make me believe that a +virtuous remonstrance may not be viciously applied, and that the interest +of the substance is not often to give way to that of the form. + +For such a purpose, I would have a man who is content with his own +fortune: + + "Quod sit, esse velit, nihilque malit," + + [Who is pleased with what he is and desires nothing further." + --Martial, x. ii, 18.] + +and of moderate station; forasmuch as, on the one hand, he would not be +afraid to touch his master's heart to the quick, for fear by that means +of losing his preferment: and, on the other hand, being of no high +quality, he would have more easy communication with all sorts of people. +I would have this office limited to only one person; for to allow the +privilege of his liberty and privacy to many, would beget an inconvenient +irreverence; and of that one, I would above all things require the +fidelity of silence. + +A king is not to be believed when he brags of his constancy in standing +the shock of the enemy for his glory, if for his profit and amendment he +cannot stand the liberty of a friend's advice, which has no other power +but to pinch his ear, the remainder of its effect being still in his own +hands. Now, there is no condition of men whatever who stand in so great +need of true and free advice and warning, as they do: they sustain a +public life, and have to satisfy the opinion of so many spectators, that, +as those about them conceal from them whatever should divert them from +their own way, they insensibly find themselves involved in the hatred and +detestation of their people, often upon occasions which they might have +avoided without any prejudice even of their pleasures themselves, had +they been advised and set right in time. Their favourites commonly have +more regard to themselves than to their master; and indeed it answers +with them, forasmuch as, in truth, most offices of real friendship, when +applied to the sovereign, are under a rude and dangerous hazard, so that +therein there is great need, not only of very great affection and +freedom, but of courage too. + +In fine, all this hodge-podge which I scribble here, is nothing but a +register of the essays of my own life, which, for the internal soundness, +is exemplary enough to take instruction against the grain; but as to +bodily health, no man can furnish out more profitable experience than I, +who present it pure, and no way corrupted and changed by art or opinion. +Experience is properly upon its own dunghill in the subject of physic, +where reason wholly gives it place: Tiberius said that whoever had lived +twenty years ought to be responsible to himself for all things that were +hurtful or wholesome to him, and know how to order himself without +physic; + + [All that Suetonius says in his Life of Tiberius is that this + emperor, after he was thirty years old, governed his health without + the aid of physicians; and what Plutarch tells us, in his essay on + the Rules and Precepts of Health, is that Tiberius said that the man + who, having attained sixty years, held out his pulse to a physician + was a fool.] + +and he might have learned it of Socrates, who, advising his disciples to +be solicitous of their health as a chief study, added that it was hard if +a man of sense, having a care to his exercise and diet, did not better +know than any physician what was good or ill for him. And physic itself +professes always to have experience for the test of its operations: so +Plato had reason to say that, to be a right physician, it would be +necessary that he who would become such, should first himself have passed +through all the diseases he pretends to cure, and through all the +accidents and circumstances whereof he is to judge. 'Tis but reason they +should get the pox, if they will know how to cure it; for my part, +I should put myself into such hands; the others but guide us, like him +who paints seas and rocks and ports sitting at table, and there makes the +model of a ship sailing in all security; but put him to the work itself, +he knows not at which end to begin. They make such a description of our +maladies as a town crier does of a lost horse or dog--such a color, such +a height, such an ear--but bring it to him and he knows it not, for all +that. If physic should one day give me some good and visible relief, +then truly I will cry out in good earnest: + + "Tandem effcaci do manus scientiae." + + ["Show me and efficacious science, and I will take it by the hand." + --Horace, xvii. I.] + +The arts that promise to keep our bodies and souls in health promise a +great deal; but, withal, there are none that less keep their promise. +And, in our time, those who make profession of these arts amongst us, +less manifest the effects than any other sort of men; one may say of +them, at the most, that they sell medicinal drugs; but that they are +physicians, a man cannot say. + + [The edition of 1588 adds: "Judging by themselves, and those + who are ruled by them."] + +I have lived long enough to be able to give an account of the custom that +has carried me so far; for him who has a mind to try it, as his taster, +I have made the experiment. Here are some of the articles, as my memory +shall supply me with them; I have no custom that has not varied according +to circumstances; but I only record those that I have been best +acquainted with, and that hitherto have had the greatest possession of +me. + +My form of life is the same in sickness as in health; the same bed, the +same hours, the same meat, and even the same drink, serve me in both +conditions alike; I add nothing to them but the moderation of more or +less, according to my strength and appetite. My health is to maintain my +wonted state without disturbance. I see that sickness puts me off it on +one side, and if I will be ruled by the physicians, they will put me off +on the other; so that by fortune and by art I am out of my way. +I believe nothing more certainly than this, that I cannot be hurt by the +use of things to which I have been so long accustomed. 'Tis for custom +to give a form to a man's life, such as it pleases him; she is all in all +in that: 'tis the potion of Circe, that varies our nature as she best +pleases. How many nations, and but three steps from us, think the fear +of the night-dew, that so manifestly is hurtful to us, a ridiculous +fancy; and our own watermen and peasants laugh at it. You make a German +sick if you lay him upon a mattress, as you do an Italian if you lay him +on a feather-bed, and a Frenchman, if without curtains or fire. A Spanish +stomach cannot hold out to eat as we can, nor ours to drink like the +Swiss. A German made me very merry at Augsburg, by finding fault with +our hearths, by the same arguments which we commonly make use of in +decrying their stoves: for, to say the truth, the smothered heat, and +then the smell of that heated matter of which the fire is composed, very +much offend such as are not used to them; not me; and, indeed, the heat +being always equal, constant, and universal, without flame, without +smoke, and without the wind that comes down our chimneys, they may many +ways sustain comparison with ours. Why do we not imitate the Roman +architecture? for they say that anciently fires were not made in the +houses, but on the outside, and at the foot of them, whence the heat was +conveyed to the whole fabric by pipes contrived in the wall, which were +drawn twining about the rooms that were to be warmed: which I have seen +plainly described somewhere in Seneca. This German hearing me commend +the conveniences and beauties of his city, which truly deserves it, began +to compassionate me that I had to leave it; and the first inconvenience +he alleged to me was, the heaviness of head that the chimneys elsewhere +would bring upon me. He had heard some one make this complaint, and +fixed it upon us, being by custom deprived of the means of perceiving it +at home. All heat that comes from the fire weakens and dulls me. Evenus +said that fire was the best condiment of life: I rather choose any other +way of making myself warm. + +We are afraid to drink our wines, when toward the bottom of the cask; in +Portugal those fumes are reputed delicious, and it is the beverage of +princes. In short, every nation has many customs and usages that are not +only unknown to other nations, but savage and miraculous in their sight. +What should we do with those people who admit of no evidence that is not +in print, who believe not men if they are not in a book, nor truth if it +be not of competent age? we dignify our fopperies when we commit them to +the press: 'tis of a great deal more weight to say, "I have read such a +thing," than if you only say, "I have heard such a thing." But I, who no +more disbelieve a man's mouth than his pen, and who know that men write +as indiscreetly as they speak, and who look upon this age as one that is +past, as soon quote a friend as Aulus Gelliusor Macrobius; and what I +have seen, as what they have written. And, as 'tis held of virtue, that +it is not greater for having continued longer, so do I hold of truth, +that for being older it is none the wiser. I often say, that it is mere +folly that makes us run after foreign and scholastic examples; their +fertility is the same now that it was in the time of Homer and Plato. +But is it not that we seek more honour from the quotation, than from the +truth of the matter in hand? As if it were more to the purpose to borrow +our proofs from the shops of Vascosan or Plantin, than from what is to be +seen in our own village; or else, indeed, that we have not the wit to +cull out and make useful what we see before us, and to judge of it +clearly enough to draw it into example: for if we say that we want +authority to give faith to our testimony, we speak from the purpose; +forasmuch as, in my opinion, of the most ordinary, common, and known +things, could we but find out their light, the greatest miracles of +nature might be formed, and the most wonderful examples, especially upon +the subject of human actions. + +Now, upon this subject, setting aside the examples I have gathered from +books, and what Aristotle says of Andron the Argian, that he travelled +over the arid sands of Lybia without drinking: a gentleman, who has very +well behaved himself in several employments, said, in a place where I +was, that he had ridden from Madrid to Lisbon, in the heat of summer, +without any drink at all. He is very healthful and vigorous for his age, +and has nothing extraordinary in the use of his life, but this, to live +sometimes two or three months, nay, a whole year, as he has told me, +without drinking. He is sometimes thirsty, but he lets it pass over, +and he holds that it is an appetite which easily goes off of itself; +and he drinks more out of caprice than either for need or pleasure. + +Here is another example: 'tis not long ago that I found one of the +learnedest men in France, among those of not inconsiderable fortune, +studying in a corner of a hall that they had separated for him with +tapestry, and about him a rabble of his servants full of licence. He +told me, and Seneca almost says the same of himself, he made an +advantage of this hubbub; that, beaten with this noise, he so much +the more collected and retired himself into himself for contemplation, +and that this tempest of voices drove back his thoughts within himself. +Being a student at Padua, he had his study so long situated amid the +rattle of coaches and the tumult of the square, that he not only formed +himself to the contempt, but even to the use of noise, for the service of +his studies. Socrates answered Alcibiades, who was astonished how he +could endure the perpetual scolding of his wife, "Why," said he, "as +those do who are accustomed to the ordinary noise of wheels drawing +water." I am quite otherwise; I have a tender head and easily +discomposed; when 'tis bent upon anything, the least buzzing of a fly +murders it. + +Seneca in his youth having warmly espoused the example of Sextius, of +eating nothing that had died, for a whole year dispensed with such food, +and, as he said, with pleasure, and discontinued it that he might not be +suspected of taking up this rule from some new religion by which it was +prescribed: he adopted, in like manner, from the precepts of Attalus a +custom not to lie upon any sort of bedding that gave way under his +weight, and, even to his old age, made use of such as would not yield to +any pressure. What the usage of his time made him account roughness, +that of ours makes us look upon as effeminacy. + +Do but observe the difference betwixt the way of living of my labourers +and my own; the Scythians and Indians have nothing more remote both from +my capacity and my form. I have picked up charity boys to serve me: who +soon after have quitted both my kitchen and livery, only that they might +return to their former course of life; and I found one afterwards, +picking mussels out of the sewer for his dinner, whom I could neither by +entreaties nor threats reclaim from the sweetness he found in indigence. +Beggars have their magnificences and delights, as well as the rich, and, +'tis said, their dignities and polities. These are the effects of +custom; she can mould us, not only into what form she pleases (the sages +say we ought to apply ourselves to the best, which she will soon make +easy to us), but also to change and variation, which is the most noble +and most useful instruction of all she teaches us. The best of my bodily +conditions is that I am flexible and not very obstinate: I have +inclinations more my own and ordinary, and more agreeable than others; +but I am diverted from them with very little ado, and easily slip into a +contrary course. A young man ought to cross his own rules, to awaken his +vigour and to keep it from growing faint and rusty; and there is no +course of life so weak and sottish as that which is carried on by rule +and discipline; + + "Ad primum lapidem vectari quum placet, hora + Sumitur ex libro; si prurit frictus ocelli + Angulus, inspecta genesi, collyria quaerit;" + + ["When he is pleased to have himself carried to the first milestone, + the hour is chosen from the almanac; if he but rub the corner of his + eye, his horoscope having been examined, he seeks the aid of + salves."---Juvenal, vi. 576.] + +he shall often throw himself even into excesses, if he will take my +advice; otherwise the least debauch will destroy him, and render him +troublesome and disagreeable in company. The worst quality in a well- +bred man is over-fastidiousness, and an obligation to a certain +particular way; and it is particular, if not pliable and supple. It is a +kind of reproach, not to be able, or not to dare, to do what we see those +about us do; let such as these stop at home. It is in every man +unbecoming, but in a soldier vicious and intolerable: who, as Philopcemen +said, ought to accustom himself to every variety and inequality of life. + +Though I have been brought up, as much as was possible, to liberty and +independence, yet so it is that, growing old, and having by indifference +more settled upon certain forms (my age is now past instruction, and has +henceforward nothing to do but to keep itself up as well as it can), +custom has already, ere I was aware, so imprinted its character in me in +certain things, that I look upon it as a kind of excess to leave them +off; and, without a force upon myself, cannot sleep in the daytime, nor +eat between meals, nor breakfast, nor go to bed, without a great interval +betwixt eating and sleeping,--[Gastroesophogeal Reflux. D.W.]-- as of +three hours after supper; nor get children but before I sleep, nor get +them standing; nor endure my own sweat; nor quench my thirst either with +pure water or pure wine; nor keep my head long bare, nor cut my hair +after dinner; and I should be as uneasy without my gloves as without my +shirt, or without washing when I rise from table or out of my bed; and I +could not lie without a canopy and curtains, as if they were essential +things. I could dine without a tablecloth, but without a clean napkin, +after the German fashion, very incommodiously; I foul them more than the +Germans or Italians do, and make but little use either of spoon or fork. +I complain that they did not keep up the fashion, begun after the example +of kings, to change our napkin at every service, as they do our plate. +We are told of that laborious soldier Marius that, growing old, he became +nice in his drink, and never drank but out of a particular cup of his own +I, in like manner, have suffered myself to fancy a certain form of +glasses, and not willingly to drink in common glasses, no more than from +a strange common hand: all metal offends me in comparison of a clear and +transparent matter: let my eyes taste, too, according to their capacity. +I owe several other such niceties to custom. Nature has also, on the +other side, helped me to some of hers: as not to be able to endure more +than two full meals in one day, without overcharging my stomach, nor a +total abstinence from one of those meals without filling myself with +wind, drying up my mouth, and dulling my appetite; the finding great +inconvenience from overmuch evening air; for of late years, in night +marches, which often happen to be all night long, after five or six hours +my stomach begins to be queasy, with a violent pain in my head, so that I +always vomit before the day can break. When the others go to breakfast, +I go to sleep; and when I rise, I am as brisk and gay as before. I had +always been told that the night dew never rises but in the beginning of +the night; but for some years past, long and familiar intercourse with +a lord, possessed with the opinion that the night dew is more sharp and +dangerous about the declining of the sun, an hour or two before it sets, +which he carefully avoids, and despises that of the night, he almost +impressed upon me, not so much his reasoning as his experiences. What, +shall mere doubt and inquiry strike our imagination, so as to change us? +Such as absolutely and on a sudden give way to these propensions, draw +total destruction upon themselves. I am sorry for several gentlemen who, +through the folly of their physicians, have in their youth and health +wholly shut themselves up: it were better to endure a cough, than, by +disuse, for ever to lose the commerce of common life in things of so +great utility. Malignant science, to interdict us the most pleasant +hours of the day! Let us keep our possession to the last; for the most +part, a man hardens himself by being obstinate, and corrects his +constitution, as Caesar did the falling sickness, by dint of contempt. +A man should addict himself to the best rules, but not enslave himself to +them, except to such, if there be any such, where obligation and +servitude are of profit. + +Both kings and philosophers go to stool, and ladies too; public lives are +bound to ceremony; mine, that is obscure and private, enjoys all natural +dispensation; soldier and Gascon are also qualities a little subject to +indiscretion; wherefore I shall say of this act of relieving nature, that +it is desirable to refer it to certain prescribed and nocturnal hours, +and compel one's self to this by custom, as I have done; but not to +subject one's self, as I have done in my declining years, to a particular +convenience of place and seat for that purpose, and make it troublesome +by long sitting; and yet, in the fouler offices, is it not in some +measure excusable to require more care and cleanliness? + + "Naturt homo mundum et elegans animal est." + + [Man is by nature a clean and delicate creature."--Seneca,Ep., 92.] + +Of all the actions of nature, I am the most impatient of being +interrupted in that. I have seen many soldiers troubled with the +unruliness of their bellies; whereas mine and I never fail of our +punctual assignation, which is at leaping out of bed, if some +indispensable business or sickness does not molest us. + +I think then, as I said before, that sick men cannot better place +themselves anywhere in more safety, than in sitting still in that course +of life wherein they have been bred and trained up; change, be it what it +will, distempers and puts one out. Do you believe that chestnuts can +hurt a Perigordin or a Lucchese, or milk and cheese the mountain people? +We enjoin them not only a new, but a contrary, method of life; a change +that the healthful cannot endure. Prescribe water to a Breton of +threescore and ten; shut a seaman up in a stove; forbid a Basque footman +to walk: you will deprive them of motion, and in the end of air and +light: + + "An vivere tanti est? + Cogimur a suetis animum suspendere rebus, + Atque, ut vivamus, vivere desinimus. . + Hos superesse reor, quibus et spirabilis aer + Et lux, qua regimur, redditur ipsa gravis." + + ["Is life worth so much? We are compelled to withhold the mind + from things to which we are accustomed; and, that we may live, we + cease to live . . . . Do I conceive that they still live, to + whom the respirable air, and the light itself, by which we are + governed, is rendered oppressive?" + --Pseudo-Gallus, Eclog., i. 155, 247.] + +If they do no other good, they do this at least, that they prepare +patients betimes for death, by little and little undermining and cutting +off the use of life. + +Both well and sick, I have ever willingly suffered myself to obey the +appetites that pressed upon me. I give great rein to my desires and +propensities; I do not love to cure one disease by another; I hate +remedies that are more troublesome than the disease itself. To be +subject to the colic and subject to abstain from eating oysters are two +evils instead of one; the disease torments us on the one side, and the +remedy on the other. Since we are ever in danger of mistaking, let us +rather run the hazard of a mistake, after we have had the pleasure. The +world proceeds quite the other way, and thinks nothing profitable that is +not painful; it has great suspicion of facility. My appetite, in various +things, has of its own accord happily enough accommodated itself to the +health of my stomach. Relish and pungency in sauces were pleasant to me +when young; my stomach disliking them since, my taste incontinently +followed. Wine is hurtful to sick people, and 'tis the first thing that +my mouth then finds distasteful, and with an invincible dislike. +Whatever I take against my liking does me harm; and nothing hurts me that +I eat with appetite and delight. I never received harm by any action +that was very pleasant to me; and accordingly have made all medicinal +conclusions largely give way to my pleasure; and I have, when I was +young, + + "Quem circumcursans huc atque huc saepe Cupido + Fulgebat crocink splendidus in tunic." + + [When Cupid, fluttering round me here and there, shone in his rich + purple mantle."--Catullus, lxvi. 133.] + +given myself the rein as licentiously and inconsiderately to the desire +that was predominant in me, as any other whomsoever: + + "Et militavi non sine gloria;" + + ["And I have played the soldier not ingloriously." + --Horace, Od., iii. 26, 2.] + +yet more in continuation and holding out, than in sally: + + "Sex me vix memini sustinuisse vices." + + ["I can scarcely remember six bouts in one night" + --Ovid, Amor., iii. 7, 26.] + +'Tis certainly a misfortune and a miracle at once to confess at what a +tender age I first came under the subjection of love: it was, indeed, by +chance; for it was long before the years of choice or knowledge; I do not +remember myself so far back; and my fortune may well be coupled with that +of Quartilla, who could not remember when she was a maid: + + "Inde tragus, celeresque pili, mirandaque matri + Barba meae." + + ["Thence the odour of the arm-pits, the precocious hair, and the + beard which astonished my mother."--Martial, xi. 22, 7.] + +Physicians modify their rules according to the violent longings that +happen to sick persons, ordinarily with good success; this great desire +cannot be imagined so strange and vicious, but that nature must have a +hand in it. And then how easy a thing is it to satisfy the fancy? In my +opinion; this part wholly carries it, at least, above all the rest. The +most grievous and ordinary evils are those that fancy loads us with; this +Spanish saying pleases me in several aspects: + + "Defenda me Dios de me." + + ["God defend me from myself."] + +I am sorry when I am sick, that I have not some longing that might give +me the pleasure of satisfying it; all the rules of physic would hardly be +able to divert me from it. I do the same when I am well; I can see very +little more to be hoped or wished for. 'Twere pity a man should be so +weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him. + +The art of physic is not so fixed, that we need be without authority for +whatever we do; it changes according to climates and moons, according to +Fernel and to Scaliger.--[Physicians to Henry II.]-- If your physician +does not think it good for you to sleep, to drink wine, or to eat such +and such meats, never trouble yourself; I will find you another that +shall not be of his opinion; the diversity of medical arguments and +opinions embraces all sorts and forms. I saw a miserable sick person +panting and burning for thirst, that he might be cured, who was +afterwards laughed at for his pains by another physician, who condemned +that advice as prejudicial to him: had he not tormented himself to good +purpose? There lately died of the stone a man of that profession, who +had made use of extreme abstinence to contend with his disease: his +fellow-physicians say that, on the contrary, this abstinence had dried +him up and baked the gravel in his kidneys. + +I have observed, that both in wounds and sicknesses, speaking discomposes +and hurts me, as much as any irregularity I can commit. My voice pains +and tires me, for 'tis loud and forced; so that when I have gone to a +whisper some great persons about affairs of consequence, they have often +desired me to moderate my voice. + +This story is worth a diversion. Some one in a certain Greek school +speaking loud as I do, the master of the ceremonies sent to him to speak +softly: " Tell him, then, he must send me," replied the other, "the tone +he would have me speak in." To which the other replied, "That he should +take the tone from the ears of him to whom he spake." It was well said, +if it is to be understood: "Speak according to the affair you are +speaking about to your auditor," for if it mean, "'tis sufficient that he +hear you, or govern yourself by him," I do not find it to be reason. The +tone and motion of my voice carries with it a great deal of the +expression and signification of my meaning, and 'tis I who am to govern +it, to make myself understood: there is a voice to instruct, a voice to +flatter, and a voice to reprehend. I will not only that my voice reach +him, but, peradventure, that it strike and pierce him. When I rate my +valet with sharp and bitter language, it would be very pretty for him to +say; "Pray, master, speak lower; I hear you very well": + + "Est quaedam vox ad auditum accommodata, + non magnitudine, sed proprietate." + + ["There is a certain voice accommodated to the hearing, not by its + loudness, but by its propriety."--Quintilian, xi. 3.] + +Speaking is half his who speaks, and half his who hears; the latter ought +to prepare himself to receive it, according to its bias; as with tennis- +players, he who receives the ball, shifts and prepares, according as he +sees him move who strikes the stroke, and according to the stroke itself. + +Experience has, moreover, taught me this, that we ruin ourselves by +impatience. Evils have their life and limits, their diseases and their +recovery. + +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. I am of Crantor's opinion, that we are +neither obstinately and deafly to oppose evils, nor succumb to them from +want of courage; but that we are naturally to give way to them, according +to their condition and our own. We ought to grant free passage to +diseases; I find they stay less with me, who let them alone; and I have +lost some, reputed the most tenacious and obstinate, by their own decay, +without help and without art, and contrary to its rules. Let us a little +permit Nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs +than we. But such an one died of it; and so shall you: if not of that +disease, of another. And how many have not escaped dying, who have had +three physicians at their tails? Example is a vague and universal +mirror, and of various reflections. If it be a delicious medicine, take +it: 'tis always so much present good. I will never stick at the name nor +the colour, if it be pleasant and grateful to the palate: pleasure is one +of the chiefest kinds of profit. I have suffered colds, gouty +defluxions, relaxations, palpitations of the heart, megrims, and other +accidents, to grow old and die in time a natural death. I have so lost +them when I was half fit to keep them: they are sooner prevailed upon by +courtesy than huffing. We must patiently suffer the laws of our +condition; we are born to grow old, to grow weak, and to be sick, in +despite of all medicine. 'Tis the first lesson the Mexicans teach their +children; so soon as ever they are born they thus salute them: "Thou art +come into the world, child, to endure: endure, suffer, and say nothing." +'Tis injustice to lament that which has befallen any one which may befall +every one: + + "Indignare, si quid in to inique proprio constitutum est." + + ["Then be angry, when there is anything unjustly decreed against + thee alone."--Seneca, Ep., 91.] + +See an old man who begs of God that he will maintain his health vigorous +and entire; that is to say, that he restore him to youth: + + "Stulte, quid haec frustra votis puerilibus optas?" + + ["Fool! why do you vainly form these puerile wishes?" + --Ovid.,Trist., 111. 8, II.] + +is it not folly? his condition is not capable of it. The gout, the +stone, and indigestion are symptoms of long years; as heat, rains, and +winds are of long journeys. Plato does not believe that AEsculapius +troubled himself to provide by regimen to prolong life in a weak and +wasted body, useless to his country and to his profession, or to beget +healthful and robust children; and does not think this care suitable to +the Divine justice and prudence, which is to direct all things to +utility. My good friend, your business is done; nobody can restore you; +they can, at the most, but patch you up, and prop you a little, and by +that means prolong your misery an hour or two: + + "Non secus instantem cupiens fulcire ruinam, + Diversis contra nititur obiicibus; + Donec certa dies, omni compage soluta, + Ipsum cum rebus subruat auxilium." + + ["Like one who, desiring to stay an impending ruin, places various + props against it, till, in a short time, the house, the props, and + all, giving way, fall together."--Pseudo-Gallus, i. 171.] + +We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade; our life, like the harmony +of the world, is composed of contrary things--of diverse tones, sweet and +harsh, sharp and flat, sprightly and solemn: the musician who should only +affect some of these, what would he be able to do? he must know how to +make use of them all, and to mix them; and so we should mingle the goods +and evils which are consubstantial with our life; our being cannot +subsist without this mixture, and the one part is no less necessary to it +than the other. To attempt to combat natural necessity, is to represent +the folly of Ctesiphon, who undertook to kick with his mule.