Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 105
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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
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
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- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 019Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4860Total number of unique words is 152640.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words57.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words65.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 020Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4766Total number of unique words is 145044.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 021Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4804Total number of unique words is 147543.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words60.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words68.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 022Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4967Total number of unique words is 153045.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 023Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5004Total number of unique words is 152948.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words68.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words76.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 024Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4791Total number of unique words is 161742.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words60.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words68.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 025Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4729Total number of unique words is 145543.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 026Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4895Total number of unique words is 151546.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words75.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 027Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4959Total number of unique words is 155746.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 028Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4818Total number of unique words is 158641.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 029Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4939Total number of unique words is 155044.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words70.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 030Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4888Total number of unique words is 155443.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 031Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4799Total number of unique words is 155843.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 032Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4784Total number of unique words is 166741.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words57.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 033Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4887Total number of unique words is 153143.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 034Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4763Total number of unique words is 149343.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 035Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4777Total number of unique words is 164541.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words59.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words68.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 036Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4812Total number of unique words is 156642.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words59.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words67.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 037Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4976Total number of unique words is 146249.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words69.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words77.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 038Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4949Total number of unique words is 144146.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.5 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 039Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5086Total number of unique words is 141551.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words69.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words77.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 040Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5052Total number of unique words is 141248.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words67.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 041Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4988Total number of unique words is 142545.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 042Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4890Total number of unique words is 142745.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 043Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4805Total number of unique words is 153242.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words70.0 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 044Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4969Total number of unique words is 141643.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 045Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4977Total number of unique words is 147845.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 046Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4918Total number of unique words is 166839.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words57.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words65.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 047Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4959Total number of unique words is 160942.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 048Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4840Total number of unique words is 163539.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words55.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words63.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 049Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4930Total number of unique words is 143640.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 050Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4742Total number of unique words is 153038.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words56.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words65.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 051Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4932Total number of unique words is 151539.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words55.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words63.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 052Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4878Total number of unique words is 157839.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words56.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words63.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 053Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4811Total number of unique words is 152337.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words55.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words63.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 054Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4864Total number of unique words is 153440.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words67.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 055Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5000Total number of unique words is 141944.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 056Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4864Total number of unique words is 159241.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words67.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 057Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4881Total number of unique words is 151840.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.0 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 058Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4940Total number of unique words is 147243.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words59.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 059Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4669Total number of unique words is 155741.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 060Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4782Total number of unique words is 150542.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words59.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 061Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4884Total number of unique words is 146542.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words60.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.0 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 062Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4856Total number of unique words is 155544.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 063Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5006Total number of unique words is 146246.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 064Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4849Total number of unique words is 149143.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 065Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4893Total number of unique words is 151146.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 066Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4875Total number of unique words is 153343.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 067Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4837Total number of unique words is 156644.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 068Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4970Total number of unique words is 152046.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 069Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4964Total number of unique words is 144646.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 070Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4908Total number of unique words is 146945.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.5 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 071Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4980Total number of unique words is 141251.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words68.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words76.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 072Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4907Total number of unique words is 144945.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 073Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4977Total number of unique words is 140946.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 074Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5152Total number of unique words is 139948.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words67.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words76.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 075Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4857Total number of unique words is 143845.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 076Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4965Total number of unique words is 145445.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.0 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 077Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5078Total number of unique words is 142345.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.6 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 078Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4990Total number of unique words is 145845.1 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 079Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4812Total number of unique words is 156446.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 080Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4787Total number of unique words is 162140.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words57.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 081Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4763Total number of unique words is 161542.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words57.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words66.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 082Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4779Total number of unique words is 154844.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words60.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words67.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 083Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4866Total number of unique words is 155542.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 084Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4776Total number of unique words is 155742.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words70.6 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 085Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4785Total number of unique words is 157145.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 086Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4747Total number of unique words is 156741.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words62.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words70.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 087Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5022Total number of unique words is 145547.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words75.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 088Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4935Total number of unique words is 142746.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 089Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4966Total number of unique words is 139148.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 090Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4888Total number of unique words is 149743.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words69.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 091Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4903Total number of unique words is 145544.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 092Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5068Total number of unique words is 150346.8 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.3 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.2 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 093Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4993Total number of unique words is 145847.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 094Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4866Total number of unique words is 147544.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 095Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4816Total number of unique words is 144045.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 096Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4894Total number of unique words is 154343.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words61.4 of words are in the 5000 most common words70.5 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 097Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4901Total number of unique words is 146346.2 of words are in the 2000 most common words63.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words71.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 098Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4772Total number of unique words is 161040.9 of words are in the 2000 most common words58.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words65.9 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 099Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4909Total number of unique words is 145147.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.9 of words are in the 5000 most common words73.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 100Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4899Total number of unique words is 148047.3 of words are in the 2000 most common words67.5 of words are in the 5000 most common words76.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 101Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4939Total number of unique words is 145244.6 of words are in the 2000 most common words64.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.8 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 102Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5068Total number of unique words is 144246.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words72.7 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 103Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4987Total number of unique words is 147947.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words65.7 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 104Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 5081Total number of unique words is 148248.7 of words are in the 2000 most common words66.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words74.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 105Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4841Total number of unique words is 152741.4 of words are in the 2000 most common words60.2 of words are in the 5000 most common words68.4 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 106Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4628Total number of unique words is 141048.0 of words are in the 2000 most common words68.8 of words are in the 5000 most common words78.1 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 107Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 4543Total number of unique words is 144747.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words68.1 of words are in the 5000 most common words77.3 of words are in the 8000 most common words
- Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 108Each bar represents the percentage of words per 1000 most common words.Total number of words is 2607Total number of unique words is 90156.5 of words are in the 2000 most common words75.0 of words are in the 5000 most common words82.5 of words are in the 8000 most common words