--[Plutarch, +How to restrain Anger, c. 8.] + +I consult little about the alterations I feel: for these doctors take +advantage; when they have you at their mercy, they surfeit your ears with +their prognostics; and formerly surprising me, weakened with sickness, +injuriously handled me with their dogmas and magisterial fopperies--one +while menacing me with great pains, and another with approaching death. +Hereby I was indeed moved and shaken, but not subdued nor jostled from my +place; and though my judgment was neither altered nor distracted, yet it +was at least disturbed: 'tis always agitation and combat. + +Now, I use my imagination as gently as I can, and would discharge it, if +I could, of all trouble and contest; a man must assist, flatter, and +deceive it, if he can; my mind is fit for that office; it needs no +appearances throughout: could it persuade as it preaches, it would +successfully relieve me. Will you have an example?. It tells me: "that +'tis for my good to have the stone: that the structure of my age must +naturally suffer some decay, and it is now time it should begin to +disjoin and to confess a breach; 'tis a common necessity, and there is +nothing in it either miraculous or new; I therein pay what is due to old +age, and I cannot expect a better bargain; that society ought to comfort +me, being fallen into the most common infirmity of my age; I see +everywhere men tormented with the same disease, and am honoured by the +fellowship, forasmuch as men of the best quality are most frequently +afflicted with it: 'tis a noble and dignified disease: that of such as +are struck with it, few have it to a less degree of pain; that these are +put to the trouble of a strict diet and the daily taking of nauseous +potions, whereas I owe my better state purely to my good fortune; for +some ordinary broths of eringo or burst-wort that I have twice or thrice +taken to oblige the ladies, who, with greater kindness than my pain was +sharp, would needs present me half of theirs, seemed to me equally easy +to take and fruitless in operation, the others have to pay a thousand +vows to AEsculapius, and as many crowns to their physicians, for the +voiding a little gravel, which I often do by the aid of nature: even the +decorum of my countenance is not disturbed in company; and I can hold my +water ten hours, and as long as any man in health. The fear of this +disease," says my mind, "formerly affrighted thee, when it was unknown to +thee; the cries and despairing groans of those who make it worse by their +impatience, begot a horror in thee. 'Tis an infirmity that punishes the +members by which thou hast most offended. Thou art a conscientious +fellow;" + + "Quae venit indigne poena, dolenda venit:" + + ["We are entitled to complain of a punishment that we have not + deserved."--Ovid, Heroid., v. 8.] + +"consider this chastisement: 'tis very easy in comparison of others, and +inflicted with a paternal tenderness: do but observe how late it comes; +it only seizes on and incommodes that part of thy life which is, one way +and another, sterile and lost; having, as it were by composition, given +time for the licence and pleasures of thy youth. The fear and the +compassion that the people have of this disease serve thee for matter of +glory; a quality whereof if thou bast thy judgment purified, and that thy +reason has somewhat cured it, thy friends notwithstanding, discern some +tincture in thy complexion. 'Tis a pleasure to hear it said of oneself +what strength of mind, what patience! Thou art seen to sweat with pain, +to turn pale and red, to tremble, to vomit blood, to suffer strange +contractions and convulsions, at times to let great tears drop from thine +eyes, to urine thick, black, and dreadful water, or to have it suppressed +by some sharp and craggy stone, that cruelly pricks and tears the neck of +the bladder, whilst all the while thou entertainest the company with an +ordinary countenance; droning by fits with thy people; making one in a +continuous discourse, now and then making excuse for thy pain, and +representing thy suffering less than it is. Dost thou call to mind the +men of past times, who so greedily sought diseases to keep their virtue +in breath and exercise? Put the case that nature sets thee on and impels +thee to this glorious school, into which thou wouldst never have entered +of thy own free will. If thou tellest me that it is a dangerous and +mortal disease, what others are not so? for 'tis a physical cheat to +expect any that they say do not go direct to death: what matters if they +go thither by accident, or if they easily slide and slip into the path +that leads us to it? But thou dost not die because thou art sick; thou +diest because thou art living: death kills thee without the help of +sickness: and sickness has deferred death in some, who have lived longer +by reason that they thought themselves always dying; to which may be +added, that as in wounds, so in diseases, some are medicinal and +wholesome. The stone is often no less long-lived than you; we see men +with whom it has continued from their infancy even to their extreme old +age; and if they had not broken company, it would have been with them +longer still; you more often kill it than it kills you. And though it +should present to you the image of approaching death, were it not a good +office to a man of such an age, to put him in mind of his end? And, +which is worse, thou hast no longer anything that should make thee desire +to be cured. Whether or no, common necessity will soon call thee away. +Do but consider how skilfully and gently she puts thee out of concern +with life, and weans thee from the world; not forcing thee with a +tyrannical subjection, like so many other infirmities which thou seest +old men afflicted withal, that hold them in continual torment, and keep +them in perpetual and unintermitted weakness and pains, but by warnings +and instructions at intervals, intermixing long pauses of repose, as it +were to give thee opportunity to meditate and ruminate upon thy lesson, +at thy own ease and leisure. To give thee means to judge aright, and to +assume the resolution of a man of courage, it presents to thee the state +of thy entire condition, both in good and evil; and one while a very +cheerful and another an insupportable life, in one and the same day. If +thou embracest not death, at least thou shakest hands with it once a +month; whence thou hast more cause to hope that it will one day surprise +thee without menace; and that being so often conducted to the water-side, +but still thinking thyself to be upon the accustomed terms, thou and thy +confidence will at one time or another be unexpectedly wafted over. A +man cannot reasonably complain of diseases that fairly divide the time +with health." + +I am obliged to Fortune for having so often assaulted me with the same +sort of weapons: she forms and fashions me by use, hardens and habituates +me, so that I can know within a little for how much I shall be quit. For +want of natural memory, I make one of paper; and as any new symptom +happens in my disease, I set it down, whence it falls out that, having +now almost passed through all sorts of examples, if anything striking +threatens me, turning over these little loose notes, as the Sybilline +leaves, I never fail of finding matter of consolation from some +favourable prognostic in my past experience. Custom also makes me hope +better for the time to come; for, the conduct of this clearing out having +so long continued, 'tis to be believed that nature will not alter her +course, and that no other worse accident will happen than what I already +feel. And besides, the condition of this disease is not unsuitable to my +prompt and sudden complexion: when it assaults me gently, I am afraid, +for 'tis then for a great while; but it has, naturally, brisk and +vigorous excesses; it claws me to purpose for a day or two. My kidneys +held out an age without alteration; and I have almost now lived another, +since they changed their state; evils have their periods, as well as +benefits: peradventure, the infirmity draws towards an end. Age weakens +the heat of my stomach, and, its digestion being less perfect, sends this +crude matter to my kidneys; why, at a certain revolution, may not the +heat of my kidneys be also abated, so that they can no more petrify my +phlegm, and nature find out some other way of purgation. Years have +evidently helped me to drain certain rheums; and why not these excrements +which furnish matter for gravel? But is there anything delightful in +comparison of this sudden change, when from an excessive pain, I come, by +the voiding of a stone, to recover, as by a flash of lightning, the +beautiful light of health, so free and full, as it happens in our sudden +and sharpest colics? Is there anything in the pain suffered, that one +can counterpoise to the pleasure of so sudden an amendment? Oh, how much +does health seem the more pleasant to me, after a sickness so near and so +contiguous, that I can distinguish them in the presence of one another, +in their greatest show; when they appear in emulation, as if to make head +against and dispute it with one another! As the Stoics say that vices +are profitably introduced to give value to and to set off virtue, we can, +with better reason and less temerity of conjecture, say that nature has +given us pain for the honour and service of pleasure and indolence. When +Socrates, after his fetters were knocked off, felt the pleasure of that +itching which the weight of them had caused in his legs, he rejoiced to +consider the strict alliance betwixt pain and pleasure; how they are +linked together by a necessary connection, so that by turns they follow +and mutually beget one another; and cried out to good AEsop, that he +ought out of this consideration to have taken matter for a fine fable. + +The worst that I see in other diseases is, that they are not so grievous +in their effect as they are in their issue: a man is a whole year in +recovering, and all the while full of weakness and fear. There is so +much hazard, and so many steps to arrive at safety, that there is no end +on't before they have unmuffled you of a kerchief, and then of a cap, +before they allow you to walk abroad and take the air, to drink wine, to +lie with your wife, to eat melons, 'tis odds you relapse into some new +distemper. The stone has this privilege, that it carries itself clean +off: whereas the other maladies always leave behind them some impression +and alteration that render the body subject to a new disease, and lend a +hand to one another. Those are excusable that content themselves with +possessing us, without extending farther and introducing their followers; +but courteous and kind are those whose passage brings us any profitable +issue. Since I have been troubled with the stone, I find myself freed +from all other accidents, much more, methinks, than I was before, and +have never had any fever since; I argue that the extreme and frequent +vomitings that I am subject to purge me: and, on the other hand, my +distastes for this and that, and the strange fasts I am forced to keep, +digest my peccant humours, and nature, with those stones, voids whatever +there is in me superfluous and hurtful. Let them never tell me that it +is a medicine too dear bought: for what avail so many stinking draughts, +so many caustics, incisions, sweats, setons, diets, and so many other +methods of cure, which often, by reason we are not able to undergo their +violence and importunity, bring us to our graves? So that when I have +the stone, I look upon it as physic; when free from it, as an absolute +deliverance. + +And here is another particular benefit of my disease; which is, that it +almost plays its game by itself, and lets 'me play mine, if I have only +courage to do it; for, in its greatest fury, I have endured it ten hours +together on horseback. Do but endure only; you need no other regimen +play, run, dine, do this and t'other, if you can; your debauch will do +you more good than harm; say as much to one that has the pox, the gout, +or hernia! The other diseases have more universal obligations; rack our +actions after another kind of manner, disturb our whole order, and to +their consideration engage the whole state of life: this only pinches the +skin; it leaves the understanding and the will wholly at our own +disposal, and the tongue, the hands, and the feet; it rather awakens than +stupefies you. The soul is struck with the ardour of a fever, +overwhelmed with an epilepsy, and displaced by a sharp megrim, and, in +short, astounded by all the diseases that hurt the whole mass and the +most noble parts; this never meddles with the soul; if anything goes +amiss with her, 'tis her own fault; she betrays, dismounts, and abandons +herself. There are none but fools who suffer themselves to be persuaded +that this hard and massive body which is baked in our kidneys is to be +dissolved by drinks; wherefore, when it is once stirred, there is nothing +to be done but to give it passage; and, for that matter, it will itself +make one. + +I moreover observe this particular convenience in it, that it is a +disease wherein we have little to guess at: we are dispensed from the +trouble into which other diseases throw us by the uncertainty of their +causes, conditions, and progress; a trouble that is infinitely painful: +we have no need of consultations and doctoral interpretations; the senses +well enough inform us both what it is and where it is. + +By suchlike arguments, weak and strong, as Cicero with the disease of his +old age, I try to rock asleep and amuse my imagination, and to dress its +wounds. If I find them worse tomorrow, I will provide new stratagems. +That this is true: I am come to that pass of late, that the least motion +forces pure blood out of my kidneys: what of that? I move about, +nevertheless, as before, and ride after my hounds with a juvenile and +insolent ardour; and hold that I have very good satisfaction for an +accident of that importance, when it costs me no more but a dull +heaviness and uneasiness in that part; 'tis some great stone that wastes +and consumes the substance of my kidneys and my life, which I by little +and little evacuate, not without some natural pleasure, as an excrement +henceforward superfluous and troublesome. Now if I feel anything +stirring, do not fancy that I trouble myself to consult my pulse or my +urine, thereby to put myself upon some annoying prevention; I shall soon +enough feel the pain, without making it more and longer by the disease of +fear. He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears. To +which may be added that the doubts and ignorance of those who take upon +them to expound the designs of nature and her internal progressions, and +the many false prognostics of their art, ought to give us to understand +that her ways are inscrutable and utterly unknown; there is great +uncertainty, variety, and obscurity in what she either promises or +threatens. Old age excepted, which is an indubitable sign of the +approach of death, in all other accidents I see few signs of the future, +whereon we may ground our divination. I only judge of myself by actual +sensation, not by reasoning: to what end, since I am resolved to bring +nothing to it but expectation and patience? Will you know how much I get +by this? observe those who do otherwise, and who rely upon so many +diverse persuasions and counsels; how often the imagination presses upon +them without any bodily pain. I have many times amused myself, being +well and in safety, and quite free from these dangerous attacks in +communicating them to the physicians as then beginning to discover +themselves in me; I underwent the decree of their dreadful conclusions, +being all the while quite at my ease, and so much the more obliged to the +favour of God and better satisfied of the vanity of this art. + +There is nothing that ought so much to be recommended to youth as +activity and vigilance our life is nothing but movement. I bestir myself +with great difficulty, and am slow in everything, whether in rising, +going to bed, or eating: seven of the clock in the morning is early for +me, and where I rule, I never dine before eleven, nor sup till after six. +I formerly attributed the cause of the fevers and other diseases I fell +into to the heaviness that long sleeping had brought upon me, and have +ever repented going to sleep again in the morning. Plato is more angry +at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking. I love to lie hard and +alone, even without my wife, as kings do; pretty well covered with +clothes. They never warm my bed, but since I have grown old they give me +at need cloths to lay to my feet and stomach. They found fault with the +great Scipio that he was a great sleeper; not, in my opinion, for any +other reason than that men were displeased that he alone should have +nothing in him to be found fault with. If I am anything fastidious in my +way of living 'tis rather in my lying than anything else; but generally +I give way and accommodate myself as well as any one to necessity. +Sleeping has taken up a great part of my life, and I yet continue, at the +age I now am, to sleep eight or nine hours at one breath. I wean myself +with utility from this proneness to sloth, and am evidently the better +for so doing. I find the change a little hard indeed, but in three days +'tis over; and I see but few who live with less sleep, when need +requires, and who more constantly exercise themselves, or to whom long +journeys are less troublesome. My body is capable of a firm, but not of +a violent or sudden agitation. I escape of late from violent exercises, +and such as make me sweat: my limbs grow weary before they are warm. +I can stand a whole day together, and am never weary of walking; but from +my youth I have ever preferred to ride upon paved roads; on foot, I get +up to the haunches in dirt, and little fellows as I am are subject in the +streets to be elbowed and jostled for want of presence; I have ever loved +to repose myself, whether sitting or lying, with my heels as high or +higher than my seat. + +There is no profession as pleasant as the military, a profession both +noble in its execution (for valour is the stoutest, proudest, and most +generous of all virtues), and noble in its cause: there is no utility +either more universal or more just than the protection of the peace and +greatness of one's country. The company of so many noble, young, and +active men delights you; the ordinary sight of so many tragic spectacles; +the freedom of the conversation, without art; a masculine and +unceremonious way of living, please you; the variety of a thousand +several actions; the encouraging harmony of martial music that ravishes +and inflames both your ears and souls; the honour of this occupation, +nay, even its hardships and difficulties, which Plato holds so light that +in his Republic he makes women and children share in them, are delightful +to you. You put yourself voluntarily upon particular exploits and +hazards, according as you judge of their lustre and importance; and, a +volunteer, find even life itself excusably employed: + + "Pulchrumque mori succurrit in armis." + + ["'Tis fine to die sword in hand." ("And he remembers that it + is honourable to die in arms.")--AEneid, ii. 317.] + + +To fear common dangers that concern so great a multitude of men; not to +dare to do what so many sorts of souls, what a whole people dare, is for +a heart that is poor and mean beyond all measure: company encourages even +children. If others excel you in knowledge, in gracefulness, in +strength, or fortune, you have alternative resources at your disposal; +but to give place to them in stability of mind, you can blame no one for +that but yourself. Death is more abject, more languishing and +troublesome, in bed than in a fight: fevers and catarrhs as painful and +mortal as a musket-shot. Whoever has fortified himself valiantly to bear +the accidents of common life need not raise his courage to be a soldier: + + "Vivere, mi Lucili, militare est." + + ["To live, my Lucilius, is (to make war) to be a soldier." + --Seneca, Ep., 96.] + +I do not remember that I ever had the itch, and yet scratching is one of +nature's sweetest gratifications, and so much at hand; but repentance +follows too near. I use it most in my ears, which are at intervals apt +to itch. + +I came into the world with all my senses entire, even to perfection. My +stomach is commodiously good, as also is my head and my breath; and, for +the most part, uphold themselves so in the height of fevers. I have +passed the age to which some nations, not without reason, have prescribed +so just a term of life that they would not suffer men to exceed it; and +yet I have some intermissions, though short and inconstant, so clean and +sound as to be little inferior to the health and pleasantness of my +youth. I do not speak of vigour and sprightliness; 'tis not reason they +should follow me beyond their limits: + + "Non hoc amplius est liminis, aut aquae + Coelestis, patiens latus." + + ["I am no longer able to stand waiting at a door in the rain." + --Horace, Od., iii. 10, 9.] + +My face and eyes presently discover my condition; all my alterations +begin there, and appear somewhat worse than they really are; my friends +often pity me before I feel the cause in myself. My looking-glass does +not frighten me; for even in my youth it has befallen me more than once +to have a scurvy complexion and of ill augury, without any great +consequence, so that the physicians, not finding any cause within +answerable to that outward alteration, attributed it to the mind and to +some secret passion that tormented me within; but they were deceived. +If my body would govern itself as well, according to my rule, as my mind +does, we should move a little more at our ease. My mind was then not +only free from trouble, but, moreover, full of joy and satisfaction, +as it commonly is, half by its complexion, half by its design: + + "Nec vitiant artus aegrae contagia mentis." + + ["Nor do the troubles of the body ever affect my mind." + --Ovid, Trist., iii. 8, 25.] + +I am of the opinion that this temperature of my soul has often raised my +body from its lapses; this is often depressed; if the other be not brisk +and gay, 'tis at least tranquil and at rest. I had a quartan ague four +or five months, that made me look miserably ill; my mind was always, if +not calm, yet pleasant. If the pain be without me, the weakness and +languor do not much afflict me; I see various corporal faintings, that +beget a horror in me but to name, which yet I should less fear than a +thousand passions and agitations of the mind that I see about me. I make +up my mind no more to run; 'tis enough that I can crawl along; nor do I +more complain of the natural decadence that I feel in myself: + + "Quis tumidum guttur miratur in Alpibus?" + + ["Who is surprised to see a swollen goitre in the Alps?" + --Juvenal, xiii. 162.] + +than I regret that my duration shall not be as long and entire as that of +an oak. + +I have no reason to complain of my imagination; I have had few thoughts +in my life that have so much as broken my sleep, except those of desire, +which have awakened without afflicting me. I dream but seldom, and then +of chimaeras and fantastic things, commonly produced from pleasant +thoughts, and rather ridiculous than sad; and I believe it to be true +that dreams are faithful interpreters of our inclinations; but there is +art required to sort and understand them + + "Res, quae in vita usurpant homines, cogitant, curant, vident, + Quaeque agunt vigilantes, agitantque, ea si cui in somno accidunt, + Minus mirandum est." + + ["'Tis less wonder, what men practise, think, care for, see, and do + when waking, (should also run in their heads and disturb them when + they are asleep) and which affect their feelings, if they happen to + any in sleep."--Attius, cited in Cicero, De Divin., i. 22.] + +Plato, moreover, says, that 'tis the office of prudence to draw +instructions of divination of future things from dreams: I don't know +about this, but there are wonderful instances of it that Socrates, +Xenophon, and Aristotle, men of irreproachable authority, relate. +Historians say that the Atlantes never dream; who also never eat any +animal food, which I add, forasmuch as it is, peradventure, the reason +why they never dream, for Pythagoras ordered a certain preparation of +diet to beget appropriate dreams. Mine are very gentle, without any +agitation of body or expression of voice. I have seen several of my time +wonderfully disturbed by them. Theon the philosopher walked in his +sleep, and so did Pericles servant, and that upon the tiles and top of +the house. + +I hardly ever choose my dish at table, but take the next at hand, and +unwillingly change it for another. A confusion of meats and a clatter of +dishes displease me as much as any other confusion: I am easily satisfied +with few dishes: and am an enemy to the opinion of Favorinus, that in a +feast they should snatch from you the meat you like, and set a plate of +another sort before you; and that 'tis a pitiful supper, if you do not +sate your guests with the rumps of various fowls, the beccafico only +deserving to be all eaten. I usually eat salt meats, yet I prefer bread +that has no salt in it; and my baker never sends up other to my table, +contrary to the custom of the country. In my infancy, what they had most +to correct in me was the refusal of things that children commonly best +love, as sugar, sweetmeats, and march-panes. My tutor contended with +this aversion to delicate things, as a kind of over-nicety; and indeed +'tis nothing else but a difficulty of taste, in anything it applies +itself to. Whoever cures a child of an obstinate liking for brown bread, +bacon, or garlic, cures him also of pampering his palate. There are some +who affect temperance and plainness by wishing for beef and ham amongst +the partridges; 'tis all very fine; this is the delicacy of the delicate; +'tis the taste of an effeminate fortune that disrelishes ordinary and +accustomed things. + + "Per qux luxuria divitiarum taedio ludit." + + ["By which the luxury of wealth causes tedium."--Seneca, Ep., 18.] + +Not to make good cheer with what another is enjoying, and to be curious +in what a man eats, is the essence of this vice: + + "Si modica coenare times olus omne patella." + + ["If you can't be content with herbs in a small dish for supper." + --Horace, Ep., i. 5, 2.] + +There is indeed this difference, that 'tis better to oblige one's +appetite to things that are most easy to be had; but 'tis always vice to +oblige one's self. I formerly said a kinsman of mine was overnice, who, +by being in our galleys, had unlearned the use of beds and to undress +when he went to sleep. + +If I had any sons, I should willingly wish them my fortune. The good +father that God gave me (who has nothing of me but the acknowledgment of +his goodness, but truly 'tis a very hearty one) sent me from my cradle to +be brought up in a poor village of his, and there continued me all the +while I was at nurse, and still longer, bringing me up to the meanest and +most common way of living: + + "Magna pars libertatis est bene moratus venter." + + ["A well-governed stomach is a great part of liberty." + --Seneca,Ep., 123.] + +Never take upon yourselves, and much less give up to your wives, the care +of their nurture; leave the formation to fortune, under popular and +natural laws; leave it to custom to train them up to frugality and +hardship, that they may rather descend from rigour than mount up to it. +This humour of his yet aimed at another end, to make me familiar with the +people and the condition of men who most need our assistance; considering +that I should rather regard them who extend their arms to me, than those +who turn their backs upon me; and for this reason it was that he provided +to hold me at the font persons of the meanest fortune, to oblige and +attach me to them. + +Nor has his design succeeded altogether ill; for, whether upon the +account of the more honour in such a condescension, or out of a natural +compassion that has a very great power over me, I have an inclination +towards the meaner sort of people. The faction which I should condemn in +our wars, I should more sharply condemn, flourishing and successful; it +will somewhat reconcile me to it, when I shall see it miserable and +overwhelmed. How willingly do I admire the fine humour of Cheilonis, +daughter and wife to kings of Sparta. Whilst her husband Cleombrotus, in +the commotion of her city, had the advantage over Leonidas her father, +she, like a good daughter, stuck close to her father in all his misery +and exile, in opposition to the conqueror. But so soon as the chance of +war turned, she changed her will with the change of fortune, and bravely +turned to her husband's side, whom she accompanied throughout, where his +ruin carried him: admitting, as it appears to me, no other choice than to +cleave to the side that stood most in need of her, and where she could +best manifest her compassion. I am naturally more apt to follow the +example of Flaminius, who rather gave his assistance to those who had +most need of him than to those who had power to do him good, than I do to +that of Pyrrhus, who was of an humour to truckle under the great and to +domineer over the poor. + +Long sittings at table both trouble me and do me harm; for, be it that I +was so accustomed when a child, I eat all the while I sit. Therefore it +is that at my own house, though the meals there are of the shortest, I +usually sit down a little while after the rest, after the manner of +Augustus, but I do not imitate him in rising also before the rest; on the +contrary, I love to sit still a long time after, and to hear them talk, +provided I am none of the talkers: for I tire and hurt myself with +speaking upon a full stomach, as much as I find it very wholesome and +pleasant to argue and to strain my voice before dinner. + +The ancient Greeks and Romans had more reason than we in setting apart +for eating, which is a principal action of life, if they were not +prevented by other extraordinary business, many hours and the greatest +part of the night; eating and drinking more deliberately than we do, who +perform all our actions post-haste; and in extending this natural +pleasure to more leisure and better use, intermixing with profitable +conversation. + +They whose concern it is to have a care of me, may very easily hinder me +from eating anything they think will do me harm; for in such matters I +never covet nor miss anything I do not see; but withal, if it once comes +in my sight, 'tis in vain to persuade me to forbear; so that when I +design to fast I must be kept apart from the suppers, and must have only +so much given me as is required for a prescribed collation; for if to +table, I forget my resolution. When I order my cook to alter the manner +of dressing any dish, all my family know what it means, that my stomach +is out of order, and that I shall not touch it. + +I love to have all meats, that will endure it, very little boiled or +roasted, and prefer them very high, and even, as to several, quite gone. +Nothing but hardness generally offends me (of any other quality I am as +patient and indifferent as any man I have known); so that, contrary to +the common humour, even in fish it often happens that I find them both +too fresh and too firm; not for want of teeth, which I ever had good, +even to excellence, and which age does not now begin to threaten; I have +always been used every morning to rub them with a napkin, and before and +after dinner. God is favourable to those whom He makes to die by +degrees; 'tis the only benefit of old age; the last death will be so much +the less painful; it will kill but a half or a quarter of a man. There +is one tooth lately fallen out without drawing and without pain; it was +the natural term of its duration; in that part of my being and several +others, are already dead, others half dead, of those that were most +active and in the first rank during my vigorous years; 'tis so I melt and +steal away from myself. What a folly it would be in my understanding to +apprehend the height of this fall, already so much advanced, as if it +were from the very top! I hope I shall not. I, in truth, receive a +principal consolation in meditating my death, that it will be just and +natural, and that henceforward I cannot herein either require or hope +from Destiny any other but unlawful favour. Men make themselves believe +that we formerly had longer lives as well as greater stature. But they +deceive themselves; and Solon, who was of those elder times, limits the +duration of life to threescore and ten years. I, who have so much and so +universally adored that "The mean is best," of the passed time, and who +have concluded the most moderate measures to be the most perfect, shall +I pretend to an immeasurable and prodigious old age? Whatever happens +contrary to the course of nature may be troublesome; but what comes +according to her should always be pleasant: + + "Omnia, quae secundum naturam fiunt, sunt habenda in bonis." + + ["All things that are done according to nature + are to be accounted good."--Cicero, De Senect., c. 19.] + +And so, says Plato, the death which is occasioned by wounds and diseases +is violent; but that which comes upon us, old age conducting us to it, is +of all others the most easy, and in some sort delicious: + + "Vitam adolescentibus vis aufert, senibus maturitas." + + ["Young men are taken away by violence, old men by maturity." + --Cicero, ubi sup.] + +Death mixes and confounds itself throughout with life; decay anticipates +its hour, and shoulders itself even into the course of our advance. +I have portraits of myself taken at five-and-twenty and five-and-thirty +years of age. I compare them with that lately drawn: how many times is +it no longer me; how much more is my present image unlike the former, +than unlike my dying one? It is too much to abuse nature, to make her +trot so far that she must be forced to leave us, and abandon our conduct, +our eyes, teeth, legs, and all the rest to the mercy of a foreign and +haggard countenance, and to resign us into the hands of art, being weary +of following us herself. + +I am not excessively fond either of salads or fruits, except melons. My +father hated all sorts of sauces; I love them all. Eating too much hurts +me; but, as to the quality of what I eat, I do not yet certainly know +that any sort of meat disagrees with me; neither have I observed that +either full moon or decrease, autumn or spring, have any influence upon +me. We have in us motions that are inconstant and unknown; for example, +I found radishes first grateful to my stomach, since that nauseous, and +now again grateful. In several other things, I find my stomach and +appetite vary after the same manner; I have changed again and again from +white wine to claret, from claret to white wine. + +I am a great lover of fish, and consequently make my fasts feasts and +feasts fasts; and I believe what some people say, that it is more easy of +digestion than flesh. As I make a conscience of eating flesh upon fish- +days, so does my taste make a conscience of mixing fish and flesh; the +difference betwixt them seems to me too remote. + +From my youth, I have sometimes kept out of the way at meals; either to +sharpen my appetite against the next morning (for, as Epicurus fasted and +made lean meals to accustom his pleasure to make shift without abundance, +I, on the contrary, do it to prepare my pleasure to make better and more +cheerful use of abundance); or else I fasted to preserve my vigour for +the service of some action of body or mind: for both the one and the +other of these is cruelly dulled in me by repletion; and, above all +things, I hate that foolish coupling of so healthful and sprightly a +goddess with that little belching god, bloated with the fumes of his +liquor--[ Montaigne did not approve of coupling Bacchus with Venus.]-- +or to cure my sick stomach, or for want of fit company; for I say, as the +same Epicurus did, that one is not so much to regard what he eats, as +with whom; and I commend Chilo, that he would not engage himself to be at +Periander's feast till he was first informed who were to be the other +guests; no dish is so acceptable to me, nor no sauce so appetising, as +that which is extracted from society. I think it more wholesome to eat +more leisurely and less, and to eat oftener; but I would have appetite +and hunger attended to; I should take no pleasure to be fed with three or +four pitiful and stinted repasts a day, after a medicinal manner: who +will assure me that, if I have a good appetite in the morning, I shall +have the same at supper? But we old fellows especially, let us take the +first opportune time of eating, and leave to almanac-makers hopes and +prognostics. The utmost fruit of my health is pleasure; let us take hold +of the present and known. I avoid the invariable in these laws of +fasting; he who would have one form serve him, let him avoid the +continuing it; we harden ourselves in it; our strength is there stupefied +and laid asleep; six months after, you shall find your stomach so inured +to it, that all you have got is the loss of your liberty of doing +otherwise but to your prejudice. + +I never keep my legs and thighs warmer in winter than in summer; one +simple pair of silk stockings is all. I have suffered myself, for the +relief of my colds, to keep my head warmer, and my belly upon the account +of my colic: my diseases in a few days habituate themselves thereto, and +disdained my ordinary provisions: we soon get from a coif to a kerchief +over it, from a simple cap to a quilted hat; the trimmings of the doublet +must not merely serve for ornament: there must be added a hare's skin or +a vulture's skin, and a cap under the hat: follow this gradation, and you +will go a very fine way to work. I will do nothing of the sort, and +would willingly leave off what I have begun. If you fall into any new +inconvenience, all this is labour lost; you are accustomed to it; seek +out some other. Thus do they destroy themselves who submit to be +pestered with these enforced and superstitious rules; they must add +something more, and something more after that; there is no end on't. + +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. I am not very used to be thirsty, either well or sick; my +mouth is, indeed, apt to be dry, but without thirst; and commonly I never +drink but with thirst that is created by eating, and far on in the meal; +I drink pretty well for a man of my pitch: in summer, and at a relishing +meal, I do not only exceed the limits of Augustus, who drank but thrice +precisely; but not to offend Democritus rule, who forbade that men should +stop at four times as an unlucky number, I proceed at need to the fifth +glass, about three half-pints; for the little glasses are my favourites, +and I like to drink them off, which other people avoid as an unbecoming +thing. I mix my wine sometimes with half, sometimes with the third part +water; and when I am at home, by an ancient custom that my father's +physician prescribed both to him and himself, they mix that which is +designed for me in the buttery, two or three hours before 'tis brought +in. 'Tis said that Cranabs, king of Attica, was the inventor of this +custom of diluting wine; whether useful or no, I have heard disputed. +I think it more decent and wholesome for children to drink no wine till +after sixteen or eighteen years of age. The most usual and common method +of living is the most becoming; all particularity, in my opinion, is to +be avoided; and I should as much hate a German who mixed water with his +wine, as I should a Frenchman who drank it pure. Public usage gives the +law in these things. + +I fear a mist, and fly from smoke as from the plague: the first repairs I +fell upon in my own house were the chimneys and houses of office, the +common and insupportable defects of all old buildings; and amongst the +difficulties of war I reckon the choking dust they made us ride in a +whole day together. I have a free and easy respiration, and my colds for +the most part go off without offence to the lungs and without a cough. + +The heat of summer is more an enemy to me than the cold of winter; for, +besides the incommodity of heat, less remediable than cold, and besides +the force of the sunbeams that strike upon the head, all glittering light +offends my eyes, so that I could not now sit at dinner over against a +flaming fire. + +To dull the whiteness of paper, in those times when I was more wont to +read, I laid a piece of glass upon my book, and found my eyes much +relieved by it. I am to this hour--to the age of fifty-four--Ignorant of +the use of spectacles; and I can see as far as ever I did, or any other. +'Tis true that in the evening I begin to find a little disturbance and +weakness in my sight if I read, an exercise I have always found +troublesome, especially by night. 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. A man +must screw up his soul to a high pitch to make it sensible how it ebbs +away. + +My walking is quick and firm; and I know not which of the two, my mind or +my body, I have most to do to keep in the same state. That preacher is +very much my friend who can fix my attention a whole sermon through: in +places of ceremony, where every one's countenance is so starched, where I +have seen the ladies keep even their eyes so fixed, I could never order +it so, that some part or other of me did not lash out; so that though I +was seated, I was never settled; and as to gesticulation, I am never +without a switch in my hand, walking or riding. As the philosopher +Chrysippus' maid said of her master, that he was only drunk in his legs, +for it was his custom to be always kicking them about in what place +soever he sat; and she said it when, the wine having made all his +companions drunk, he found no alteration in himself at all; it may have +been said of me from my infancy, that I had either folly or quicksilver +in my feet, so much stirring and unsettledness there is in them, wherever +they are placed. + +'Tis indecent, besides the hurt it does to one's health, and even to the +pleasure of eating, to eat greedily as I do; I often bite my tongue, and +sometimes my fingers, in my haste. Diogenes, meeting a boy eating after +that manner, gave his tutor a box on the ear! There were men at Rome +that taught people to chew, as well as to walk, with a good grace. I +lose thereby the leisure of speaking, which gives great relish to the +table, provided the discourse be suitable, that is, pleasant and short. + +There is jealousy and envy amongst our pleasures; they cross and hinder +one another. Alcibiades, a man who well understood how to make good +cheer, banished even music from the table, that it might not disturb the +entertainment of discourse, for the reason, as Plato tells us, "that it +is the custom of ordinary people to call fiddlers and singing men to +feasts, for want of good discourse and pleasant talk, with which men of +understanding know how to entertain one another." Varro requires all +this in entertainments: "Persons of graceful presence and agreeable +conversation, who are neither silent nor garrulous; neatness and +delicacy, both of meat and place; and fair weather." The art of dining +well is no slight art, the pleasure not a slight pleasure; neither the +greatest captains nor the greatest philosophers have disdained the use or +science of eating well. My imagination has delivered three repasts to +the custody of my memory, which fortune rendered sovereignly sweet to me, +upon several occasions in my more flourishing age; my present state +excludes me; for every one, according to the good temper of body and mind +wherein he then finds himself, furnishes for his own share a particular +grace and savour. I, who but crawl upon the earth, hate this inhuman +wisdom, that will have us despise and hate all culture of the body; I +look upon it as an equal injustice to loath natural pleasures as to be +too much in love with them. Xerxes was a blockhead, who, environed with +all human delights, proposed a reward to him who could find out others; +but he is not much less so who cuts off any of those pleasures that +nature has provided for him. A man should neither pursue nor avoid them, +but receive them. I receive them, I confess, a little too warmly and +kindly, and easily suffer myself to follow my natural propensions. We +have no need to exaggerate their inanity; they themselves will make us +sufficiently sensible of it, thanks to our sick wet-blanket mind, that +puts us out of taste with them as with itself; it treats both itself and +all it receives, one while better, and another worse, according to its +insatiable, vagabond, and versatile essence: + + "Sincerum est nisi vas, quodcunque infundis, acescit." + + ["Unless the vessel be clean, it will sour whatever + you put into it."--Horace, Ep., i. 2, 54.] + +I, who boast that I so curiously and particularly embrace the +conveniences of life, find them, when I most nearly consider them, very +little more than wind. But what? We are all wind throughout; and, +moreover, the wind itself, more discreet than we, loves to bluster and +shift from corner to corner, and contents itself with its proper offices +without desiring stability and solidity-qualities not its own. + +The pure pleasures, as well as the pure displeasures, of the imagination, +say some, are the greatest, as was expressed by the balance of +Critolaiis. 'Tis no wonder; it makes them to its own liking, and cuts +them out of the whole cloth; of this I every day see notable examples, +and, peradventure, to be desired. But I, who am of a mixed and heavy +condition, cannot snap so soon at this one simple object, but that I +negligently suffer myself to be carried away with the present pleasures +of the, general human law, intellectually sensible, and sensibly +intellectual. The Cyrenaic philosophers will have it that as corporal +pains, so corporal pleasures are more powerful, both as double and as +more just. There are some, as Aristotle says, who out of a savage kind +of stupidity dislike them; and I know others who out of ambition do the +same. Why do they not, moreover, forswear breathing? why do they not +live of their own? why not refuse light, because it is gratuitous, and +costs them neither invention nor exertion? Let Mars, Pallas, or Mercury +afford them their light by which to see, instead of Venus, Ceres, and +Bacchus. These boastful humours may counterfeit some content, for what +will not fancy do? But as to wisdom, there is no touch of it. Will they +not seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives? I hate +that we should be enjoined to have our minds in the clouds, when our +bodies are at table; I would not have the mind nailed there, nor wallow +there; I would have it take place there and sit, but not lie down. +Aristippus maintained nothing but the body, as if we had no soul; Zeno +comprehended only the soul, as if we had no body: both of them faultily. +Pythagoras, they say, followed a philosophy that was all contemplation, +Socrates one that was all conduct and action; Plato found a mean betwixt +the two; but they only say this for the sake of talking. The true +temperament is found in Socrates; and, Plato is much more Socratic than +Pythagoric, and it becomes him better. When I dance, I dance; when I +sleep, I sleep. Nay, when I walk alone in a beautiful orchard, if my +thoughts are some part of the time taken up with external occurrences, +I some part of the time call them back again to my walk, to the orchard, +to the sweetness of that solitude, and to myself. + +Nature has mother-like observed this, that the actions she has enjoined +us for our necessity should be also pleasurable to us; and she invites us +to them, not only by reason, but also by appetite, and 'tis ,injustice to +infringe her laws. When I see alike Caesar and Alexander, in the midst +of his greatest business, so fully enjoy human and corporal pleasures, I +do not say that he relaxed his mind: I say that he strengthened it, by +vigour of courage subjecting those violent employments and laborious +thoughts to the ordinary usage of life: wise, had he believed the last +was his ordinary, the first his extraordinary, vocation. We are great +fools. "He has passed his life in idleness," say we: "I have done +nothing to-day." What? have you not lived? that is not only the +fundamental, but the most illustrious, of your occupations. "Had I been +put to the management of great affairs, I should have made it seen what I +could do." "Have you known how to meditate and manage your life? you +have performed the greatest work of all." In order to shew and develop +herself, nature needs only fortune; she equally manifests herself in all +stages, and behind a curtain as well as without one. Have you known how +to regulate your conduct, you have done a great deal more than he who has +composed books. Have you known how to take repose, you have done more +than he who has taken empires and cities. + +The glorious masterpiece of man is to live to purpose; all other things: +to reign, to lay up treasure, to build, are but little appendices and +props. I take pleasure in seeing a general of an army, at the foot of a +breach he is presently to assault, give himself up entire and free at +dinner, to talk and be merry with his friends. And Brutus, when heaven +and earth were conspired against him and the Roman liberty, stealing some +hour of the night from his rounds to read and scan Polybius in all +security. 'Tis for little souls, buried under the weight of affairs, not +from them to know how clearly to disengage themselves, not to know how to +lay them aside and take them up again: + + "O fortes, pejoraque passi + Mecum saepe viri! nunc vino pellite curas + Cras ingens iterabimus aequor." + + ["O brave spirits, who have often suffered sorrow with me, drink + cares away; tomorrow we will embark once more on the vast sea." + --Horace, Od., i. 7, 30.] + +Whether it be in jest or earnest, that the theological and Sorbonnical +wine, and their feasts, are turned into a proverb, I find it reasonable +they should dine so much more commodiously and pleasantly, as they have +profitably and seriously employed the morning in the exercise of their +schools. The conscience of having well spent the other hours, is the +just and savoury sauce of the dinner-table. The sages lived after that +manner; and that inimitable emulation to virtue, which astonishes us both +in the one and the other Cato, that humour of theirs, so severe as even +to be importunate, gently submits itself and yields to the laws of the +human condition, of Venus and Bacchus; according to the precepts of their +sect, that require the perfect sage to be as expert and intelligent in +the use of natural pleasures as in all other duties of life: + + "Cui cor sapiat, ei et sapiat palatus." + +Relaxation and facility, methinks, wonderfully honour and best become a +strong and generous soul. Epaminondas did not think that to take part, +and that heartily, in songs and sports and dances with the young men of +his city, were things that in any way derogated from the honour of his +glorious victories and the perfect purity of manners that was in him. +And amongst so many admirable actions of Scipio the grandfather, a person +worthy to be reputed of a heavenly extraction, there is nothing that +gives him a greater grace than to see him carelessly and childishly +trifling at gathering and selecting cockle shells, and playing at quoits, + + [This game, as the "Dictionnaire de Trevoux" describes it, is one + wherein two persons contend which of them shall soonest pick up some + object.] + +amusing and tickling himself in representing by writing in comedies the +meanest and most popular actions of men. And his head full of that +wonderful enterprise of Hannibal and Africa, visiting the schools in +Sicily, and attending philosophical lectures, to the extent of arming the +blind envy of his enemies at Rome. Nor is there anything more remarkable +in Socrates than that, old as he was, he found time to make himself +taught dancing and playing upon instruments, and thought it time well +spent. This same man was seen in an ecstasy, standing upon his feet a +whole day and a night together, in the presence of all the Grecian army, +surprised and absorbed by some profound thought. He was the first, +amongst so many valiant men of the army, to run to the relief of +Alcibiades, oppressed with the enemy, to shield him with his own body, +and disengage him from the crowd by absolute force of arms. It was he +who, in the Delian battle, raised and saved Xenophon when fallen from his +horse; and who, amongst all the people of Athens, enraged as he was at so +unworthy a spectacle, first presented himself to rescue Theramenes, whom +the thirty tyrants were leading to execution by their satellites, and +desisted not from his bold enterprise but at the remonstrance of +Theramenes himself, though he was only followed by two more in all. He +was seen, when courted by a beauty with whom he was in love, to maintain +at need a severe abstinence. He was seen ever to go to the wars, and +walk upon ice, with bare feet; to wear the same robe, winter and summer; +to surpass all his companions in patience of bearing hardships, and to +eat no more at a feast than at his own private dinner. He was seen, for +seven-and-twenty years together, to endure hunger, poverty, the +indocility of his children, and the nails of his wife, with the same +countenance. And, in the end, calumny, tyranny, imprisonment, fetters, +and poison. But was this man obliged to drink full bumpers by any rule +of civility? he was also the man of the whole army with whom the +advantage in drinking, remained. And he never refused to play at +noisettes, nor to ride the hobby-horse with children, and it became him +well; for all actions, says philosophy, equally become and equally honour +a wise man. We have enough wherewithal to do it, and we ought never to +be weary of presenting the image of this great man in all the patterns +and forms of perfection. There are very few examples of life, full and +pure; and we wrong our teaching every day, to propose to ourselves those +that are weak and imperfect, scarce good for any one service, and rather +pull us back; corrupters rather than correctors of manners. The people +deceive themselves; a man goes much more easily indeed by the ends, where +the extremity serves for a bound, a stop, and guide, than by the middle +way, large and open; and according to art, more than according to nature: +but withal much less nobly and commendably. + +Greatness of soul consists not so much in mounting and in pressing +forward, as in knowing how to govern and circumscribe itself; it takes +everything for great, that is enough, and demonstrates itself in +preferring moderate to eminent things. There is nothing so fine and +legitimate as well and duly to play the man; nor science so arduous as +well and naturally to know how to live this life; and of all the +infirmities we have, 'tis the most barbarous to despise our being. + +Whoever has a mind to isolate his spirit, when the body is ill at ease, +to preserve it from the contagion, let him by all means do it if he can: +but otherwise let him on the contrary favour and assist it, and not +refuse to participate of its natural pleasures with a conjugal +complacency, bringing to it, if it be the wiser, moderation, lest by +indiscretion they should get confounded with displeasure. Intemperance +is the pest of pleasure; and temperance is not its scourge, but rather +its seasoning. Euxodus, who therein established the sovereign good, and +his companions, who set so high a value upon it, tasted it in its most +charming sweetness, by the means of temperance, which in them was +singular and exemplary. + +I enjoin my soul to look upon pain and pleasure with an eye equally +regulated: + + "Eodem enim vitio est effusio animi in laetitia + quo in dolore contractio," + + ["For from the same imperfection arises the expansion of the + mind in pleasure and its contraction in sorrow." + --Cicero, Tusc. Quaes., iv. 31.] + +and equally firm; but the one gaily and the other severely, and so far as +it is able, to be careful to extinguish the one as to extend the other. +The judging rightly of good brings along with it the judging soundly of +evil: pain has something of the inevitable in its tender beginnings, and +pleasure something of the evitable in its excessive end. Plato couples +them together, and wills that it should be equally the office of +fortitude to fight against pain, and against the immoderate and charming +blandishments of pleasure: they are two fountains, from which whoever +draws, when and as much as he needs, whether city, man, or beast, is very +fortunate. The first is to be taken medicinally and upon necessity, and +more scantily; the other for thirst, but not to, drunkenness. Pain, +pleasure, love and hatred are the first things that a child is sensible +of: if, when reason comes, they apply it to themselves, that is virtue. + +I have a special vocabulary of my own; I "pass away time," when it is ill +and uneasy, but when 'tis good I do not pass it away: "I taste it over +again and adhere to it"; one must run over the ill and settle upon the +good. This ordinary phrase of pastime, and passing away the time, +represents the usage of those wise sort of people who think they cannot +do better with their lives than to let them run out and slide away, pass +them over, and baulk them, and, as much as they can, ignore them and shun +them as a thing of troublesome and contemptible quality: but I know it to +be another kind of thing, and find it both valuable and commodious, even +in its latest decay, wherein I now enjoy it; and nature has delivered it +into our hands in such and so favourable circumstances that we have only +ourselves to blame if it be troublesome to us, or escapes us +unprofitably: + + "Stulti vita ingrata est, trepida est, tota in futurum fertur." + + ["The life of a fool is thankless, timorous, and wholly bent upon + the future."--Seneca, Ep:, 15.] + +Nevertheless I compose myself to lose mine without regret; but withal as +a thing that is perishable by its condition, not that it molests or +annoys me. Nor does it properly well become any not to be displeased +when they die, excepting such as are pleased to live. There is good +husbandry in enjoying it: I enjoy it double to what others do; for the +measure of its fruition depends upon our more or less application to it. +Chiefly that I perceive mine to be so short in time, I desire to extend +it in weight; I will stop the promptitude of its flight by the +promptitude of my grasp; and by the vigour of using it compensate the +speed of its running away. In proportion as the possession of life is +more short, I must make it so much deeper and fuller. + +Others feel the pleasure of content and prosperity; I feel it too, as +well as they, but not as it passes and slips by; one should study, taste, +and ruminate upon it to render condign thanks to Him who grants it to us. +They enjoy the other pleasures as they do that of sleep, without knowing +it. To the end that even sleep itself should not so stupidly escape from +me, I have formerly caused myself to be disturbed in my sleep, so that I +might the better and more sensibly relish and taste it. I ponder with +myself of content; I do not skim over, but sound it; and I bend my +reason, now grown perverse and peevish, to entertain it. Do I find +myself in any calm composedness? is there any pleasure that tickles me? +I do not suffer it to dally with my senses only; I associate my soul to +it too: not there to engage itself, but therein to take delight; not +there to lose itself, but to be present there; and I employ it, on its +part, to view itself in this prosperous state, to weigh and appreciate +its happiness and to amplify it. It reckons how much it stands indebted +to God that its conscience and the intestine passions are in repose; that +it has the body in its natural disposition, orderly and competently +enjoying the soft and soothing functions by which He, of His grace is +pleased to compensate the sufferings wherewith His justice at His good +pleasure chastises us. It reflects how great a benefit it is to be so +protected, that which way soever it turns its eye the heavens are calm +around it. No desire, no fear, no doubt, troubles the air; no +difficulty, past, present, or to, come, that its imagination may not pass +over without offence. This consideration takes great lustre from the +comparison of different conditions. So it is that I present to my +thought, in a thousand aspects, those whom fortune or their own error +carries away and torments. And, again, those who, more like to me, so +negligently and incuriously receive their good fortune. Those are folks +who spend their time indeed; they pass over the present and that which +they possess, to wait on hope, and for shadows and vain images which +fancy puts before them: + + "Morte obita quales fama est volitare figuras, + Aut quae sopitos deludunt somnia sensus:" + + ["Such forms as those which after death are reputed to hover about, + or dreams which delude the senses in sleep."--AEneid, x. 641.] + +which hasten and prolong their flight, according as they are pursued. +The fruit and end of their pursuit is to pursue; as Alexander said, that +the end of his labour was to labour: + + "Nil actum credens, cum quid superesset agendum." + + ["Thinking nothing done, if anything remained to be done. + --"Lucan, ii. 657.] + +For my part then, I love life and cultivate it, such as it has pleased +God to bestow it upon us. I do not desire it should be without the +necessity of eating and drinking; and I should think it a not less +excusable failing to wish it had been twice as long; + + "Sapiens divitiarum naturalium quaesitor acerrimus:" + + ["A wise man is the keenest seeker for natural riches." + --Seneca, Ep., 119.] + +nor that we should support ourselves by putting only a little of that +drug into our mouths, by which Epimenides took away his appetite and kept +himself alive; nor that we should stupidly beget children with our +fingers or heels, but rather; with reverence be it spoken, that we might +voluptuously beget them with our fingers and heels; nor that the body +should be without desire and without titillation. These are ungrateful +and wicked complaints. I accept kindly, and with gratitude, what nature +has done for me; am well pleased with it, and proud of it. A man does +wrong to that great and omnipotent giver to refuse, annul, or disfigure +his gift: all goodness himself, he has made everything good: + + "Omnia quae secundum naturam sunt, aestimatione digna sunt." + + ["All things that are according to nature are worthy of esteem." + --Cicero, De Fin., iii. 6.] + +Of philosophical opinions, I preferably embrace those that are most +solid, that is to say, the most human and most our own: my discourse is, +suitable to my manners, low and humble: philosophy plays the child, to my +thinking, when it puts itself upon its Ergos to preach to us that 'tis a +barbarous alliance to marry the divine with the earthly, the reasonable +with the unreasonable, the severe with the indulgent, the honest with the +dishonest. That pleasure is a brutish quality, unworthy to be tasted by +a wise man; that the sole pleasure he extracts from the enjoyment of a +fair young wife is a pleasure of his conscience to perform an action +according to order, as to put on his boots for a profitable journey. +Oh, that its followers had no more right, nor nerves, nor vigour in +getting their wives' maidenheads than in its lesson. + +This is not what Socrates says, who is its master and ours: he values, as +he ought, bodily pleasure; but he prefers that of the mind as having more +force, constancy, facility, variety, and dignity. This, according to +him, goes by no means alone--he is not so fantastic--but only it goes +first; temperance with him is the moderatrix, not the adversary of +pleasure. Nature is a gentle guide, but not more sweet and gentle than +prudent and just. + + "Intrandum est in rerum naturam, et penitus, + quid ea postulet, pervidendum." + + ["A man must search into the nature of things, and fully examine + what she requires."--Cicero, De Fin., V. 16.] + +I hunt after her foot throughout: we have confounded it with artificial +traces; and that academic and peripatetic good, which is "to live +according to it," becomes on this account hard to limit and explain; and +that of the Stoics, neighbour to it, which is "to consent to nature." +Is it not an error to esteem any actions less worthy, because they are +necessary? And yet they will not take it out of my head, that it is not +a very convenient marriage of pleasure with necessity, with which, says +an ancient, the gods always conspire. To what end do we dismember by +divorce a building united by so close and brotherly a correspondence? +Let us, on the contrary, confirm it by mutual offices; let the mind rouse +and quicken the heaviness of the body, and the body stay and fix the +levity of the soul: + + "Qui, velut summum bonum, laudat animac naturam, et, tanquam malum, + naturam carnis accusat, profectd et animam carnatiter appetit, et + carnem carnaliter fugit; quoniam id vanitate sentit humans, non + veritate divina." + + [He who commends the nature of the soul as the supreme good, and + condemns the nature of the flesh as evil, at once both carnally + desires the soul, and carnally flies the flesh, because he feels + thus from human vanity, not from divine truth." + --St. Augustin, De Civit. Dei, xiv. 5.] + +In this present that God has made us, there is nothing unworthy our care; +we stand accountable for it even to a hair; and is it not a commission to +man, to conduct man according to his condition; 'tis express, plain, and +the very principal one, and the Creator has seriously and strictly +prescribed it to us. Authority has power only to work in regard to +matters of common judgment, and is of more weight in a foreign language; +therefore let us again charge at it in this place: + + "Stultitiae proprium quis non dixerit, ignave et contumaciter + facere, quae facienda sunt; et alio corpus impellere, alio animum; + distrahique inter diversissimos motus?" + + ["Who will not say, that it is the property of folly, slothfully and + contumaciously to perform what is to be done, and to bend the body + one way and the mind another, and to be distracted betwixt wholly + different motions?"--Seneca, Ep., 74.] + +To make this apparent, ask any one, some day, to tell you what whimsies +and imaginations he put into his pate, upon the account of which he +diverted his thoughts from a good meal, and regrets the time he spends in +eating; you will find there is nothing so insipid in all the dishes at +your table as this wise meditation of his (for the most part we had +better sleep than wake to the purpose we wake); and that his discourses +and notions are not worth the worst mess there. Though they were the +ecstasies of Archimedes himself, what then? I do not here speak of, nor +mix with the rabble of us ordinary men, and the vanity of the thoughts +and desires that divert us, those venerable souls, elevated by the ardour +of devotion and religion, to a constant and conscientious meditation of +divine things, who, by the energy of vivid and vehement hope, +prepossessing the use of the eternal nourishment, the final aim and last +step of Christian desires, the sole constant, and incorruptible pleasure, +disdain to apply themselves to our necessitous, fluid, and ambiguous +conveniences, and easily resign to the body the care and use of sensual +and temporal pasture; 'tis a privileged study. Between ourselves, I have +ever observed supercelestial opinions and subterranean manners to be of +singular accord. + +AEsop, that great man, saw his master piss as he walked: "What then," +said he, "must we drop as we run?" Let us manage our time; there yet +remains a great deal idle and ill employed. The mind has not willingly +other hours enough wherein to do its business, without disassociating +itself from the body, in that little space it must have for its +necessity. They would put themselves out of themselves, and escape from +being men. It is folly; instead of transforming themselves into angels, +they transform themselves into beasts; instead of elevating, they lay +themselves lower. These transcendental humours affright me, like high +and inaccessible places; and nothing is hard for me to digest in the life +of Socrates but his ecstasies and communication with demons; nothing so +human in Plato as that for which they say he was called divine; and of +our sciences, those seem to be the most terrestrial and low that are +highest mounted; and I find nothing so humble and mortal in the life of +Alexander as his fancies about his immortalisation. Philotas pleasantly +quipped him in his answer; he congratulated him by letter concerning the +oracle of Jupiter Ammon, which had placed him amongst the gods: "Upon thy +account I am glad of it, but the men are to be pitied who are to live +with a man, and to obey him, who exceeds and is not contented with the +measure of a man:" + + "Diis to minorem quod geris, imperas." + + ["Because thou carriest thyself lower than the gods, thou rulest." + --Horace, Od., iii. 6, 5.] + +The pretty inscription wherewith the Athenians honoured the entry of +Pompey into their city is conformable to my sense: "By so much thou art +a god, as thou confessest thee a man." 'Tis an absolute and, as it were, +a divine perfection, for a man to know how loyally to enjoy his being. +We seek other conditions, by reason we do not understand the use of our +own; and go out of ourselves, because we know not how there to reside. +'Tis to much purpose to go upon stilts, for, when upon stilts, we must +yet walk with our legs; and when seated upon the most elevated throne in +the world, we are but seated upon our breech. The fairest lives, in my +opinion, are those which regularly accommodate themselves to the common +and human model without miracle, without extravagance. Old age stands a +little in need of a more gentle treatment. Let us recommend that to God, +the protector of health and wisdom, but let it be gay and sociable: + + "Frui paratis et valido mihi + Latoe, dones, et precor, integra + Cum mente; nec turpem senectam + Degere, nec Cithara carentem." + + ["Grant it to me, Apollo, that I may enjoy my possessions in good + health; let me be sound in mind; let me not lead a dishonourable + old age, nor want the cittern."--Horace, Od., i. 31, 17.] + +Or: + + ["Grant it to me, Apollo, that I may enjoy what I have in good + health; let me be sound in body and mind; let me live in honour when + old, nor let music be wanting."] + + + + +APOLOGY: +[In fact, the first edition of the Essays (Bordeaux, 1580) has very few +quotations. These became more numerous in the edition of 1588; but the +multitude of classical texts which at times encumber Montaigne's text, +only dates from the posthumous edition of 1595] he had made these +collections in the four last years of his life, as an amusement of his +"idleness."--Le Clerc. They grow, however, more sparing in the Third +Book. + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +A well-governed stomach is a great part of liberty +Affirmation and obstinacy are express signs of want of wit +Alexander said, that the end of his labour was to labour +All actions equally become and equally honour a wise man +As we were formerly by crimes, so we are now overburdened by law +At the most, but patch you up, and prop you a little +better have none at all than to have them in so prodigious a num +Both kings and philosophers go to stool +Cannot stand the liberty of a friend's advice +Cleave to the side that stood most in need of her +Condemnations have I seen more criminal than the crimes +Customs and laws make justice +Dignify our fopperies when we commit them to the press +Diversity of medical arguments and opinions embraces all +Every man thinks himself sufficiently intelligent +Excuse myself from knowing anything which enslaves me to others +First informed who were to be the other guests +Go out of ourselves, because we know not how there to reside +Got up but an inch upon the shoulders of the last, but one +Hate remedies that are more troublesome than the disease itself +He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears +How many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment +"I have done nothing to-day."--"What? have you not lived?" +If it be a delicious medicine, take it +Intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not +Intemperance is the pest of pleasure +Language: obscure and unintelligible in wills and contracts +Last death will kill but a half or a quarter of a man +Law: breeder of altercation and division +Laws keep up their credit, not for being just--but as laws +Lay the fault on the voices of those who speak to me. +Learn my own debility and the treachery of my understanding +Life of Caesar has no greater example for us than our own +Long sittings at table both trouble me and do me harm +Made all medicinal conclusions largely give way to my pleasure +Man after who held out his pulse to a physician was a fool +Man must learn that he is nothing but a fool +More ado to interpret interpretations +More books upon books than upon any other subject +Never did two men make the same judgment of the same thing +Nnone that less keep their promise(than physicians) +Nor get children but before I sleep, nor get them standing +Nothing so grossly, nor so ordinarily faulty, as the laws +Our justice presents to us but one hand +Perpetual scolding of his wife (of Socrates) +Physician: pass through all the diseases he pretends to cure +Plato angry at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking +Plato: lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country +Prolong your misery an hour or two +Put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties +Resolved to bring nothing to it but expectation and patience +Scratching is one of nature's sweetest gratifications +Seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives +So weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him +Soft, easy, and wholesome pillow is ignorance and incuriosity +Study makes me sensible how much I have to learn +Style wherewith men establish religions and laws +Subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doub +That we may live, we cease to live +The mean is best +There is none of us who would not be worse than kings +Thinking nothing done, if anything remained to be done +Thinks nothing profitable that is not painful +Thou diest because thou art living +Tis so I melt and steal away from myself +Truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times +Truth, that for being older it is none the wiser +We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade +We ought to grant free passage to diseases +Whoever will call to mind the excess of his past anger +Why do we not imitate the Roman architecture? +Wrangling arrogance, wholly believing and trusting in itself +Yet do we find any end of the need of interpretating? + + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of The Essays of Montaigne, V19 +By Michel de Montaigne + diff --git a/old/mn19v10.zip b/old/mn19v10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..bcf4938 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mn19v10.zip diff --git a/old/mn19v11.txt b/old/mn19v11.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3c1573d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mn19v11.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2825 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Essays of Montaigne, V19 +#19 in our series by Michel de Montaigne, Translator: Cotton +Edited by William Carew Hazlitt, 1877 + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the laws for your country before redistributing these files!!!!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. + +Please do not remove this. + +This should be the first thing seen when anyone opens the book. +Do not change or edit it without written permission. 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Hart +and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.] +[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales +of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or +software or any other related product without express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.10/04/01*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the +file for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making an +entire meal of them. D.W.] + + + + + +ESSAYS OF MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE + +Translated by Charles Cotton + +Edited by William Carew Hazilitt + +1877 + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOLUME 19. + +XIII. Of Experience. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +OF EXPERIENCE + +There is no desire more natural than that of knowledge. We try all ways +that can lead us to it; where reason is wanting, we therein employ +experience, + + "Per varios usus artem experientia fecit, + Exemplo monstrante viam," + + ["By various trials experience created art, example shewing the + way."--Manilius, i. 59.] + +which is a means much more weak and cheap; but truth is so great a thing +that we ought not to disdain any mediation that will guide us to it. +Reason has so many forms that we know not to which to take; experience +has no fewer; the consequence we would draw from the comparison of events +is unsure, by reason they are always unlike. There is no quality so +universal in this image of things as diversity and variety. Both the +Greeks and the Latins and we, for the most express example of similitude, +employ that of eggs; and yet there have been men, particularly one at +Delphos, who could distinguish marks of difference amongst eggs so well +that he never mistook one for another, and having many hens, could tell +which had laid it. + +Dissimilitude intrudes itself of itself in our works; no art can arrive +at perfect similitude: neither Perrozet nor any other can so carefully +polish and blanch the backs of his cards that some gamesters will not +distinguish them by seeing them only shuffled by another. Resemblance +does not so much make one as difference makes another. Nature has +obliged herself to make nothing other that was not unlike. + +And yet I am not much pleased with his opinion, who thought by the +multitude of laws to curb the authority of judges in cutting out for them +their several parcels; he was not aware that there is as much liberty and +latitude in the interpretation of laws as in their form; and they but +fool themselves, who think to lessen and stop our disputes by recalling +us to the express words of the Bible: forasmuch as our mind does not find +the field less spacious wherein to controvert the sense of another than +to deliver his own; and as if there were less animosity and tartness in +commentary than in invention. We see how much he was mistaken, for we +have more laws in France than all the rest of the world put together, and +more than would be necessary for the government of all the worlds of +Epicurus: + + "Ut olim flagitiis, sic nunc legibus, laboramus." + + ["As we were formerly by crimes, so we are now overburdened by + laws."--Tacitus, Annal., iii. 25.] + +and yet we have left so much to the opinions and decisions of our judges +that there never was so full a liberty or so full a license. What have +our legislators gained by culling out a hundred thousand particular +cases, and by applying to these a hundred thousand laws? This number +holds no manner of proportion with the infinite diversity of human +actions; the multiplication of our inventions will never arrive at the +variety of examples; add to these a hundred times as many more, it will +still not happen that, of events to come, there shall one be found that, +in this vast number of millions of events so chosen and recorded, shall +so tally with any other one, and be so exactly coupled and matched with +it that there will not remain some circumstance and diversity which will +require a diverse judgment. There is little relation betwixt our +actions, which are in perpetual mutation, and fixed and immutable laws; +the most to be desired are those that are the most rare, the most simple +and general; and I am even of opinion that we had better have none at all +than to have them in so prodigious a number as we have. + +Nature always gives them better and happier than those we make ourselves; +witness the picture of the Golden Age of the Poets and the state wherein +we see nations live who have no other. Some there are, who for their +only judge take the first passer-by that travels along their mountains, +to determine their cause; and others who, on their market day, choose out +some one amongst them upon the spot to decide their controversies. What +danger would there be that the wisest amongst us should so determine +ours, according to occurrences and at sight, without obligation of +example and consequence? For every foot its own shoe. King Ferdinand, +sending colonies to the Indies, wisely provided that they should not +carry along with them any students of jurisprudence, for fear lest suits +should get footing in that new world, as being a science in its own +nature, breeder of altercation and division; judging with Plato, "that +lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country." + +Whence does it come to pass that our common language, so easy for all +other uses, becomes obscure and unintelligible in wills and contracts? +and that he who so clearly expresses himself in whatever else he speaks +or writes, cannot find in these any way of declaring himself that does +not fall into doubt and contradiction? if it be not that the princes of +that art, applying themselves with a peculiar attention to cull out +portentous words and to contrive artificial sentences, have so weighed +every syllable, and so thoroughly sifted every sort of quirking +connection that they are now confounded and entangled in the infinity of +figures and minute divisions, and can no more fall within any rule or +prescription, nor any certain intelligence: + + "Confusum est, quidquid usque in pulverem sectum est." + + ["Whatever is beaten into powder is undistinguishable (confused)." + --Seneca, Ep., 89.] + +As you see children trying to bring a mass of quicksilver to a certain +number of parts, the more they press and work it and endeavour to reduce +it to their own will, the more they irritate the liberty of this generous +metal; it evades their endeavour and sprinkles itself into so many +separate bodies as frustrate all reckoning; so is it here, for in +subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doubts; they +put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties, and +lengthen and disperse them. In sowing and retailing questions they make +the world fructify and increase in uncertainties and disputes, as the +earth is made fertile by being crumbled and dug deep. + + "Difficultatem facit doctrina." + + ["Learning (Doctrine) begets difficulty." + --Quintilian, Insat. Orat., x. 3.] + +We doubted of Ulpian, and are still now more perplexed with Bartolus and +Baldus. We should efface the trace of this innumerable diversity of +opinions; not adorn ourselves with it, and fill posterity with crotchets. +I know not what to say to it; but experience makes it manifest, that so +many interpretations dissipate truth and break it. Aristotle wrote to be +understood; if he could not do this, much less will another that is not +so good at it; and a third than he, who expressed his own thoughts. We +open the matter, and spill it in pouring out: of one subject we make a +thousand, and in multiplying and subdividing them, fall again into the +infinity of atoms of Epicurus. Never did two men make the same judgment +of the same thing; and 'tis impossible to find two opinions exactly +alike, not only in several men, but in the same man, at diverse hours. +I often find matter of doubt in things of which the commentary has +disdained to take notice; I am most apt to stumble in an even country, +like some horses that I have known, that make most trips in the smoothest +way. + +Who will not say that glosses augment doubts and ignorance, since there's +no book to be found, either human or divine, which the world busies +itself about, whereof the difficulties are cleared by interpretation. +The hundredth commentator passes it on to the next, still more knotty and +perplexed than he found it. When were we ever agreed amongst ourselves: +"This book has enough; there is now no more to be said about it"? This +is most apparent in the law; we give the authority of law to infinite +doctors, infinite decrees, and as many interpretations; yet do we find +any end of the need of interpretating? is there, for all that, any +progress or advancement towards peace, or do we stand in need of any +fewer advocates and judges than when this great mass of law was yet in +its first infancy? On the contrary, we darken and bury intelligence; we +can no longer discover it, but at the mercy of so many fences and +barriers. Men do not know the natural disease of the mind; it does +nothing but ferret and inquire, and is eternally wheeling, juggling, and +perplexing itself like silkworms, and then suffocates itself in its work; +"Mus in pice."--[" A mouse in a pitch barrel."]--It thinks it discovers +at a great distance, I know not what glimpses of light and imaginary +truth: but whilst running to it, so many difficulties, hindrances, and +new inquisitions cross it, that it loses its way, and is made drunk with +the motion: not much unlike AEsop's dogs, that seeing something like a +dead body floating in the sea, and not being able to approach it, set to +work to drink the water and lay the passage dry, and so choked +themselves. To which what one Crates' said of the writings of Heraclitus +falls pat enough, "that they required a reader who could swim well," so +that the depth and weight of his learning might not overwhelm and stifle +him. 'Tis nothing but particular weakness that makes us content with +what others or ourselves have found out in this chase after knowledge: +one of better understanding will not rest so content; there is always +room for one to follow, nay, even for ourselves; and another road; there +is no end of our inquisitions; our end is in the other world. 'Tis a +sign either that the mind has grown shortsighted when it is satisfied, or +that it has got weary. No generous mind can stop in itself; it will +still tend further and beyond its power; it has sallies beyond its +effects; if it do not advance and press forward, and retire, and rush and +wheel about, 'tis but half alive; its pursuits are without bound or +method; its aliment is admiration, the chase, ambiguity, which Apollo +sufficiently declared in always speaking to us in a double, obscure, and +oblique sense: not feeding, but amusing and puzzling us. 'Tis an +irregular and perpetual motion, without model and without aim; its +inventions heat, pursue, and interproduce one another: + +Estienne de la Boetie; thus translated by Cotton: + + "So in a running stream one wave we see + After another roll incessantly, + And as they glide, each does successively + Pursue the other, each the other fly + By this that's evermore pushed on, and this + By that continually preceded is: + The water still does into water swill, + Still the same brook, but different water still." + +There is more ado to interpret interpretations than to interpret things, +and more books upon books than upon any other subject; we do nothing but +comment upon one another. Every place swarms with commentaries; of +authors there is great scarcity. Is it not the principal and most +reputed knowledge of our later ages to understand the learned? Is it not +the common and final end of all studies? Our opinions are grafted upon +one another; the first serves as a stock to the second, the second to the +third, and so forth; thus step by step we climb the ladder; whence it +comes to pass that he who is mounted highest has often more honour than +merit, for he is got up but an inch upon the shoulders of the last, but +one. + +How often, and, peradventure, how foolishly, have I extended my book to +make it speak of itself; foolishly, if for no other reason but this, that +it should remind me of what I say of others who do the same: that the +frequent amorous glances they cast upon their work witness that their +hearts pant with self-love, and that even the disdainful severity +wherewith they scourge them are but the dandlings and caressings of +maternal love; as Aristotle, whose valuing and undervaluing himself often +spring from the same air of arrogance. My own excuse is, that I ought in +this to have more liberty than others, forasmuch as I write specifically +of myself and of my writings, as I do of my other actions; that my theme +turns upon itself; but I know not whether others will accept this excuse. + +I observed in Germany that Luther has left as many divisions and disputes +about the doubt of his opinions, and more, than he himself raised upon +the Holy Scriptures. Our contest is verbal: I ask what nature is, what +pleasure, circle, and substitution are? the question is about words, and +is answered accordingly. A stone is a body; but if a man should further +urge: "And what is a body?"--"Substance"; "And what is substance?" and +so on, he would drive the respondent to the end of his Calepin. + + [Calepin (Ambrogio da Calepio), a famous lexicographer of the + fifteenth century. His Polyglot Dictionary became so famous, that + Calepin became a common appellation for a lexicon] + +We exchange one word for another, and often for one less understood. +I better know what man is than I know what Animal is, or Mortal, or +Rational. To satisfy one doubt, they give me three; 'tis the Hydra's +head. Socrates asked Menon, "What virtue was." "There is," says Menon, +"the virtue of a man and of a woman, of a magistrate and of a private +person, of an old man and of a child." "Very fine," cried Socrates, +"we were in quest of one virtue, and thou hast brought us a whole +swarm." We put one question, and they return us a whole hive. As no +event, no face, entirely resembles another, so do they not entirely +differ: an ingenious mixture of nature. If our faces were not alike, we +could not distinguish man from beast; if they were not unlike, we could +not distinguish one man from another; all things hold by some similitude; +every example halts, and the relation which is drawn from experience is +always faulty and imperfect. Comparisons are ever-coupled at one end or +other: so do the laws serve, and are fitted to every one of our affairs, +by some wrested, biassed, and forced interpretation. + +Since the ethic laws, that concern the particular duty of every one in +himself, are so hard to be framed, as we see they are, 'tis no wonder if +those which govern so many particulars are much more so. Do but consider +the form of this justice that governs us; 'tis a true testimony of human +weakness, so full is it of error and contradiction. What we find to be +favour and severity in justice--and we find so much of them both, that I +know not whether the medium is as often met with are sickly and unjust +members of the very body and essence of justice. Some country people +have just brought me news in great haste, that they presently left in a +forest of mine a man with a hundred wounds upon him, who was yet +breathing, and begged of them water for pity's sake, and help to carry +him to some place of relief; they tell me they durst not go near him, but +have run away, lest the officers of justice should catch them there; and +as happens to those who are found near a murdered person, they should be +called in question about this accident, to their utter ruin, having +neither money nor friends to defend their innocence. What could I have +said to these people? 'Tis certain that this office of humanity would +have brought them into trouble. + +How many innocent people have we known that have been punished, and this +without the judge's fault; and how many that have not arrived at our +knowledge? This happened in my time: certain men were condemned to die +for a murder committed; their sentence, if not pronounced, at least +determined and concluded on. The judges, just in the nick, are informed +by the officers of an inferior court hard by, that they have some men in +custody, who have directly confessed the murder, and made an indubitable +discovery of all the particulars of the fact. Yet it was gravely +deliberated whether or not they ought to suspend the execution of the +sentence already passed upon the first accused: they considered the +novelty of the example judicially, and the consequence of reversing +judgments; that the sentence was passed, and the judges deprived of +repentance; and in the result, these poor devils were sacrificed by the +forms of justice. Philip, or some other, provided against a like +inconvenience after this manner. He had condemned a man in a great fine +towards another by an absolute judgment. The truth some time after being +discovered, he found that he had passed an unjust sentence. On one side +was the reason of the cause; on the other side, the reason of the +judicial forms: he in some sort satisfied both, leaving the sentence in +the state it was, and out of his own purse recompensing the condemned +party. But he had to do with a reparable affair; my men were irreparably +hanged. How many condemnations have I seen more criminal than the crimes +themselves? + +All which makes me remember the ancient opinions, "That 'tis of necessity +a man must do wrong by retail who will do right in gross; and injustice +in little things, who would come to do justice in great: that human +justice is formed after the model of physic, according to which, all that +is useful is also just and honest: and of what is held by the Stoics, +that Nature herself proceeds contrary to justice in most of her works: +and of what is received by the Cyrenaics, that there is nothing just of +itself, but that customs and laws make justice: and what the Theodorians +held that theft, sacrilege, and all sorts of uncleanness, are just in a +sage, if he knows them to be profitable to him." There is no remedy: I +am in the same case that Alcibiades was, that I will never, if I can help +it, put myself into the hands of a man who may determine as to my head, +where my life and honour shall more depend upon the skill and diligence +of my attorney than on my own innocence. I would venture myself with +such justice as would take notice of my good deeds, as well as my ill; +where I had as much to hope as to fear: indemnity is not sufficient pay +to a man who does better than not to do amiss. Our justice presents to +us but one hand, and that the left hand, too; let him be who he may, he +shall be sure to come off with loss. + +In China, of which kingdom the government and arts, without commerce with +or knowledge of ours, surpass our examples in several excellent features, +and of which the history teaches me how much greater and more various the +world is than either the ancients or we have been able to penetrate, the +officers deputed by the prince to visit the state of his provinces, as +they punish those who behave themselves ill in their charge, so do they +liberally reward those who have conducted themselves better than the +common sort, and beyond the necessity of their duty; these there present +themselves, not only to be approved but to get; not simply to be paid, +but to have a present made to them. + +No judge, thank God, has ever yet spoken to me in the quality of a judge, +upon any account whatever, whether my own or that of a third party, +whether criminal or civil; nor no prison has ever received me, not even +to walk there. Imagination renders the very outside of a jail +displeasing to me; I am so enamoured of liberty, that should I be +interdicted the access to some corner of the Indies, I should live a +little less at my ease; and whilst I can find earth or air open +elsewhere, I shall never lurk in any place where I must hide myself. +My God! how ill should I endure the condition wherein I see so many +people, nailed to a corner of the kingdom, deprived of the right to enter +the principal cities and courts, and the liberty of the public roads, +for having quarrelled with our laws. If those under which I live should +shake a finger at me by way of menace, I would immediately go seek out +others, let them be where they would. All my little prudence in the +civil wars wherein we are now engaged is employed that they may not +hinder my liberty of going and coming. + +Now, the laws keep up their credit, not for being just, but because they +are laws; 'tis the mystic foundation of their authority; they have no +other, and it well answers their purpose. They are often made by fools, +still oftener by men who, out of hatred to equality, fail in equity, but +always by men, vain and irresolute authors. There is nothing so much, +nor so grossly, nor so ordinarily faulty, as the laws. Whoever obeys +them because they are just, does not justly obey them as he ought. Our +French laws, by their irregularity and deformity, lend, in some sort, a +helping hand to the disorder and corruption that all manifest in their +dispensation and execution: the command is so perplexed and inconstant, +that it in some sort excuses alike disobedience and defect in the +interpretation, the administration and the observation of it. What fruit +then soever we may extract from experience, that will little advantage +our institution, which we draw from foreign examples, if we make so +little profit of that we have of our own, which is more familiar to us, +and, doubtless, sufficient to instruct us in that whereof we have need. +I study myself more than any other subject; 'tis my metaphysic, my +physic: + + "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...." + + + ["What god may govern with skill this dwelling of the world? whence + rises the monthly moon, whither wanes she? how is it that her horns + are contracted and reopen? whence do winds prevail on the main? + what does the east wind court with its blasts? and whence are the + clouds perpetually supplied with water? is a day to come which may + undermine the world?"--Propertius, iii. 5, 26.] + + "Quaerite, quos agitat mundi labor." + + ["Ask whom the cares of the world trouble"--Lucan, i. 417.] + +In this universality, I suffer myself to be ignorantly and negligently +led by the general law of the world: I shall know it well enough when I +feel it; my learning cannot make it alter its course; it will not change +itself for me; 'tis folly to hope it, and a greater folly to concern +one's self about it, seeing it is necessarily alike public and common. +The goodness and capacity of the governor ought absolutely to discharge +us of all care of the government: philosophical inquisitions and +contemplations serve for no other use but to increase our curiosity. +The philosophers; with great reason, send us back to the rules of nature; +but they have nothing to do with so sublime a knowledge; they falsify +them, and present us her face painted with too high and too adulterate a +complexion, whence spring so many different pictures of so uniform a +subject. As she has given us feet to walk with, so has she given us +prudence to guide us in life: not so ingenious, robust, and pompous a +prudence as that of their invention; but yet one that is easy, quiet, and +salutary, and that very well performs what the other promises, in him who +has the good luck to know how to employ it sincerely and regularly, that +is to say, according to nature. The most simply to commit one's self to +nature is to do it most wisely. Oh, what a soft, easy, and wholesome +pillow is ignorance and incuriosity, whereon to repose a well-ordered +head! + +I had rather understand myself well in myself, than in Cicero. Of the +experience I have of myself, I find enough to make me wise, if I were but +a good scholar: whoever will call to mind the excess of his past anger, +and to what a degree that fever transported him, will see the deformity +of this passion better than in Aristotle, and conceive a more just hatred +against it; whoever will remember the ills he has undergone, those that +have threatened him, and the light occasions that have removed him from +one state to another, will by that prepare himself for future changes, +and the knowledge of his condition. The life of Caesar has no greater +example for us than our own: though popular and of command, 'tis still a +life subject to all human accidents. Let us but listen to it; we apply +to ourselves all whereof we have principal need; whoever shall call to +memory how many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment, +is he not a great fool if he does not ever after suspect it? When I find +myself convinced, by the reason of another, of a false opinion, I do not +so much learn what he has said to me that is new and the particular +ignorance--that would be no great acquisition--as, in general, I learn my +own debility and the treachery of my understanding, whence I extract the +reformation of the whole mass. In all my other errors I do the same, and +find from this rule great utility to life; I regard not the species and +individual as a stone that I have stumbled at; I learn to suspect my +steps throughout, and am careful to place them right. To learn that a +man has said or done a foolish thing is nothing: a man must learn that he +is nothing but a fool, a much more ample, and important instruction. The +false steps that my memory has so often made, even then when it was most +secure and confident of itself, are not idly thrown away; it vainly +swears and assures me I shake my ears; the first opposition that is made +to its testimony puts me into suspense, and I durst not rely upon it in +anything of moment, nor warrant it in another person's concerns: and were +it not that what I do for want of memory, others do more often for want +of good faith, I should always, in matter of fact, rather choose to take +the truth from another's mouth than from my own. If every one would pry +into the effects and circumstances of the passions that sway him, as I +have done into those which I am most subject to, he would see them +coming, and would a little break their impetuosity and career; they do +not always seize us on a sudden; there is threatening and degrees + + "Fluctus uti primo coepit cum albescere vento, + Paulatim sese tollit mare, et altius undas + Erigit, inde imo consurgit ad aethera fundo." + + ["As with the first wind the sea begins to foam, and swells, thence + higher swells, and higher raises the waves, till the ocean rises + from its depths to the sky."--AEneid, vii. 528.] + +Judgment holds in me a magisterial seat; at least it carefully endeavours +to make it so: it leaves my appetites to take their own course, hatred +and friendship, nay, even that I bear to myself, without change or +corruption; if it cannot reform the other parts according to its own +model, at least it suffers not itself to be corrupted by them, but plays +its game apart. + +The advice to every one, "to know themselves," should be of important +effect, since that god of wisdom and light' caused it to be written on +the front of his temple,--[At Delphi]--as comprehending all he had to +advise us. Plato says also, that prudence is no other thing than the +execution of this ordinance; and Socrates minutely verifies it in +Xenophon. The difficulties and obscurity are not discerned in any +science but by those who are got into it; for a certain degree of +intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not, and we +must push against a door to know whether it be bolted against us or no: +whence this Platonic subtlety springs, that "neither they who know are to +enquire, forasmuch as they know; nor they who do not know, forasmuch as +to inquire they must know what they inquire of. So in this, "of knowing +a man's self," that every man is seen so resolved and satisfied with +himself, that every man thinks himself sufficiently intelligent, +signifies that every one knows nothing about the matter; as Socrates +gives Euthydemus to understand. I, who profess nothing else, therein +find so infinite a depth and variety, that all the fruit I have reaped +from my learning serves only to make me sensible how much I have to +learn. To my weakness, so often confessed, I owe the propension I have +to modesty, to the obedience of belief prescribed me, to a constant +coldness and moderation of opinions, and a hatred of that troublesome and +wrangling arrogance, wholly believing and trusting in itself, the capital +enemy of discipline and truth. Do but hear them domineer; the first +fopperies they utter, 'tis in the style wherewith men establish religions +and laws: + + "Nihil est turpius, quam cognitioni et perceptions + assertionem approbationemque praecurrere." + + ["Nothing is worse than that assertion and decision should precede + knowledge and perception."--Cicero, Acad., i. 13.] + +Aristarchus said that anciently there were scarce seven sages to be found +in the world, and in his time scarce so many fools: have not we more +reason than he to say so in this age of ours? Affirmation and obstinacy +are express signs of want of wit. This fellow may have knocked his nose +against the ground a hundred times in a day, yet he will be at his Ergo's +as resolute and sturdy as before. You would say he had had some new soul +and vigour of understanding infused into him since, and that it happened +to him, as to that ancient son of the earth, who took fresh courage and +vigour by his fall; + + "Cui cum tetigere parentem, + jam defecta vigent renovata robore membra:" + + ["Whose broken limbs, when they touched his mother earth, + immediately new force acquired."--Lucan, iv. 599.] + +does not this incorrigible coxcomb think that he assumes a new +understanding by undertaking a new dispute? 'Tis by my own experience +that I accuse human ignorance, which is, in my opinion, the surest part +of the world's school. Such as will not conclude it in themselves, by so +vain an example as mine, or their own, let them believe it from Socrates, +the master of masters; for the philosopher Antisthenes said to his +disciples, "Let us go and hear Socrates; there I will be a pupil with you"; +and, maintaining this doctrine of the Stoic sect, "that virtue was +sufficient to make a life completely happy, having no need of any other +thing whatever"; except of the force of Socrates, added he. + +That long attention that I employ in considering myself, also fits rile +to judge tolerably enough of others; and there are few things whereof I +speak better and with better excuse. I happen very often more exactly to +see and distinguish the qualities of my friends than they do themselves: +I have astonished some with the pertinence of my description, and have +given them warning of themselves. By having from my infancy been +accustomed to contemplate my own life in those of others, I have acquired +a complexion studious in that particular; and when I am once interit upon +it, I let few things about me, whether countenances, humours, +or discourses, that serve to that purpose, escape me. I study all, +both what I am to avoid and what I am to follow. Also in my friends, +I discover by their productions their inward inclinations; not by +arranging this infinite variety of so diverse and unconnected actions +into certain species and chapters, and distinctly distributing my parcels +and divisions under known heads and classes; + + "Sed neque quam multae species, nec nomina quae sint, + Est numerus." + + ["But neither can we enumerate how many kinds there what are their + names."--Virgil, Georg., ii. 103.] + +The wise speak and deliver their fancies more specifically, and piece by +piece; I, who see no further into things than as use informs me, present +mine generally without rule and experimentally: I pronounce my opinion by +disjointed articles, as a thing that cannot be spoken at once and in +gross; relation and conformity are not to be found in such low and common +souls as ours. Wisdom is a solid and entire building, of which every +piece keeps its place and bears its mark: + + "Sola sapientia in se tota conversa est." + + ["Wisdom only is wholly within itself"--Cicero, De Fin., iii. 7.] + +I leave it to artists, and I know not whether or no they will be able to +bring it about, in so perplexed, minute, and fortuitous a thing, to +marshal into distinct bodies this infinite diversity of faces, to settle +our inconstancy, and set it in order. I do not only find it hard to +piece our actions to one another, but I moreover find it hard properly to +design each by itself by any principal quality, so ambiguous and variform +they are with diverse lights. That which is remarked for rare in +Perseus, king of Macedon, "that his mind, fixing itself to no one +condition, wandered in all sorts of living, and represented manners so +wild and erratic that it was neither known to himself or any other what +kind of man he was," seems almost to fit all the world; and, especially, +I have seen another of his make, to whom I think this conclusion might +more properly be applied; no moderate settledness, still running headlong +from one extreme to another, upon occasions not to be guessed at; no line +of path without traverse and wonderful contrariety: no one quality simple +and unmixed; so that the best guess men can one day make will be, that he +affected and studied to make himself known by being not to be known. A +man had need have sound ears to hear himself frankly criticised; and as +there are few who can endure to hear it without being nettled, those who +hazard the undertaking it to us manifest a singular effect of friendship; +for 'tis to love sincerely indeed, to venture to wound and offend us, for +our own good. I think it harsh to judge a man whose ill qualities are +more than his good ones: Plato requires three things in him who will +examine the soul of another: knowledge, benevolence, boldness. + +I was sometimes asked, what I should have thought myself fit for, had any +one designed to make use of me, while I was of suitable years: + + "Dum melior vires sanguis dabat, aemula necdum + Temporibus geminis canebat sparsa senectus:" + + ["Whilst better blood gave me vigour, and before envious old age + whitened and thinned my temples."--AEneid, V. 415.] + +"for nothing," said I; and I willingly excuse myself from knowing +anything which enslaves me to others. But I had told the truth to my +master,--[Was this Henri VI.? D.W.]--and had regulated his manners, if +he had so pleased, not in gross, by scholastic lessons, which I +understand not, and from which I see no true reformation spring in those +that do; but by observing them by leisure, at all opportunities, and +simply and naturally judging them as an eye-witness, distinctly one by +one; giving him to understand upon what terms he was in the common +opinion, in opposition to his flatterers. There is none of us who would +not be worse than kings, if so continually corrupted as they are with +that sort of canaille. How, if Alexander, that great king and +philosopher, cannot defend himself from them! + +I should have had fidelity, judgment, and freedom enough for that +purpose. It would be a nameless office, otherwise it would lose its +grace and its effect; and 'tis a part that is not indifferently fit for +all men; for truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times +and indiscriminately; its use, noble as it is, has its circumspections +and limits. It often falls out, as the world goes, that a man lets it +slip into the ear of a prince, not only to no purpose, but moreover +injuriously and unjustly; and no man shall make me believe that a +virtuous remonstrance may not be viciously applied, and that the interest +of the substance is not often to give way to that of the form. + +For such a purpose, I would have a man who is content with his own +fortune: + + "Quod sit, esse velit, nihilque malit," + + ["Who is pleased with what he is and desires nothing further." + --Martial, x. ii, 18.] + +and of moderate station; forasmuch as, on the one hand, he would not be +afraid to touch his master's heart to the quick, for fear by that means +of losing his preferment: and, on the other hand, being of no high +quality, he would have more easy communication with all sorts of people. +I would have this office limited to only one person; for to allow the +privilege of his liberty and privacy to many, would beget an inconvenient +irreverence; and of that one, I would above all things require the +fidelity of silence. + +A king is not to be believed when he brags of his constancy in standing +the shock of the enemy for his glory, if for his profit and amendment he +cannot stand the liberty of a friend's advice, which has no other power +but to pinch his ear, the remainder of its effect being still in his own +hands. Now, there is no condition of men whatever who stand in so great +need of true and free advice and warning, as they do: they sustain a +public life, and have to satisfy the opinion of so many spectators, that, +as those about them conceal from them whatever should divert them from +their own way, they insensibly find themselves involved in the hatred and +detestation of their people, often upon occasions which they might have +avoided without any prejudice even of their pleasures themselves, had +they been advised and set right in time. Their favourites commonly have +more regard to themselves than to their master; and indeed it answers +with them, forasmuch as, in truth, most offices of real friendship, when +applied to the sovereign, are under a rude and dangerous hazard, so that +therein there is great need, not only of very great affection and +freedom, but of courage too. + +In fine, all this hodge-podge which I scribble here, is nothing but a +register of the essays of my own life, which, for the internal soundness, +is exemplary enough to take instruction against the grain; but as to +bodily health, no man can furnish out more profitable experience than I, +who present it pure, and no way corrupted and changed by art or opinion. +Experience is properly upon its own dunghill in the subject of physic, +where reason wholly gives it place: Tiberius said that whoever had lived +twenty years ought to be responsible to himself for all things that were +hurtful or wholesome to him, and know how to order himself without +physic; + + [All that Suetonius says in his Life of Tiberius is that this + emperor, after he was thirty years old, governed his health without + the aid of physicians; and what Plutarch tells us, in his essay on + the Rules and Precepts of Health, is that Tiberius said that the man + who, having attained sixty years, held out his pulse to a physician + was a fool.] + +and he might have learned it of Socrates, who, advising his disciples to +be solicitous of their health as a chief study, added that it was hard if +a man of sense, having a care to his exercise and diet, did not better +know than any physician what was good or ill for him. And physic itself +professes always to have experience for the test of its operations: so +Plato had reason to say that, to be a right physician, it would be +necessary that he who would become such, should first himself have passed +through all the diseases he pretends to cure, and through all the +accidents and circumstances whereof he is to judge. 'Tis but reason they +should get the pox, if they will know how to cure it; for my part, +I should put myself into such hands; the others but guide us, like him +who paints seas and rocks and ports sitting at table, and there makes the +model of a ship sailing in all security; but put him to the work itself, +he knows not at which end to begin. They make such a description of our +maladies as a town crier does of a lost horse or dog--such a color, such +a height, such an ear--but bring it to him and he knows it not, for all +that. If physic should one day give me some good and visible relief, +then truly I will cry out in good earnest: + + "Tandem effcaci do manus scientiae." + + ["Show me and efficacious science, and I will take it by the hand." + --Horace, xvii. I.] + +The arts that promise to keep our bodies and souls in health promise a +great deal; but, withal, there are none that less keep their promise. +And, in our time, those who make profession of these arts amongst us, +less manifest the effects than any other sort of men; one may say of +them, at the most, that they sell medicinal drugs; but that they are +physicians, a man cannot say. + + [The edition of 1588 adds: "Judging by themselves, and those + who are ruled by them."] + +I have lived long enough to be able to give an account of the custom that +has carried me so far; for him who has a mind to try it, as his taster, +I have made the experiment. Here are some of the articles, as my memory +shall supply me with them; I have no custom that has not varied according +to circumstances; but I only record those that I have been best +acquainted with, and that hitherto have had the greatest possession of +me. + +My form of life is the same in sickness as in health; the same bed, the +same hours, the same meat, and even the same drink, serve me in both +conditions alike; I add nothing to them but the moderation of more or +less, according to my strength and appetite. My health is to maintain my +wonted state without disturbance. I see that sickness puts me off it on +one side, and if I will be ruled by the physicians, they will put me off +on the other; so that by fortune and by art I am out of my way. +I believe nothing more certainly than this, that I cannot be hurt by the +use of things to which I have been so long accustomed. 'Tis for custom +to give a form to a man's life, such as it pleases him; she is all in all +in that: 'tis the potion of Circe, that varies our nature as she best +pleases. How many nations, and but three steps from us, think the fear +of the night-dew, that so manifestly is hurtful to us, a ridiculous +fancy; and our own watermen and peasants laugh at it. You make a German +sick if you lay him upon a mattress, as you do an Italian if you lay him +on a feather-bed, and a Frenchman, if without curtains or fire. A Spanish +stomach cannot hold out to eat as we can, nor ours to drink like the +Swiss. A German made me very merry at Augsburg, by finding fault with +our hearths, by the same arguments which we commonly make use of in +decrying their stoves: for, to say the truth, the smothered heat, and +then the smell of that heated matter of which the fire is composed, very +much offend such as are not used to them; not me; and, indeed, the heat +being always equal, constant, and universal, without flame, without +smoke, and without the wind that comes down our chimneys, they may many +ways sustain comparison with ours. Why do we not imitate the Roman +architecture? for they say that anciently fires were not made in the +houses, but on the outside, and at the foot of them, whence the heat was +conveyed to the whole fabric by pipes contrived in the wall, which were +drawn twining about the rooms that were to be warmed: which I have seen +plainly described somewhere in Seneca. This German hearing me commend +the conveniences and beauties of his city, which truly deserves it, began +to compassionate me that I had to leave it; and the first inconvenience +he alleged to me was, the heaviness of head that the chimneys elsewhere +would bring upon me. He had heard some one make this complaint, and +fixed it upon us, being by custom deprived of the means of perceiving it +at home. All heat that comes from the fire weakens and dulls me. Evenus +said that fire was the best condiment of life: I rather choose any other +way of making myself warm. + +We are afraid to drink our wines, when toward the bottom of the cask; in +Portugal those fumes are reputed delicious, and it is the beverage of +princes. In short, every nation has many customs and usages that are not +only unknown to other nations, but savage and miraculous in their sight. +What should we do with those people who admit of no evidence that is not +in print, who believe not men if they are not in a book, nor truth if it +be not of competent age? we dignify our fopperies when we commit them to +the press: 'tis of a great deal more weight to say, "I have read such a +thing," than if you only say, "I have heard such a thing." But I, who no +more disbelieve a man's mouth than his pen, and who know that men write +as indiscreetly as they speak, and who look upon this age as one that is +past, as soon quote a friend as Aulus Gelliusor Macrobius; and what I +have seen, as what they have written. And, as 'tis held of virtue, that +it is not greater for having continued longer, so do I hold of truth, +that for being older it is none the wiser. I often say, that it is mere +folly that makes us run after foreign and scholastic examples; their +fertility is the same now that it was in the time of Homer and Plato. +But is it not that we seek more honour from the quotation, than from the +truth of the matter in hand? As if it were more to the purpose to borrow +our proofs from the shops of Vascosan or Plantin, than from what is to be +seen in our own village; or else, indeed, that we have not the wit to +cull out and make useful what we see before us, and to judge of it +clearly enough to draw it into example: for if we say that we want +authority to give faith to our testimony, we speak from the purpose; +forasmuch as, in my opinion, of the most ordinary, common, and known +things, could we but find out their light, the greatest miracles of +nature might be formed, and the most wonderful examples, especially upon +the subject of human actions. + +Now, upon this subject, setting aside the examples I have gathered from +books, and what Aristotle says of Andron the Argian, that he travelled +over the arid sands of Lybia without drinking: a gentleman, who has very +well behaved himself in several employments, said, in a place where I +was, that he had ridden from Madrid to Lisbon, in the heat of summer, +without any drink at all. He is very healthful and vigorous for his age, +and has nothing extraordinary in the use of his life, but this, to live +sometimes two or three months, nay, a whole year, as he has told me, +without drinking. He is sometimes thirsty, but he lets it pass over, +and he holds that it is an appetite which easily goes off of itself; +and he drinks more out of caprice than either for need or pleasure. + +Here is another example: 'tis not long ago that I found one of the +learnedest men in France, among those of not inconsiderable fortune, +studying in a corner of a hall that they had separated for him with +tapestry, and about him a rabble of his servants full of licence. He +told me, and Seneca almost says the same of himself, he made an +advantage of this hubbub; that, beaten with this noise, he so much +the more collected and retired himself into himself for contemplation, +and that this tempest of voices drove back his thoughts within himself. +Being a student at Padua, he had his study so long situated amid the +rattle of coaches and the tumult of the square, that he not only formed +himself to the contempt, but even to the use of noise, for the service of +his studies. Socrates answered Alcibiades, who was astonished how he +could endure the perpetual scolding of his wife, "Why," said he, "as +those do who are accustomed to the ordinary noise of wheels drawing +water." I am quite otherwise; I have a tender head and easily +discomposed; when 'tis bent upon anything, the least buzzing of a fly +murders it. + +Seneca in his youth having warmly espoused the example of Sextius, of +eating nothing that had died, for a whole year dispensed with such food, +and, as he said, with pleasure, and discontinued it that he might not be +suspected of taking up this rule from some new religion by which it was +prescribed: he adopted, in like manner, from the precepts of Attalus a +custom not to lie upon any sort of bedding that gave way under his +weight, and, even to his old age, made use of such as would not yield to +any pressure. What the usage of his time made him account roughness, +that of ours makes us look upon as effeminacy. + +Do but observe the difference betwixt the way of living of my labourers +and my own; the Scythians and Indians have nothing more remote both from +my capacity and my form. I have picked up charity boys to serve me: who +soon after have quitted both my kitchen and livery, only that they might +return to their former course of life; and I found one afterwards, +picking mussels out of the sewer for his dinner, whom I could neither by +entreaties nor threats reclaim from the sweetness he found in indigence. +Beggars have their magnificences and delights, as well as the rich, and, +'tis said, their dignities and polities. These are the effects of +custom; she can mould us, not only into what form she pleases (the sages +say we ought to apply ourselves to the best, which she will soon make +easy to us), but also to change and variation, which is the most noble +and most useful instruction of all she teaches us. The best of my bodily +conditions is that I am flexible and not very obstinate: I have +inclinations more my own and ordinary, and more agreeable than others; +but I am diverted from them with very little ado, and easily slip into a +contrary course. A young man ought to cross his own rules, to awaken his +vigour and to keep it from growing faint and rusty; and there is no +course of life so weak and sottish as that which is carried on by rule +and discipline; + + "Ad primum lapidem vectari quum placet, hora + Sumitur ex libro; si prurit frictus ocelli + Angulus, inspecta genesi, collyria quaerit;" + + ["When he is pleased to have himself carried to the first milestone, + the hour is chosen from the almanac; if he but rub the corner of his + eye, his horoscope having been examined, he seeks the aid of + salves."---Juvenal, vi. 576.] + +he shall often throw himself even into excesses, if he will take my +advice; otherwise the least debauch will destroy him, and render him +troublesome and disagreeable in company. The worst quality in a well- +bred man is over-fastidiousness, and an obligation to a certain +particular way; and it is particular, if not pliable and supple. It is a +kind of reproach, not to be able, or not to dare, to do what we see those +about us do; let such as these stop at home. It is in every man +unbecoming, but in a soldier vicious and intolerable: who, as Philopcemen +said, ought to accustom himself to every variety and inequality of life. + +Though I have been brought up, as much as was possible, to liberty and +independence, yet so it is that, growing old, and having by indifference +more settled upon certain forms (my age is now past instruction, and has +henceforward nothing to do but to keep itself up as well as it can), +custom has already, ere I was aware, so imprinted its character in me in +certain things, that I look upon it as a kind of excess to leave them +off; and, without a force upon myself, cannot sleep in the daytime, nor +eat between meals, nor breakfast, nor go to bed, without a great interval +betwixt eating and sleeping,--[Gastroesophogeal Reflux. D.W.]--as of +three hours after supper; nor get children but before I sleep, nor get +them standing; nor endure my own sweat; nor quench my thirst either with +pure water or pure wine; nor keep my head long bare, nor cut my hair +after dinner; and I should be as uneasy without my gloves as without my +shirt, or without washing when I rise from table or out of my bed; and I +could not lie without a canopy and curtains, as if they were essential +things. I could dine without a tablecloth, but without a clean napkin, +after the German fashion, very incommodiously; I foul them more than the +Germans or Italians do, and make but little use either of spoon or fork. +I complain that they did not keep up the fashion, begun after the example +of kings, to change our napkin at every service, as they do our plate. +We are told of that laborious soldier Marius that, growing old, he became +nice in his drink, and never drank but out of a particular cup of his own +I, in like manner, have suffered myself to fancy a certain form of +glasses, and not willingly to drink in common glasses, no more than from +a strange common hand: all metal offends me in comparison of a clear and +transparent matter: let my eyes taste, too, according to their capacity. +I owe several other such niceties to custom. Nature has also, on the +other side, helped me to some of hers: as not to be able to endure more +than two full meals in one day, without overcharging my stomach, nor a +total abstinence from one of those meals without filling myself with +wind, drying up my mouth, and dulling my appetite; the finding great +inconvenience from overmuch evening air; for of late years, in night +marches, which often happen to be all night long, after five or six hours +my stomach begins to be queasy, with a violent pain in my head, so that I +always vomit before the day can break. When the others go to breakfast, +I go to sleep; and when I rise, I am as brisk and gay as before. I had +always been told that the night dew never rises but in the beginning of +the night; but for some years past, long and familiar intercourse with +a lord, possessed with the opinion that the night dew is more sharp and +dangerous about the declining of the sun, an hour or two before it sets, +which he carefully avoids, and despises that of the night, he almost +impressed upon me, not so much his reasoning as his experiences. What, +shall mere doubt and inquiry strike our imagination, so as to change us? +Such as absolutely and on a sudden give way to these propensions, draw +total destruction upon themselves. I am sorry for several gentlemen who, +through the folly of their physicians, have in their youth and health +wholly shut themselves up: it were better to endure a cough, than, by +disuse, for ever to lose the commerce of common life in things of so +great utility. Malignant science, to interdict us the most pleasant +hours of the day! Let us keep our possession to the last; for the most +part, a man hardens himself by being obstinate, and corrects his +constitution, as Caesar did the falling sickness, by dint of contempt. +A man should addict himself to the best rules, but not enslave himself to +them, except to such, if there be any such, where obligation and +servitude are of profit. + +Both kings and philosophers go to stool, and ladies too; public lives are +bound to ceremony; mine, that is obscure and private, enjoys all natural +dispensation; soldier and Gascon are also qualities a little subject to +indiscretion; wherefore I shall say of this act of relieving nature, that +it is desirable to refer it to certain prescribed and nocturnal hours, +and compel one's self to this by custom, as I have done; but not to +subject one's self, as I have done in my declining years, to a particular +convenience of place and seat for that purpose, and make it troublesome +by long sitting; and yet, in the fouler offices, is it not in some +measure excusable to require more care and cleanliness? + + "Naturt homo mundum et elegans animal est." + + ["Man is by nature a clean and delicate creature."--Seneca, Ep., 92.] + +Of all the actions of nature, I am the most impatient of being +interrupted in that. I have seen many soldiers troubled with the +unruliness of their bellies; whereas mine and I never fail of our +punctual assignation, which is at leaping out of bed, if some +indispensable business or sickness does not molest us. + +I think then, as I said before, that sick men cannot better place +themselves anywhere in more safety, than in sitting still in that course +of life wherein they have been bred and trained up; change, be it what it +will, distempers and puts one out. Do you believe that chestnuts can +hurt a Perigordin or a Lucchese, or milk and cheese the mountain people? +We enjoin them not only a new, but a contrary, method of life; a change +that the healthful cannot endure. Prescribe water to a Breton of +threescore and ten; shut a seaman up in a stove; forbid a Basque footman +to walk: you will deprive them of motion, and in the end of air and +light: + + "An vivere tanti est? + Cogimur a suetis animum suspendere rebus, + Atque, ut vivamus, vivere desinimus. . + Hos superesse reor, quibus et spirabilis aer + Et lux, qua regimur, redditur ipsa gravis." + + ["Is life worth so much? We are compelled to withhold the mind + from things to which we are accustomed; and, that we may live, we + cease to live . . . . Do I conceive that they still live, to + whom the respirable air, and the light itself, by which we are + governed, is rendered oppressive?" + --Pseudo-Gallus, Eclog., i. 155, 247.] + +If they do no other good, they do this at least, that they prepare +patients betimes for death, by little and little undermining and cutting +off the use of life. + +Both well and sick, I have ever willingly suffered myself to obey the +appetites that pressed upon me. I give great rein to my desires and +propensities; I do not love to cure one disease by another; I hate +remedies that are more troublesome than the disease itself. To be +subject to the colic and subject to abstain from eating oysters are two +evils instead of one; the disease torments us on the one side, and the +remedy on the other. Since we are ever in danger of mistaking, let us +rather run the hazard of a mistake, after we have had the pleasure. The +world proceeds quite the other way, and thinks nothing profitable that is +not painful; it has great suspicion of facility. My appetite, in various +things, has of its own accord happily enough accommodated itself to the +health of my stomach. Relish and pungency in sauces were pleasant to me +when young; my stomach disliking them since, my taste incontinently +followed. Wine is hurtful to sick people, and 'tis the first thing that +my mouth then finds distasteful, and with an invincible dislike. +Whatever I take against my liking does me harm; and nothing hurts me that +I eat with appetite and delight. I never received harm by any action +that was very pleasant to me; and accordingly have made all medicinal +conclusions largely give way to my pleasure; and I have, when I was +young, + + "Quem circumcursans huc atque huc saepe Cupido + Fulgebat crocink splendidus in tunic." + + ["When Cupid, fluttering round me here and there, shone in his rich + purple mantle."--Catullus, lxvi. 133.] + +given myself the rein as licentiously and inconsiderately to the desire +that was predominant in me, as any other whomsoever: + + "Et militavi non sine gloria;" + + ["And I have played the soldier not ingloriously." + --Horace, Od., iii. 26, 2.] + +yet more in continuation and holding out, than in sally: + + "Sex me vix memini sustinuisse vices." + + ["I can scarcely remember six bouts in one night" + --Ovid, Amor., iii. 7, 26.] + +'Tis certainly a misfortune and a miracle at once to confess at what a +tender age I first came under the subjection of love: it was, indeed, by +chance; for it was long before the years of choice or knowledge; I do not +remember myself so far back; and my fortune may well be coupled with that +of Quartilla, who could not remember when she was a maid: + + "Inde tragus, celeresque pili, mirandaque matri + Barba meae." + + ["Thence the odour of the arm-pits, the precocious hair, and the + beard which astonished my mother."--Martial, xi. 22, 7.] + +Physicians modify their rules according to the violent longings that +happen to sick persons, ordinarily with good success; this great desire +cannot be imagined so strange and vicious, but that nature must have a +hand in it. And then how easy a thing is it to satisfy the fancy? In my +opinion; this part wholly carries it, at least, above all the rest. The +most grievous and ordinary evils are those that fancy loads us with; this +Spanish saying pleases me in several aspects: + + "Defenda me Dios de me." + + ["God defend me from myself."] + +I am sorry when I am sick, that I have not some longing that might give +me the pleasure of satisfying it; all the rules of physic would hardly be +able to divert me from it. I do the same when I am well; I can see very +little more to be hoped or wished for. 'Twere pity a man should be so +weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him. + +The art of physic is not so fixed, that we need be without authority for +whatever we do; it changes according to climates and moons, according to +Fernel and to Scaliger.--[Physicians to Henry II.]--If your physician +does not think it good for you to sleep, to drink wine, or to eat such +and such meats, never trouble yourself; I will find you another that +shall not be of his opinion; the diversity of medical arguments and +opinions embraces all sorts and forms. I saw a miserable sick person +panting and burning for thirst, that he might be cured, who was +afterwards laughed at for his pains by another physician, who condemned +that advice as prejudicial to him: had he not tormented himself to good +purpose? There lately died of the stone a man of that profession, who +had made use of extreme abstinence to contend with his disease: his +fellow-physicians say that, on the contrary, this abstinence had dried +him up and baked the gravel in his kidneys. + +I have observed, that both in wounds and sicknesses, speaking discomposes +and hurts me, as much as any irregularity I can commit. My voice pains +and tires me, for 'tis loud and forced; so that when I have gone to a +whisper some great persons about affairs of consequence, they have often +desired me to moderate my voice. + +This story is worth a diversion. Some one in a certain Greek school +speaking loud as I do, the master of the ceremonies sent to him to speak +softly: "Tell him, then, he must send me," replied the other, "the tone +he would have me speak in." To which the other replied, "That he should +take the tone from the ears of him to whom he spake." It was well said, +if it is to be understood: "Speak according to the affair you are +speaking about to your auditor," for if it mean, "'tis sufficient that he +hear you, or govern yourself by him," I do not find it to be reason. The +tone and motion of my voice carries with it a great deal of the +expression and signification of my meaning, and 'tis I who am to govern +it, to make myself understood: there is a voice to instruct, a voice to +flatter, and a voice to reprehend. I will not only that my voice reach +him, but, peradventure, that it strike and pierce him. When I rate my +valet with sharp and bitter language, it would be very pretty for him to +say; "Pray, master, speak lower; I hear you very well": + + "Est quaedam vox ad auditum accommodata, + non magnitudine, sed proprietate." + + ["There is a certain voice accommodated to the hearing, not by its + loudness, but by its propriety."--Quintilian, xi. 3.] + +Speaking is half his who speaks, and half his who hears; the latter ought +to prepare himself to receive it, according to its bias; as with tennis- +players, he who receives the ball, shifts and prepares, according as he +sees him move who strikes the stroke, and according to the stroke itself. + +Experience has, moreover, taught me this, that we ruin ourselves by +impatience. Evils have their life and limits, their diseases and their +recovery. + +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. I am of Crantor's opinion, that we are +neither obstinately and deafly to oppose evils, nor succumb to them from +want of courage; but that we are naturally to give way to them, according +to their condition and our own. We ought to grant free passage to +diseases; I find they stay less with me, who let them alone; and I have +lost some, reputed the most tenacious and obstinate, by their own decay, +without help and without art, and contrary to its rules. Let us a little +permit Nature to take her own way; she better understands her own affairs +than we. But such an one died of it; and so shall you: if not of that +disease, of another. And how many have not escaped dying, who have had +three physicians at their tails? Example is a vague and universal +mirror, and of various reflections. If it be a delicious medicine, take +it: 'tis always so much present good. I will never stick at the name nor +the colour, if it be pleasant and grateful to the palate: pleasure is one +of the chiefest kinds of profit. I have suffered colds, gouty +defluxions, relaxations, palpitations of the heart, megrims, and other +accidents, to grow old and die in time a natural death. I have so lost +them when I was half fit to keep them: they are sooner prevailed upon by +courtesy than huffing. We must patiently suffer the laws of our +condition; we are born to grow old, to grow weak, and to be sick, in +despite of all medicine. 'Tis the first lesson the Mexicans teach their +children; so soon as ever they are born they thus salute them: "Thou art +come into the world, child, to endure: endure, suffer, and say nothing." +'Tis injustice to lament that which has befallen any one which may befall +every one: + + "Indignare, si quid in to inique proprio constitutum est." + + ["Then be angry, when there is anything unjustly decreed against + thee alone."--Seneca, Ep., 91.] + +See an old man who begs of God that he will maintain his health vigorous +and entire; that is to say, that he restore him to youth: + + "Stulte, quid haec frustra votis puerilibus optas?" + + ["Fool! why do you vainly form these puerile wishes?" + --Ovid., Trist., 111. 8, II.] + +is it not folly? his condition is not capable of it. The gout, the +stone, and indigestion are symptoms of long years; as heat, rains, and +winds are of long journeys. Plato does not believe that AEsculapius +troubled himself to provide by regimen to prolong life in a weak and +wasted body, useless to his country and to his profession, or to beget +healthful and robust children; and does not think this care suitable to +the Divine justice and prudence, which is to direct all things to +utility. My good friend, your business is done; nobody can restore you; +they can, at the most, but patch you up, and prop you a little, and by +that means prolong your misery an hour or two: + + "Non secus instantem cupiens fulcire ruinam, + Diversis contra nititur obiicibus; + Donec certa dies, omni compage soluta, + Ipsum cum rebus subruat auxilium." + + ["Like one who, desiring to stay an impending ruin, places various + props against it, till, in a short time, the house, the props, and + all, giving way, fall together."--Pseudo-Gallus, i. 171.] + +We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade; our life, like the harmony +of the world, is composed of contrary things--of diverse tones, sweet and +harsh, sharp and flat, sprightly and solemn: the musician who should only +affect some of these, what would he be able to do? he must know how to +make use of them all, and to mix them; and so we should mingle the goods +and evils which are consubstantial with our life; our being cannot +subsist without this mixture, and the one part is no less necessary to it +than the other. To attempt to combat natural necessity, is to represent +the folly of Ctesiphon, who undertook to kick with his mule.--[Plutarch, +How to restrain Anger, c. 8.] + +I consult little about the alterations I feel: for these doctors take +advantage; when they have you at their mercy, they surfeit your ears with +their prognostics; and formerly surprising me, weakened with sickness, +injuriously handled me with their dogmas and magisterial fopperies--one +while menacing me with great pains, and another with approaching death. +Hereby I was indeed moved and shaken, but not subdued nor jostled from my +place; and though my judgment was neither altered nor distracted, yet it +was at least disturbed: 'tis always agitation and combat. + +Now, I use my imagination as gently as I can, and would discharge it, if +I could, of all trouble and contest; a man must assist, flatter, and +deceive it, if he can; my mind is fit for that office; it needs no +appearances throughout: could it persuade as it preaches, it would +successfully relieve me. Will you have an example? It tells me: "that +'tis for my good to have the stone: that the structure of my age must +naturally suffer some decay, and it is now time it should begin to +disjoin and to confess a breach; 'tis a common necessity, and there is +nothing in it either miraculous or new; I therein pay what is due to old +age, and I cannot expect a better bargain; that society ought to comfort +me, being fallen into the most common infirmity of my age; I see +everywhere men tormented with the same disease, and am honoured by the +fellowship, forasmuch as men of the best quality are most frequently +afflicted with it: 'tis a noble and dignified disease: that of such as +are struck with it, few have it to a less degree of pain; that these are +put to the trouble of a strict diet and the daily taking of nauseous +potions, whereas I owe my better state purely to my good fortune; for +some ordinary broths of eringo or burst-wort that I have twice or thrice +taken to oblige the ladies, who, with greater kindness than my pain was +sharp, would needs present me half of theirs, seemed to me equally easy +to take and fruitless in operation, the others have to pay a thousand +vows to AEsculapius, and as many crowns to their physicians, for the +voiding a little gravel, which I often do by the aid of nature: even the +decorum of my countenance is not disturbed in company; and I can hold my +water ten hours, and as long as any man in health. The fear of this +disease," says my mind, "formerly affrighted thee, when it was unknown to +thee; the cries and despairing groans of those who make it worse by their +impatience, begot a horror in thee. 'Tis an infirmity that punishes the +members by which thou hast most offended. Thou art a conscientious +fellow;" + + "Quae venit indigne poena, dolenda venit:" + + ["We are entitled to complain of a punishment that we have not + deserved."--Ovid, Heroid., v. 8.] + +"consider this chastisement: 'tis very easy in comparison of others, and +inflicted with a paternal tenderness: do but observe how late it comes; +it only seizes on and incommodes that part of thy life which is, one way +and another, sterile and lost; having, as it were by composition, given +time for the licence and pleasures of thy youth. The fear and the +compassion that the people have of this disease serve thee for matter of +glory; a quality whereof if thou bast thy judgment purified, and that thy +reason has somewhat cured it, thy friends notwithstanding, discern some +tincture in thy complexion. 'Tis a pleasure to hear it said of oneself +what strength of mind, what patience! Thou art seen to sweat with pain, +to turn pale and red, to tremble, to vomit blood, to suffer strange +contractions and convulsions, at times to let great tears drop from thine +eyes, to urine thick, black, and dreadful water, or to have it suppressed +by some sharp and craggy stone, that cruelly pricks and tears the neck of +the bladder, whilst all the while thou entertainest the company with an +ordinary countenance; droning by fits with thy people; making one in a +continuous discourse, now and then making excuse for thy pain, and +representing thy suffering less than it is. Dost thou call to mind the +men of past times, who so greedily sought diseases to keep their virtue +in breath and exercise? Put the case that nature sets thee on and impels +thee to this glorious school, into which thou wouldst never have entered +of thy own free will. If thou tellest me that it is a dangerous and +mortal disease, what others are not so? for 'tis a physical cheat to +expect any that they say do not go direct to death: what matters if they +go thither by accident, or if they easily slide and slip into the path +that leads us to it? But thou dost not die because thou art sick; thou +diest because thou art living: death kills thee without the help of +sickness: and sickness has deferred death in some, who have lived longer +by reason that they thought themselves always dying; to which may be +added, that as in wounds, so in diseases, some are medicinal and +wholesome. The stone is often no less long-lived than you; we see men +with whom it has continued from their infancy even to their extreme old +age; and if they had not broken company, it would have been with them +longer still; you more often kill it than it kills you. And though it +should present to you the image of approaching death, were it not a good +office to a man of such an age, to put him in mind of his end? And, +which is worse, thou hast no longer anything that should make thee desire +to be cured. Whether or no, common necessity will soon call thee away. +Do but consider how skilfully and gently she puts thee out of concern +with life, and weans thee from the world; not forcing thee with a +tyrannical subjection, like so many other infirmities which thou seest +old men afflicted withal, that hold them in continual torment, and keep +them in perpetual and unintermitted weakness and pains, but by warnings +and instructions at intervals, intermixing long pauses of repose, as it +were to give thee opportunity to meditate and ruminate upon thy lesson, +at thy own ease and leisure. To give thee means to judge aright, and to +assume the resolution of a man of courage, it presents to thee the state +of thy entire condition, both in good and evil; and one while a very +cheerful and another an insupportable life, in one and the same day. If +thou embracest not death, at least thou shakest hands with it once a +month; whence thou hast more cause to hope that it will one day surprise +thee without menace; and that being so often conducted to the water-side, +but still thinking thyself to be upon the accustomed terms, thou and thy +confidence will at one time or another be unexpectedly wafted over. A +man cannot reasonably complain of diseases that fairly divide the time +with health." + +I am obliged to Fortune for having so often assaulted me with the same +sort of weapons: she forms and fashions me by use, hardens and habituates +me, so that I can know within a little for how much I shall be quit. For +want of natural memory, I make one of paper; and as any new symptom +happens in my disease, I set it down, whence it falls out that, having +now almost passed through all sorts of examples, if anything striking +threatens me, turning over these little loose notes, as the Sybilline +leaves, I never fail of finding matter of consolation from some +favourable prognostic in my past experience. Custom also makes me hope +better for the time to come; for, the conduct of this clearing out having +so long continued, 'tis to be believed that nature will not alter her +course, and that no other worse accident will happen than what I already +feel. And besides, the condition of this disease is not unsuitable to my +prompt and sudden complexion: when it assaults me gently, I am afraid, +for 'tis then for a great while; but it has, naturally, brisk and +vigorous excesses; it claws me to purpose for a day or two. My kidneys +held out an age without alteration; and I have almost now lived another, +since they changed their state; evils have their periods, as well as +benefits: peradventure, the infirmity draws towards an end. Age weakens +the heat of my stomach, and, its digestion being less perfect, sends this +crude matter to my kidneys; why, at a certain revolution, may not the +heat of my kidneys be also abated, so that they can no more petrify my +phlegm, and nature find out some other way of purgation. Years have +evidently helped me to drain certain rheums; and why not these excrements +which furnish matter for gravel? But is there anything delightful in +comparison of this sudden change, when from an excessive pain, I come, by +the voiding of a stone, to recover, as by a flash of lightning, the +beautiful light of health, so free and full, as it happens in our sudden +and sharpest colics? Is there anything in the pain suffered, that one +can counterpoise to the pleasure of so sudden an amendment? Oh, how much +does health seem the more pleasant to me, after a sickness so near and so +contiguous, that I can distinguish them in the presence of one another, +in their greatest show; when they appear in emulation, as if to make head +against and dispute it with one another! As the Stoics say that vices +are profitably introduced to give value to and to set off virtue, we can, +with better reason and less temerity of conjecture, say that nature has +given us pain for the honour and service of pleasure and indolence. When +Socrates, after his fetters were knocked off, felt the pleasure of that +itching which the weight of them had caused in his legs, he rejoiced to +consider the strict alliance betwixt pain and pleasure; how they are +linked together by a necessary connection, so that by turns they follow +and mutually beget one another; and cried out to good AEsop, that he +ought out of this consideration to have taken matter for a fine fable. + +The worst that I see in other diseases is, that they are not so grievous +in their effect as they are in their issue: a man is a whole year in +recovering, and all the while full of weakness and fear. There is so +much hazard, and so many steps to arrive at safety, that there is no end +on't before they have unmuffled you of a kerchief, and then of a cap, +before they allow you to walk abroad and take the air, to drink wine, to +lie with your wife, to eat melons, 'tis odds you relapse into some new +distemper. The stone has this privilege, that it carries itself clean +off: whereas the other maladies always leave behind them some impression +and alteration that render the body subject to a new disease, and lend a +hand to one another. Those are excusable that content themselves with +possessing us, without extending farther and introducing their followers; +but courteous and kind are those whose passage brings us any profitable +issue. Since I have been troubled with the stone, I find myself freed +from all other accidents, much more, methinks, than I was before, and +have never had any fever since; I argue that the extreme and frequent +vomitings that I am subject to purge me: and, on the other hand, my +distastes for this and that, and the strange fasts I am forced to keep, +digest my peccant humours, and nature, with those stones, voids whatever +there is in me superfluous and hurtful. Let them never tell me that it +is a medicine too dear bought: for what avail so many stinking draughts, +so many caustics, incisions, sweats, setons, diets, and so many other +methods of cure, which often, by reason we are not able to undergo their +violence and importunity, bring us to our graves? So that when I have +the stone, I look upon it as physic; when free from it, as an absolute +deliverance. + +And here is another particular benefit of my disease; which is, that it +almost plays its game by itself, and lets 'me play mine, if I have only +courage to do it; for, in its greatest fury, I have endured it ten hours +together on horseback. Do but endure only; you need no other regimen +play, run, dine, do this and t'other, if you can; your debauch will do +you more good than harm; say as much to one that has the pox, the gout, +or hernia! The other diseases have more universal obligations; rack our +actions after another kind of manner, disturb our whole order, and to +their consideration engage the whole state of life: this only pinches the +skin; it leaves the understanding and the will wholly at our own +disposal, and the tongue, the hands, and the feet; it rather awakens than +stupefies you. The soul is struck with the ardour of a fever, +overwhelmed with an epilepsy, and displaced by a sharp megrim, and, in +short, astounded by all the diseases that hurt the whole mass and the +most noble parts; this never meddles with the soul; if anything goes +amiss with her, 'tis her own fault; she betrays, dismounts, and abandons +herself. There are none but fools who suffer themselves to be persuaded +that this hard and massive body which is baked in our kidneys is to be +dissolved by drinks; wherefore, when it is once stirred, there is nothing +to be done but to give it passage; and, for that matter, it will itself +make one. + +I moreover observe this particular convenience in it, that it is a +disease wherein we have little to guess at: we are dispensed from the +trouble into which other diseases throw us by the uncertainty of their +causes, conditions, and progress; a trouble that is infinitely painful: +we have no need of consultations and doctoral interpretations; the senses +well enough inform us both what it is and where it is. + +By suchlike arguments, weak and strong, as Cicero with the disease of his +old age, I try to rock asleep and amuse my imagination, and to dress its +wounds. If I find them worse tomorrow, I will provide new stratagems. +That this is true: I am come to that pass of late, that the least motion +forces pure blood out of my kidneys: what of that? I move about, +nevertheless, as before, and ride after my hounds with a juvenile and +insolent ardour; and hold that I have very good satisfaction for an +accident of that importance, when it costs me no more but a dull +heaviness and uneasiness in that part; 'tis some great stone that wastes +and consumes the substance of my kidneys and my life, which I by little +and little evacuate, not without some natural pleasure, as an excrement +henceforward superfluous and troublesome. Now if I feel anything +stirring, do not fancy that I trouble myself to consult my pulse or my +urine, thereby to put myself upon some annoying prevention; I shall soon +enough feel the pain, without making it more and longer by the disease of +fear. He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears. To +which may be added that the doubts and ignorance of those who take upon +them to expound the designs of nature and her internal progressions, and +the many false prognostics of their art, ought to give us to understand +that her ways are inscrutable and utterly unknown; there is great +uncertainty, variety, and obscurity in what she either promises or +threatens. Old age excepted, which is an indubitable sign of the +approach of death, in all other accidents I see few signs of the future, +whereon we may ground our divination. I only judge of myself by actual +sensation, not by reasoning: to what end, since I am resolved to bring +nothing to it but expectation and patience? Will you know how much I get +by this? observe those who do otherwise, and who rely upon so many +diverse persuasions and counsels; how often the imagination presses upon +them without any bodily pain. I have many times amused myself, being +well and in safety, and quite free from these dangerous attacks in +communicating them to the physicians as then beginning to discover +themselves in me; I underwent the decree of their dreadful conclusions, +being all the while quite at my ease, and so much the more obliged to the +favour of God and better satisfied of the vanity of this art. + +There is nothing that ought so much to be recommended to youth as +activity and vigilance our life is nothing but movement. I bestir myself +with great difficulty, and am slow in everything, whether in rising, +going to bed, or eating: seven of the clock in the morning is early for +me, and where I rule, I never dine before eleven, nor sup till after six. +I formerly attributed the cause of the fevers and other diseases I fell +into to the heaviness that long sleeping had brought upon me, and have +ever repented going to sleep again in the morning. Plato is more angry +at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking. I love to lie hard and +alone, even without my wife, as kings do; pretty well covered with +clothes. They never warm my bed, but since I have grown old they give me +at need cloths to lay to my feet and stomach. They found fault with the +great Scipio that he was a great sleeper; not, in my opinion, for any +other reason than that men were displeased that he alone should have +nothing in him to be found fault with. If I am anything fastidious in my +way of living 'tis rather in my lying than anything else; but generally +I give way and accommodate myself as well as any one to necessity. +Sleeping has taken up a great part of my life, and I yet continue, at the +age I now am, to sleep eight or nine hours at one breath. I wean myself +with utility from this proneness to sloth, and am evidently the better +for so doing. I find the change a little hard indeed, but in three days +'tis over; and I see but few who live with less sleep, when need +requires, and who more constantly exercise themselves, or to whom long +journeys are less troublesome. My body is capable of a firm, but not of +a violent or sudden agitation. I escape of late from violent exercises, +and such as make me sweat: my limbs grow weary before they are warm. +I can stand a whole day together, and am never weary of walking; but from +my youth I have ever preferred to ride upon paved roads; on foot, I get +up to the haunches in dirt, and little fellows as I am are subject in the +streets to be elbowed and jostled for want of presence; I have ever loved +to repose myself, whether sitting or lying, with my heels as high or +higher than my seat. + +There is no profession as pleasant as the military, a profession both +noble in its execution (for valour is the stoutest, proudest, and most +generous of all virtues), and noble in its cause: there is no utility +either more universal or more just than the protection of the peace and +greatness of one's country. The company of so many noble, young, and +active men delights you; the ordinary sight of so many tragic spectacles; +the freedom of the conversation, without art; a masculine and +unceremonious way of living, please you; the variety of a thousand +several actions; the encouraging harmony of martial music that ravishes +and inflames both your ears and souls; the honour of this occupation, +nay, even its hardships and difficulties, which Plato holds so light that +in his Republic he makes women and children share in them, are delightful +to you. You put yourself voluntarily upon particular exploits and +hazards, according as you judge of their lustre and importance; and, a +volunteer, find even life itself excusably employed: + + "Pulchrumque mori succurrit in armis." + + ["'Tis fine to die sword in hand." ("And he remembers that it + is honourable to die in arms.")--AEneid, ii. 317.] + + +To fear common dangers that concern so great a multitude of men; not to +dare to do what so many sorts of souls, what a whole people dare, is for +a heart that is poor and mean beyond all measure: company encourages even +children. If others excel you in knowledge, in gracefulness, in +strength, or fortune, you have alternative resources at your disposal; +but to give place to them in stability of mind, you can blame no one for +that but yourself. Death is more abject, more languishing and +troublesome, in bed than in a fight: fevers and catarrhs as painful and +mortal as a musket-shot. Whoever has fortified himself valiantly to bear +the accidents of common life need not raise his courage to be a soldier: + + "Vivere, mi Lucili, militare est." + + ["To live, my Lucilius, is (to make war) to be a soldier." + --Seneca, Ep., 96.] + +I do not remember that I ever had the itch, and yet scratching is one of +nature's sweetest gratifications, and so much at hand; but repentance +follows too near. I use it most in my ears, which are at intervals apt +to itch. + +I came into the world with all my senses entire, even to perfection. My +stomach is commodiously good, as also is my head and my breath; and, for +the most part, uphold themselves so in the height of fevers. I have +passed the age to which some nations, not without reason, have prescribed +so just a term of life that they would not suffer men to exceed it; and +yet I have some intermissions, though short and inconstant, so clean and +sound as to be little inferior to the health and pleasantness of my +youth. I do not speak of vigour and sprightliness; 'tis not reason they +should follow me beyond their limits: + + "Non hoc amplius est liminis, aut aquae + Coelestis, patiens latus." + + ["I am no longer able to stand waiting at a door in the rain." + --Horace, Od., iii. 10, 9.] + +My face and eyes presently discover my condition; all my alterations +begin there, and appear somewhat worse than they really are; my friends +often pity me before I feel the cause in myself. My looking-glass does +not frighten me; for even in my youth it has befallen me more than once +to have a scurvy complexion and of ill augury, without any great +consequence, so that the physicians, not finding any cause within +answerable to that outward alteration, attributed it to the mind and to +some secret passion that tormented me within; but they were deceived. +If my body would govern itself as well, according to my rule, as my mind +does, we should move a little more at our ease. My mind was then not +only free from trouble, but, moreover, full of joy and satisfaction, +as it commonly is, half by its complexion, half by its design: + + "Nec vitiant artus aegrae contagia mentis." + + ["Nor do the troubles of the body ever affect my mind." + --Ovid, Trist., iii. 8, 25.] + +I am of the opinion that this temperature of my soul has often raised my +body from its lapses; this is often depressed; if the other be not brisk +and gay, 'tis at least tranquil and at rest. I had a quartan ague four +or five months, that made me look miserably ill; my mind was always, if +not calm, yet pleasant. If the pain be without me, the weakness and +languor do not much afflict me; I see various corporal faintings, that +beget a horror in me but to name, which yet I should less fear than a +thousand passions and agitations of the mind that I see about me. I make +up my mind no more to run; 'tis enough that I can crawl along; nor do I +more complain of the natural decadence that I feel in myself: + + "Quis tumidum guttur miratur in Alpibus?" + + ["Who is surprised to see a swollen goitre in the Alps?" + --Juvenal, xiii. 162.] + +than I regret that my duration shall not be as long and entire as that of +an oak. + +I have no reason to complain of my imagination; I have had few thoughts +in my life that have so much as broken my sleep, except those of desire, +which have awakened without afflicting me. I dream but seldom, and then +of chimaeras and fantastic things, commonly produced from pleasant +thoughts, and rather ridiculous than sad; and I believe it to be true +that dreams are faithful interpreters of our inclinations; but there is +art required to sort and understand them + + "Res, quae in vita usurpant homines, cogitant, curant, vident, + Quaeque agunt vigilantes, agitantque, ea si cui in somno accidunt, + Minus mirandum est." + + ["'Tis less wonder, what men practise, think, care for, see, and do + when waking, (should also run in their heads and disturb them when + they are asleep) and which affect their feelings, if they happen to + any in sleep."--Attius, cited in Cicero, De Divin., i. 22.] + +Plato, moreover, says, that 'tis the office of prudence to draw +instructions of divination of future things from dreams: I don't know +about this, but there are wonderful instances of it that Socrates, +Xenophon, and Aristotle, men of irreproachable authority, relate. +Historians say that the Atlantes never dream; who also never eat any +animal food, which I add, forasmuch as it is, peradventure, the reason +why they never dream, for Pythagoras ordered a certain preparation of +diet to beget appropriate dreams. Mine are very gentle, without any +agitation of body or expression of voice. I have seen several of my time +wonderfully disturbed by them. Theon the philosopher walked in his +sleep, and so did Pericles servant, and that upon the tiles and top of +the house. + +I hardly ever choose my dish at table, but take the next at hand, and +unwillingly change it for another. A confusion of meats and a clatter of +dishes displease me as much as any other confusion: I am easily satisfied +with few dishes: and am an enemy to the opinion of Favorinus, that in a +feast they should snatch from you the meat you like, and set a plate of +another sort before you; and that 'tis a pitiful supper, if you do not +sate your guests with the rumps of various fowls, the beccafico only +deserving to be all eaten. I usually eat salt meats, yet I prefer bread +that has no salt in it; and my baker never sends up other to my table, +contrary to the custom of the country. In my infancy, what they had most +to correct in me was the refusal of things that children commonly best +love, as sugar, sweetmeats, and march-panes. My tutor contended with +this aversion to delicate things, as a kind of over-nicety; and indeed +'tis nothing else but a difficulty of taste, in anything it applies +itself to. Whoever cures a child of an obstinate liking for brown bread, +bacon, or garlic, cures him also of pampering his palate. There are some +who affect temperance and plainness by wishing for beef and ham amongst +the partridges; 'tis all very fine; this is the delicacy of the delicate; +'tis the taste of an effeminate fortune that disrelishes ordinary and +accustomed things. + + "Per qux luxuria divitiarum taedio ludit." + + ["By which the luxury of wealth causes tedium."--Seneca, Ep., 18.] + +Not to make good cheer with what another is enjoying, and to be curious +in what a man eats, is the essence of this vice: + + "Si modica coenare times olus omne patella." + + ["If you can't be content with herbs in a small dish for supper." + --Horace, Ep., i. 5, 2.] + +There is indeed this difference, that 'tis better to oblige one's +appetite to things that are most easy to be had; but 'tis always vice to +oblige one's self. I formerly said a kinsman of mine was overnice, who, +by being in our galleys, had unlearned the use of beds and to undress +when he went to sleep. + +If I had any sons, I should willingly wish them my fortune. The good +father that God gave me (who has nothing of me but the acknowledgment of +his goodness, but truly 'tis a very hearty one) sent me from my cradle to +be brought up in a poor village of his, and there continued me all the +while I was at nurse, and still longer, bringing me up to the meanest and +most common way of living: + + "Magna pars libertatis est bene moratus venter." + + ["A well-governed stomach is a great part of liberty." + --Seneca,Ep., 123.] + +Never take upon yourselves, and much less give up to your wives, the care +of their nurture; leave the formation to fortune, under popular and +natural laws; leave it to custom to train them up to frugality and +hardship, that they may rather descend from rigour than mount up to it. +This humour of his yet aimed at another end, to make me familiar with the +people and the condition of men who most need our assistance; considering +that I should rather regard them who extend their arms to me, than those +who turn their backs upon me; and for this reason it was that he provided +to hold me at the font persons of the meanest fortune, to oblige and +attach me to them. + +Nor has his design succeeded altogether ill; for, whether upon the +account of the more honour in such a condescension, or out of a natural +compassion that has a very great power over me, I have an inclination +towards the meaner sort of people. The faction which I should condemn in +our wars, I should more sharply condemn, flourishing and successful; it +will somewhat reconcile me to it, when I shall see it miserable and +overwhelmed. How willingly do I admire the fine humour of Cheilonis, +daughter and wife to kings of Sparta. Whilst her husband Cleombrotus, in +the commotion of her city, had the advantage over Leonidas her father, +she, like a good daughter, stuck close to her father in all his misery +and exile, in opposition to the conqueror. But so soon as the chance of +war turned, she changed her will with the change of fortune, and bravely +turned to her husband's side, whom she accompanied throughout, where his +ruin carried him: admitting, as it appears to me, no other choice than to +cleave to the side that stood most in need of her, and where she could +best manifest her compassion. I am naturally more apt to follow the +example of Flaminius, who rather gave his assistance to those who had +most need of him than to those who had power to do him good, than I do to +that of Pyrrhus, who was of an humour to truckle under the great and to +domineer over the poor. + +Long sittings at table both trouble me and do me harm; for, be it that I +was so accustomed when a child, I eat all the while I sit. Therefore it +is that at my own house, though the meals there are of the shortest, I +usually sit down a little while after the rest, after the manner of +Augustus, but I do not imitate him in rising also before the rest; on the +contrary, I love to sit still a long time after, and to hear them talk, +provided I am none of the talkers: for I tire and hurt myself with +speaking upon a full stomach, as much as I find it very wholesome and +pleasant to argue and to strain my voice before dinner. + +The ancient Greeks and Romans had more reason than we in setting apart +for eating, which is a principal action of life, if they were not +prevented by other extraordinary business, many hours and the greatest +part of the night; eating and drinking more deliberately than we do, who +perform all our actions post-haste; and in extending this natural +pleasure to more leisure and better use, intermixing with profitable +conversation. + +They whose concern it is to have a care of me, may very easily hinder me +from eating anything they think will do me harm; for in such matters I +never covet nor miss anything I do not see; but withal, if it once comes +in my sight, 'tis in vain to persuade me to forbear; so that when I +design to fast I must be kept apart from the suppers, and must have only +so much given me as is required for a prescribed collation; for if to +table, I forget my resolution. When I order my cook to alter the manner +of dressing any dish, all my family know what it means, that my stomach +is out of order, and that I shall not touch it. + +I love to have all meats, that will endure it, very little boiled or +roasted, and prefer them very high, and even, as to several, quite gone. +Nothing but hardness generally offends me (of any other quality I am as +patient and indifferent as any man I have known); so that, contrary to +the common humour, even in fish it often happens that I find them both +too fresh and too firm; not for want of teeth, which I ever had good, +even to excellence, and which age does not now begin to threaten; I have +always been used every morning to rub them with a napkin, and before and +after dinner. God is favourable to those whom He makes to die by +degrees; 'tis the only benefit of old age; the last death will be so much +the less painful; it will kill but a half or a quarter of a man. There +is one tooth lately fallen out without drawing and without pain; it was +the natural term of its duration; in that part of my being and several +others, are already dead, others half dead, of those that were most +active and in the first rank during my vigorous years; 'tis so I melt and +steal away from myself. What a folly it would be in my understanding to +apprehend the height of this fall, already so much advanced, as if it +were from the very top! I hope I shall not. I, in truth, receive a +principal consolation in meditating my death, that it will be just and +natural, and that henceforward I cannot herein either require or hope +from Destiny any other but unlawful favour. Men make themselves believe +that we formerly had longer lives as well as greater stature. But they +deceive themselves; and Solon, who was of those elder times, limits the +duration of life to threescore and ten years. I, who have so much and so +universally adored that "The mean is best," of the passed time, and who +have concluded the most moderate measures to be the most perfect, shall +I pretend to an immeasurable and prodigious old age? Whatever happens +contrary to the course of nature may be troublesome; but what comes +according to her should always be pleasant: + + "Omnia, quae secundum naturam fiunt, sunt habenda in bonis." + + ["All things that are done according to nature + are to be accounted good."--Cicero, De Senect., c. 19.] + +And so, says Plato, the death which is occasioned by wounds and diseases +is violent; but that which comes upon us, old age conducting us to it, is +of all others the most easy, and in some sort delicious: + + "Vitam adolescentibus vis aufert, senibus maturitas." + + ["Young men are taken away by violence, old men by maturity." + --Cicero, ubi sup.] + +Death mixes and confounds itself throughout with life; decay anticipates +its hour, and shoulders itself even into the course of our advance. +I have portraits of myself taken at five-and-twenty and five-and-thirty +years of age. I compare them with that lately drawn: how many times is +it no longer me; how much more is my present image unlike the former, +than unlike my dying one? It is too much to abuse nature, to make her +trot so far that she must be forced to leave us, and abandon our conduct, +our eyes, teeth, legs, and all the rest to the mercy of a foreign and +haggard countenance, and to resign us into the hands of art, being weary +of following us herself. + +I am not excessively fond either of salads or fruits, except melons. My +father hated all sorts of sauces; I love them all. Eating too much hurts +me; but, as to the quality of what I eat, I do not yet certainly know +that any sort of meat disagrees with me; neither have I observed that +either full moon or decrease, autumn or spring, have any influence upon +me. We have in us motions that are inconstant and unknown; for example, +I found radishes first grateful to my stomach, since that nauseous, and +now again grateful. In several other things, I find my stomach and +appetite vary after the same manner; I have changed again and again from +white wine to claret, from claret to white wine. + +I am a great lover of fish, and consequently make my fasts feasts and +feasts fasts; and I believe what some people say, that it is more easy of +digestion than flesh. As I make a conscience of eating flesh upon fish- +days, so does my taste make a conscience of mixing fish and flesh; the +difference betwixt them seems to me too remote. + +From my youth, I have sometimes kept out of the way at meals; either to +sharpen my appetite against the next morning (for, as Epicurus fasted and +made lean meals to accustom his pleasure to make shift without abundance, +I, on the contrary, do it to prepare my pleasure to make better and more +cheerful use of abundance); or else I fasted to preserve my vigour for +the service of some action of body or mind: for both the one and the +other of these is cruelly dulled in me by repletion; and, above all +things, I hate that foolish coupling of so healthful and sprightly a +goddess with that little belching god, bloated with the fumes of his +liquor--[ Montaigne did not approve of coupling Bacchus with Venus.]-- +or to cure my sick stomach, or for want of fit company; for I say, as the +same Epicurus did, that one is not so much to regard what he eats, as +with whom; and I commend Chilo, that he would not engage himself to be at +Periander's feast till he was first informed who were to be the other +guests; no dish is so acceptable to me, nor no sauce so appetising, as +that which is extracted from society. I think it more wholesome to eat +more leisurely and less, and to eat oftener; but I would have appetite +and hunger attended to; I should take no pleasure to be fed with three or +four pitiful and stinted repasts a day, after a medicinal manner: who +will assure me that, if I have a good appetite in the morning, I shall +have the same at supper? But we old fellows especially, let us take the +first opportune time of eating, and leave to almanac-makers hopes and +prognostics. The utmost fruit of my health is pleasure; let us take hold +of the present and known. I avoid the invariable in these laws of +fasting; he who would have one form serve him, let him avoid the +continuing it; we harden ourselves in it; our strength is there stupefied +and laid asleep; six months after, you shall find your stomach so inured +to it, that all you have got is the loss of your liberty of doing +otherwise but to your prejudice. + +I never keep my legs and thighs warmer in winter than in summer; one +simple pair of silk stockings is all. I have suffered myself, for the +relief of my colds, to keep my head warmer, and my belly upon the account +of my colic: my diseases in a few days habituate themselves thereto, and +disdained my ordinary provisions: we soon get from a coif to a kerchief +over it, from a simple cap to a quilted hat; the trimmings of the doublet +must not merely serve for ornament: there must be added a hare's skin or +a vulture's skin, and a cap under the hat: follow this gradation, and you +will go a very fine way to work. I will do nothing of the sort, and +would willingly leave off what I have begun. If you fall into any new +inconvenience, all this is labour lost; you are accustomed to it; seek +out some other. Thus do they destroy themselves who submit to be +pestered with these enforced and superstitious rules; they must add +something more, and something more after that; there is no end on't. + +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. I am not very used to be thirsty, either well or sick; my +mouth is, indeed, apt to be dry, but without thirst; and commonly I never +drink but with thirst that is created by eating, and far on in the meal; +I drink pretty well for a man of my pitch: in summer, and at a relishing +meal, I do not only exceed the limits of Augustus, who drank but thrice +precisely; but not to offend Democritus rule, who forbade that men should +stop at four times as an unlucky number, I proceed at need to the fifth +glass, about three half-pints; for the little glasses are my favourites, +and I like to drink them off, which other people avoid as an unbecoming +thing. I mix my wine sometimes with half, sometimes with the third part +water; and when I am at home, by an ancient custom that my father's +physician prescribed both to him and himself, they mix that which is +designed for me in the buttery, two or three hours before 'tis brought +in. 'Tis said that Cranabs, king of Attica, was the inventor of this +custom of diluting wine; whether useful or no, I have heard disputed. +I think it more decent and wholesome for children to drink no wine till +after sixteen or eighteen years of age. The most usual and common method +of living is the most becoming; all particularity, in my opinion, is to +be avoided; and I should as much hate a German who mixed water with his +wine, as I should a Frenchman who drank it pure. Public usage gives the +law in these things. + +I fear a mist, and fly from smoke as from the plague: the first repairs I +fell upon in my own house were the chimneys and houses of office, the +common and insupportable defects of all old buildings; and amongst the +difficulties of war I reckon the choking dust they made us ride in a +whole day together. I have a free and easy respiration, and my colds for +the most part go off without offence to the lungs and without a cough. + +The heat of summer is more an enemy to me than the cold of winter; for, +besides the incommodity of heat, less remediable than cold, and besides +the force of the sunbeams that strike upon the head, all glittering light +offends my eyes, so that I could not now sit at dinner over against a +flaming fire. + +To dull the whiteness of paper, in those times when I was more wont to +read, I laid a piece of glass upon my book, and found my eyes much +relieved by it. I am to this hour--to the age of fifty-four--Ignorant of +the use of spectacles; and I can see as far as ever I did, or any other. +'Tis true that in the evening I begin to find a little disturbance and +weakness in my sight if I read, an exercise I have always found +troublesome, especially by night. 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. A man +must screw up his soul to a high pitch to make it sensible how it ebbs +away. + +My walking is quick and firm; and I know not which of the two, my mind or +my body, I have most to do to keep in the same state. That preacher is +very much my friend who can fix my attention a whole sermon through: in +places of ceremony, where every one's countenance is so starched, where I +have seen the ladies keep even their eyes so fixed, I could never order +it so, that some part or other of me did not lash out; so that though I +was seated, I was never settled; and as to gesticulation, I am never +without a switch in my hand, walking or riding. As the philosopher +Chrysippus' maid said of her master, that he was only drunk in his legs, +for it was his custom to be always kicking them about in what place +soever he sat; and she said it when, the wine having made all his +companions drunk, he found no alteration in himself at all; it may have +been said of me from my infancy, that I had either folly or quicksilver +in my feet, so much stirring and unsettledness there is in them, wherever +they are placed. + +'Tis indecent, besides the hurt it does to one's health, and even to the +pleasure of eating, to eat greedily as I do; I often bite my tongue, and +sometimes my fingers, in my haste. Diogenes, meeting a boy eating after +that manner, gave his tutor a box on the ear! There were men at Rome +that taught people to chew, as well as to walk, with a good grace. I +lose thereby the leisure of speaking, which gives great relish to the +table, provided the discourse be suitable, that is, pleasant and short. + +There is jealousy and envy amongst our pleasures; they cross and hinder +one another. Alcibiades, a man who well understood how to make good +cheer, banished even music from the table, that it might not disturb the +entertainment of discourse, for the reason, as Plato tells us, "that it +is the custom of ordinary people to call fiddlers and singing men to +feasts, for want of good discourse and pleasant talk, with which men of +understanding know how to entertain one another." Varro requires all +this in entertainments: "Persons of graceful presence and agreeable +conversation, who are neither silent nor garrulous; neatness and +delicacy, both of meat and place; and fair weather." The art of dining +well is no slight art, the pleasure not a slight pleasure; neither the +greatest captains nor the greatest philosophers have disdained the use or +science of eating well. My imagination has delivered three repasts to +the custody of my memory, which fortune rendered sovereignly sweet to me, +upon several occasions in my more flourishing age; my present state +excludes me; for every one, according to the good temper of body and mind +wherein he then finds himself, furnishes for his own share a particular +grace and savour. I, who but crawl upon the earth, hate this inhuman +wisdom, that will have us despise and hate all culture of the body; I +look upon it as an equal injustice to loath natural pleasures as to be +too much in love with them. Xerxes was a blockhead, who, environed with +all human delights, proposed a reward to him who could find out others; +but he is not much less so who cuts off any of those pleasures that +nature has provided for him. A man should neither pursue nor avoid them, +but receive them. I receive them, I confess, a little too warmly and +kindly, and easily suffer myself to follow my natural propensions. We +have no need to exaggerate their inanity; they themselves will make us +sufficiently sensible of it, thanks to our sick wet-blanket mind, that +puts us out of taste with them as with itself; it treats both itself and +all it receives, one while better, and another worse, according to its +insatiable, vagabond, and versatile essence: + + "Sincerum est nisi vas, quodcunque infundis, acescit." + + ["Unless the vessel be clean, it will sour whatever + you put into it."--Horace, Ep., i. 2, 54.] + +I, who boast that I so curiously and particularly embrace the +conveniences of life, find them, when I most nearly consider them, very +little more than wind. But what? We are all wind throughout; and, +moreover, the wind itself, more discreet than we, loves to bluster and +shift from corner to corner, and contents itself with its proper offices +without desiring stability and solidity-qualities not its own. + +The pure pleasures, as well as the pure displeasures, of the imagination, +say some, are the greatest, as was expressed by the balance of +Critolaiis. 'Tis no wonder; it makes them to its own liking, and cuts +them out of the whole cloth; of this I every day see notable examples, +and, peradventure, to be desired. But I, who am of a mixed and heavy +condition, cannot snap so soon at this one simple object, but that I +negligently suffer myself to be carried away with the present pleasures +of the, general human law, intellectually sensible, and sensibly +intellectual. The Cyrenaic philosophers will have it that as corporal +pains, so corporal pleasures are more powerful, both as double and as +more just. There are some, as Aristotle says, who out of a savage kind +of stupidity dislike them; and I know others who out of ambition do the +same. Why do they not, moreover, forswear breathing? why do they not +live of their own? why not refuse light, because it is gratuitous, and +costs them neither invention nor exertion? Let Mars, Pallas, or Mercury +afford them their light by which to see, instead of Venus, Ceres, and +Bacchus. These boastful humours may counterfeit some content, for what +will not fancy do? But as to wisdom, there is no touch of it. Will they +not seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives? I hate +that we should be enjoined to have our minds in the clouds, when our +bodies are at table; I would not have the mind nailed there, nor wallow +there; I would have it take place there and sit, but not lie down. +Aristippus maintained nothing but the body, as if we had no soul; Zeno +comprehended only the soul, as if we had no body: both of them faultily. +Pythagoras, they say, followed a philosophy that was all contemplation, +Socrates one that was all conduct and action; Plato found a mean betwixt +the two; but they only say this for the sake of talking. The true +temperament is found in Socrates; and, Plato is much more Socratic than +Pythagoric, and it becomes him better. When I dance, I dance; when I +sleep, I sleep. Nay, when I walk alone in a beautiful orchard, if my +thoughts are some part of the time taken up with external occurrences, +I some part of the time call them back again to my walk, to the orchard, +to the sweetness of that solitude, and to myself. + +Nature has mother-like observed this, that the actions she has enjoined +us for our necessity should be also pleasurable to us; and she invites us +to them, not only by reason, but also by appetite, and 'tis injustice to +infringe her laws. When I see alike Caesar and Alexander, in the midst +of his greatest business, so fully enjoy human and corporal pleasures, I +do not say that he relaxed his mind: I say that he strengthened it, by +vigour of courage subjecting those violent employments and laborious +thoughts to the ordinary usage of life: wise, had he believed the last +was his ordinary, the first his extraordinary, vocation. We are great +fools. "He has passed his life in idleness," say we: "I have done +nothing to-day." What? have you not lived? that is not only the +fundamental, but the most illustrious, of your occupations. "Had I been +put to the management of great affairs, I should have made it seen what I +could do." "Have you known how to meditate and manage your life? you +have performed the greatest work of all." In order to shew and develop +herself, nature needs only fortune; she equally manifests herself in all +stages, and behind a curtain as well as without one. Have you known how +to regulate your conduct, you have done a great deal more than he who has +composed books. Have you known how to take repose, you have done more +than he who has taken empires and cities. + +The glorious masterpiece of man is to live to purpose; all other things: +to reign, to lay up treasure, to build, are but little appendices and +props. I take pleasure in seeing a general of an army, at the foot of a +breach he is presently to assault, give himself up entire and free at +dinner, to talk and be merry with his friends. And Brutus, when heaven +and earth were conspired against him and the Roman liberty, stealing some +hour of the night from his rounds to read and scan Polybius in all +security. 'Tis for little souls, buried under the weight of affairs, not +from them to know how clearly to disengage themselves, not to know how to +lay them aside and take them up again: + + "O fortes, pejoraque passi + Mecum saepe viri! nunc vino pellite curas + Cras ingens iterabimus aequor." + + ["O brave spirits, who have often suffered sorrow with me, drink + cares away; tomorrow we will embark once more on the vast sea." + --Horace, Od., i. 7, 30.] + +Whether it be in jest or earnest, that the theological and Sorbonnical +wine, and their feasts, are turned into a proverb, I find it reasonable +they should dine so much more commodiously and pleasantly, as they have +profitably and seriously employed the morning in the exercise of their +schools. The conscience of having well spent the other hours, is the +just and savoury sauce of the dinner-table. The sages lived after that +manner; and that inimitable emulation to virtue, which astonishes us both +in the one and the other Cato, that humour of theirs, so severe as even +to be importunate, gently submits itself and yields to the laws of the +human condition, of Venus and Bacchus; according to the precepts of their +sect, that require the perfect sage to be as expert and intelligent in +the use of natural pleasures as in all other duties of life: + + "Cui cor sapiat, ei et sapiat palatus." + +Relaxation and facility, methinks, wonderfully honour and best become a +strong and generous soul. Epaminondas did not think that to take part, +and that heartily, in songs and sports and dances with the young men of +his city, were things that in any way derogated from the honour of his +glorious victories and the perfect purity of manners that was in him. +And amongst so many admirable actions of Scipio the grandfather, a person +worthy to be reputed of a heavenly extraction, there is nothing that +gives him a greater grace than to see him carelessly and childishly +trifling at gathering and selecting cockle shells, and playing at quoits, + + [This game, as the "Dictionnaire de Trevoux" describes it, is one + wherein two persons contend which of them shall soonest pick up some + object.] + +amusing and tickling himself in representing by writing in comedies the +meanest and most popular actions of men. And his head full of that +wonderful enterprise of Hannibal and Africa, visiting the schools in +Sicily, and attending philosophical lectures, to the extent of arming the +blind envy of his enemies at Rome. Nor is there anything more remarkable +in Socrates than that, old as he was, he found time to make himself +taught dancing and playing upon instruments, and thought it time well +spent. This same man was seen in an ecstasy, standing upon his feet a +whole day and a night together, in the presence of all the Grecian army, +surprised and absorbed by some profound thought. He was the first, +amongst so many valiant men of the army, to run to the relief of +Alcibiades, oppressed with the enemy, to shield him with his own body, +and disengage him from the crowd by absolute force of arms. It was he +who, in the Delian battle, raised and saved Xenophon when fallen from his +horse; and who, amongst all the people of Athens, enraged as he was at so +unworthy a spectacle, first presented himself to rescue Theramenes, whom +the thirty tyrants were leading to execution by their satellites, and +desisted not from his bold enterprise but at the remonstrance of +Theramenes himself, though he was only followed by two more in all. He +was seen, when courted by a beauty with whom he was in love, to maintain +at need a severe abstinence. He was seen ever to go to the wars, and +walk upon ice, with bare feet; to wear the same robe, winter and summer; +to surpass all his companions in patience of bearing hardships, and to +eat no more at a feast than at his own private dinner. He was seen, for +seven-and-twenty years together, to endure hunger, poverty, the +indocility of his children, and the nails of his wife, with the same +countenance. And, in the end, calumny, tyranny, imprisonment, fetters, +and poison. But was this man obliged to drink full bumpers by any rule +of civility? he was also the man of the whole army with whom the +advantage in drinking, remained. And he never refused to play at +noisettes, nor to ride the hobby-horse with children, and it became him +well; for all actions, says philosophy, equally become and equally honour +a wise man. We have enough wherewithal to do it, and we ought never to +be weary of presenting the image of this great man in all the patterns +and forms of perfection. There are very few examples of life, full and +pure; and we wrong our teaching every day, to propose to ourselves those +that are weak and imperfect, scarce good for any one service, and rather +pull us back; corrupters rather than correctors of manners. The people +deceive themselves; a man goes much more easily indeed by the ends, where +the extremity serves for a bound, a stop, and guide, than by the middle +way, large and open; and according to art, more than according to nature: +but withal much less nobly and commendably. + +Greatness of soul consists not so much in mounting and in pressing +forward, as in knowing how to govern and circumscribe itself; it takes +everything for great, that is enough, and demonstrates itself in +preferring moderate to eminent things. There is nothing so fine and +legitimate as well and duly to play the man; nor science so arduous as +well and naturally to know how to live this life; and of all the +infirmities we have, 'tis the most barbarous to despise our being. + +Whoever has a mind to isolate his spirit, when the body is ill at ease, +to preserve it from the contagion, let him by all means do it if he can: +but otherwise let him on the contrary favour and assist it, and not +refuse to participate of its natural pleasures with a conjugal +complacency, bringing to it, if it be the wiser, moderation, lest by +indiscretion they should get confounded with displeasure. Intemperance +is the pest of pleasure; and temperance is not its scourge, but rather +its seasoning. Euxodus, who therein established the sovereign good, and +his companions, who set so high a value upon it, tasted it in its most +charming sweetness, by the means of temperance, which in them was +singular and exemplary. + +I enjoin my soul to look upon pain and pleasure with an eye equally +regulated: + + "Eodem enim vitio est effusio animi in laetitia + quo in dolore contractio," + + ["For from the same imperfection arises the expansion of the + mind in pleasure and its contraction in sorrow." + --Cicero, Tusc. Quaes., iv. 31.] + +and equally firm; but the one gaily and the other severely, and so far as +it is able, to be careful to extinguish the one as to extend the other. +The judging rightly of good brings along with it the judging soundly of +evil: pain has something of the inevitable in its tender beginnings, and +pleasure something of the evitable in its excessive end. Plato couples +them together, and wills that it should be equally the office of +fortitude to fight against pain, and against the immoderate and charming +blandishments of pleasure: they are two fountains, from which whoever +draws, when and as much as he needs, whether city, man, or beast, is very +fortunate. The first is to be taken medicinally and upon necessity, and +more scantily; the other for thirst, but not to, drunkenness. Pain, +pleasure, love and hatred are the first things that a child is sensible +of: if, when reason comes, they apply it to themselves, that is virtue. + +I have a special vocabulary of my own; I "pass away time," when it is ill +and uneasy, but when 'tis good I do not pass it away: "I taste it over +again and adhere to it"; one must run over the ill and settle upon the +good. This ordinary phrase of pastime, and passing away the time, +represents the usage of those wise sort of people who think they cannot +do better with their lives than to let them run out and slide away, pass +them over, and baulk them, and, as much as they can, ignore them and shun +them as a thing of troublesome and contemptible quality: but I know it to +be another kind of thing, and find it both valuable and commodious, even +in its latest decay, wherein I now enjoy it; and nature has delivered it +into our hands in such and so favourable circumstances that we have only +ourselves to blame if it be troublesome to us, or escapes us +unprofitably: + + "Stulti vita ingrata est, trepida est, tota in futurum fertur." + + ["The life of a fool is thankless, timorous, and wholly bent upon + the future."--Seneca, Ep:, 15.] + +Nevertheless I compose myself to lose mine without regret; but withal as +a thing that is perishable by its condition, not that it molests or +annoys me. Nor does it properly well become any not to be displeased +when they die, excepting such as are pleased to live. There is good +husbandry in enjoying it: I enjoy it double to what others do; for the +measure of its fruition depends upon our more or less application to it. +Chiefly that I perceive mine to be so short in time, I desire to extend +it in weight; I will stop the promptitude of its flight by the +promptitude of my grasp; and by the vigour of using it compensate the +speed of its running away. In proportion as the possession of life is +more short, I must make it so much deeper and fuller. + +Others feel the pleasure of content and prosperity; I feel it too, as +well as they, but not as it passes and slips by; one should study, taste, +and ruminate upon it to render condign thanks to Him who grants it to us. +They enjoy the other pleasures as they do that of sleep, without knowing +it. To the end that even sleep itself should not so stupidly escape from +me, I have formerly caused myself to be disturbed in my sleep, so that I +might the better and more sensibly relish and taste it. I ponder with +myself of content; I do not skim over, but sound it; and I bend my +reason, now grown perverse and peevish, to entertain it. Do I find +myself in any calm composedness? is there any pleasure that tickles me? +I do not suffer it to dally with my senses only; I associate my soul to +it too: not there to engage itself, but therein to take delight; not +there to lose itself, but to be present there; and I employ it, on its +part, to view itself in this prosperous state, to weigh and appreciate +its happiness and to amplify it. It reckons how much it stands indebted +to God that its conscience and the intestine passions are in repose; that +it has the body in its natural disposition, orderly and competently +enjoying the soft and soothing functions by which He, of His grace is +pleased to compensate the sufferings wherewith His justice at His good +pleasure chastises us. It reflects how great a benefit it is to be so +protected, that which way soever it turns its eye the heavens are calm +around it. No desire, no fear, no doubt, troubles the air; no +difficulty, past, present, or to, come, that its imagination may not pass +over without offence. This consideration takes great lustre from the +comparison of different conditions. So it is that I present to my +thought, in a thousand aspects, those whom fortune or their own error +carries away and torments. And, again, those who, more like to me, so +negligently and incuriously receive their good fortune. Those are folks +who spend their time indeed; they pass over the present and that which +they possess, to wait on hope, and for shadows and vain images which +fancy puts before them: + + "Morte obita quales fama est volitare figuras, + Aut quae sopitos deludunt somnia sensus:" + + ["Such forms as those which after death are reputed to hover about, + or dreams which delude the senses in sleep."--AEneid, x. 641.] + +which hasten and prolong their flight, according as they are pursued. +The fruit and end of their pursuit is to pursue; as Alexander said, that +the end of his labour was to labour: + + "Nil actum credens, cum quid superesset agendum." + + ["Thinking nothing done, if anything remained to be done. + --"Lucan, ii. 657.] + +For my part then, I love life and cultivate it, such as it has pleased +God to bestow it upon us. I do not desire it should be without the +necessity of eating and drinking; and I should think it a not less +excusable failing to wish it had been twice as long; + + "Sapiens divitiarum naturalium quaesitor acerrimus:" + + ["A wise man is the keenest seeker for natural riches." + --Seneca, Ep., 119.] + +nor that we should support ourselves by putting only a little of that +drug into our mouths, by which Epimenides took away his appetite and kept +himself alive; nor that we should stupidly beget children with our +fingers or heels, but rather; with reverence be it spoken, that we might +voluptuously beget them with our fingers and heels; nor that the body +should be without desire and without titillation. These are ungrateful +and wicked complaints. I accept kindly, and with gratitude, what nature +has done for me; am well pleased with it, and proud of it. A man does +wrong to that great and omnipotent giver to refuse, annul, or disfigure +his gift: all goodness himself, he has made everything good: + + "Omnia quae secundum naturam sunt, aestimatione digna sunt." + + ["All things that are according to nature are worthy of esteem." + --Cicero, De Fin., iii. 6.] + +Of philosophical opinions, I preferably embrace those that are most +solid, that is to say, the most human and most our own: my discourse is, +suitable to my manners, low and humble: philosophy plays the child, to my +thinking, when it puts itself upon its Ergos to preach to us that 'tis a +barbarous alliance to marry the divine with the earthly, the reasonable +with the unreasonable, the severe with the indulgent, the honest with the +dishonest. That pleasure is a brutish quality, unworthy to be tasted by +a wise man; that the sole pleasure he extracts from the enjoyment of a +fair young wife is a pleasure of his conscience to perform an action +according to order, as to put on his boots for a profitable journey. +Oh, that its followers had no more right, nor nerves, nor vigour in +getting their wives' maidenheads than in its lesson. + +This is not what Socrates says, who is its master and ours: he values, as +he ought, bodily pleasure; but he prefers that of the mind as having more +force, constancy, facility, variety, and dignity. This, according to +him, goes by no means alone--he is not so fantastic--but only it goes +first; temperance with him is the moderatrix, not the adversary of +pleasure. Nature is a gentle guide, but not more sweet and gentle than +prudent and just. + + "Intrandum est in rerum naturam, et penitus, + quid ea postulet, pervidendum." + + ["A man must search into the nature of things, and fully examine + what she requires."--Cicero, De Fin., V. 16.] + +I hunt after her foot throughout: we have confounded it with artificial +traces; and that academic and peripatetic good, which is "to live +according to it," becomes on this account hard to limit and explain; and +that of the Stoics, neighbour to it, which is "to consent to nature." +Is it not an error to esteem any actions less worthy, because they are +necessary? And yet they will not take it out of my head, that it is not +a very convenient marriage of pleasure with necessity, with which, says +an ancient, the gods always conspire. To what end do we dismember by +divorce a building united by so close and brotherly a correspondence? +Let us, on the contrary, confirm it by mutual offices; let the mind rouse +and quicken the heaviness of the body, and the body stay and fix the +levity of the soul: + + "Qui, velut summum bonum, laudat animac naturam, et, tanquam malum, + naturam carnis accusat, profectd et animam carnatiter appetit, et + carnem carnaliter fugit; quoniam id vanitate sentit humans, non + veritate divina." + + ["He who commends the nature of the soul as the supreme good, and + condemns the nature of the flesh as evil, at once both carnally + desires the soul, and carnally flies the flesh, because he feels + thus from human vanity, not from divine truth." + --St. Augustin, De Civit. Dei, xiv. 5.] + +In this present that God has made us, there is nothing unworthy our care; +we stand accountable for it even to a hair; and is it not a commission to +man, to conduct man according to his condition; 'tis express, plain, and +the very principal one, and the Creator has seriously and strictly +prescribed it to us. Authority has power only to work in regard to +matters of common judgment, and is of more weight in a foreign language; +therefore let us again charge at it in this place: + + "Stultitiae proprium quis non dixerit, ignave et contumaciter + facere, quae facienda sunt; et alio corpus impellere, alio animum; + distrahique inter diversissimos motus?" + + ["Who will not say, that it is the property of folly, slothfully and + contumaciously to perform what is to be done, and to bend the body + one way and the mind another, and to be distracted betwixt wholly + different motions?"--Seneca, Ep., 74.] + +To make this apparent, ask any one, some day, to tell you what whimsies +and imaginations he put into his pate, upon the account of which he +diverted his thoughts from a good meal, and regrets the time he spends in +eating; you will find there is nothing so insipid in all the dishes at +your table as this wise meditation of his (for the most part we had +better sleep than wake to the purpose we wake); and that his discourses +and notions are not worth the worst mess there. Though they were the +ecstasies of Archimedes himself, what then? I do not here speak of, nor +mix with the rabble of us ordinary men, and the vanity of the thoughts +and desires that divert us, those venerable souls, elevated by the ardour +of devotion and religion, to a constant and conscientious meditation of +divine things, who, by the energy of vivid and vehement hope, +prepossessing the use of the eternal nourishment, the final aim and last +step of Christian desires, the sole constant, and incorruptible pleasure, +disdain to apply themselves to our necessitous, fluid, and ambiguous +conveniences, and easily resign to the body the care and use of sensual +and temporal pasture; 'tis a privileged study. Between ourselves, I have +ever observed supercelestial opinions and subterranean manners to be of +singular accord. + +AEsop, that great man, saw his master piss as he walked: "What then," +said he, "must we drop as we run?" Let us manage our time; there yet +remains a great deal idle and ill employed. The mind has not willingly +other hours enough wherein to do its business, without disassociating +itself from the body, in that little space it must have for its +necessity. They would put themselves out of themselves, and escape from +being men. It is folly; instead of transforming themselves into angels, +they transform themselves into beasts; instead of elevating, they lay +themselves lower. These transcendental humours affright me, like high +and inaccessible places; and nothing is hard for me to digest in the life +of Socrates but his ecstasies and communication with demons; nothing so +human in Plato as that for which they say he was called divine; and of +our sciences, those seem to be the most terrestrial and low that are +highest mounted; and I find nothing so humble and mortal in the life of +Alexander as his fancies about his immortalisation. Philotas pleasantly +quipped him in his answer; he congratulated him by letter concerning the +oracle of Jupiter Ammon, which had placed him amongst the gods: "Upon thy +account I am glad of it, but the men are to be pitied who are to live +with a man, and to obey him, who exceeds and is not contented with the +measure of a man:" + + "Diis to minorem quod geris, imperas." + + ["Because thou carriest thyself lower than the gods, thou rulest." + --Horace, Od., iii. 6, 5.] + +The pretty inscription wherewith the Athenians honoured the entry of +Pompey into their city is conformable to my sense: "By so much thou art +a god, as thou confessest thee a man." 'Tis an absolute and, as it were, +a divine perfection, for a man to know how loyally to enjoy his being. +We seek other conditions, by reason we do not understand the use of our +own; and go out of ourselves, because we know not how there to reside. +'Tis to much purpose to go upon stilts, for, when upon stilts, we must +yet walk with our legs; and when seated upon the most elevated throne in +the world, we are but seated upon our breech. The fairest lives, in my +opinion, are those which regularly accommodate themselves to the common +and human model without miracle, without extravagance. Old age stands a +little in need of a more gentle treatment. Let us recommend that to God, +the protector of health and wisdom, but let it be gay and sociable: + + "Frui paratis et valido mihi + Latoe, dones, et precor, integra + Cum mente; nec turpem senectam + Degere, nec Cithara carentem." + + ["Grant it to me, Apollo, that I may enjoy my possessions in good + health; let me be sound in mind; let me not lead a dishonourable + old age, nor want the cittern."--Horace, Od., i. 31, 17.] + +Or: + + ["Grant it to me, Apollo, that I may enjoy what I have in good + health; let me be sound in body and mind; let me live in honour when + old, nor let music be wanting."] + + + + +APOLOGY: +[In fact, the first edition of the Essays (Bordeaux, 1580) has very few +quotations. These became more numerous in the edition of 1588; but the +multitude of classical texts which at times encumber Montaigne's text, +only dates from the posthumous edition of 1595] he had made these +collections in the four last years of his life, as an amusement of his +"idleness."--Le Clerc. They grow, however, more sparing in the Third +Book. + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +A well-governed stomach is a great part of liberty +Affirmation and obstinacy are express signs of want of wit +Alexander said, that the end of his labour was to labour +All actions equally become and equally honour a wise man +As we were formerly by crimes, so we are now overburdened by law +At the most, but patch you up, and prop you a little +better have none at all than to have them in so prodigious a num +Both kings and philosophers go to stool +Cannot stand the liberty of a friend's advice +Cleave to the side that stood most in need of her +Condemnations have I seen more criminal than the crimes +Customs and laws make justice +Dignify our fopperies when we commit them to the press +Diversity of medical arguments and opinions embraces all +Every man thinks himself sufficiently intelligent +Excuse myself from knowing anything which enslaves me to others +First informed who were to be the other guests +Go out of ourselves, because we know not how there to reside +Got up but an inch upon the shoulders of the last, but one +Hate remedies that are more troublesome than the disease itself +He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears +How many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment +"I have done nothing to-day."--"What? have you not lived?" +If it be a delicious medicine, take it +Intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not +Intemperance is the pest of pleasure +Language: obscure and unintelligible in wills and contracts +Last death will kill but a half or a quarter of a man +Law: breeder of altercation and division +Laws keep up their credit, not for being just--but as laws +Lay the fault on the voices of those who speak to me. +Learn my own debility and the treachery of my understanding +Life of Caesar has no greater example for us than our own +Long sittings at table both trouble me and do me harm +Made all medicinal conclusions largely give way to my pleasure +Man after who held out his pulse to a physician was a fool +Man must learn that he is nothing but a fool +More ado to interpret interpretations +More books upon books than upon any other subject +Never did two men make the same judgment of the same thing +Nnone that less keep their promise(than physicians) +Nor get children but before I sleep, nor get them standing +Nothing so grossly, nor so ordinarily faulty, as the laws +Our justice presents to us but one hand +Perpetual scolding of his wife (of Socrates) +Physician: pass through all the diseases he pretends to cure +Plato angry at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking +Plato: lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country +Prolong your misery an hour or two +Put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties +Resolved to bring nothing to it but expectation and patience +Scratching is one of nature's sweetest gratifications +Seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives +So weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him +Soft, easy, and wholesome pillow is ignorance and incuriosity +Study makes me sensible how much I have to learn +Style wherewith men establish religions and laws +Subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doub +That we may live, we cease to live +The mean is best +There is none of us who would not be worse than kings +Thinking nothing done, if anything remained to be done +Thinks nothing profitable that is not painful +Thou diest because thou art living +Tis so I melt and steal away from myself +Truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times +Truth, that for being older it is none the wiser +We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade +We ought to grant free passage to diseases +Whoever will call to mind the excess of his past anger +Why do we not imitate the Roman architecture? +Wrangling arrogance, wholly believing and trusting in itself +Yet do we find any end of the need of interpretating? + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of The Essays of Montaigne, V19 +By Michel de Montaigne + diff --git a/old/mn19v11.zip b/old/mn19v11.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..bb9f0c0 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mn19v11.zip |