Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 100

die, but, moreover, seek it at need, of which elephants have given many
examples.
Besides, the method of arguing, of which Socrates here makes use, is it
not equally admirable both in simplicity and vehemence? Truly it is much
more easy to speak like Aristotle and to live like Caesar than to speak
and live as Socrates did; there lies the extreme degree of perfection and
difficulty; art cannot reach it. Now, our faculties are not so trained
up; we do not try, we do not know them; we invest ourselves with those of
others, and let our own lie idle; as some one may say of me, that I have
here only made a nosegay of foreign flowers, having furnished nothing of
my own but the thread to tie them.
Certainly I have so far yielded to public opinion, that those borrowed
ornaments accompany me; but I do not mean that they shall cover me and
hide me; that is quite contrary to my design, who desire to make a show
of nothing but what is my own, and what is my own by nature; and had I
taken my own advice, I had at all hazards spoken purely alone, I more and
more load myself every day,
[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.]
beyond my purpose and first method, upon the account of idleness and the
humour of the age. If it misbecome me, as I believe it does, ‘tis no
matter; it may be of use to some others. Such there are who quote Plato
and Homer, who never saw either of them; and I also have taken things out
of places far enough distant from their source. Without pains and
without learning, having a thousand volumes about me in the place where I
write, I can presently borrow, if I please, from a dozen such
scrap-gatherers, people about whom I do not much trouble myself, wherewith
to trick up this treatise of Physiognomy; there needs no more but a
preliminary epistle of a German to stuff me with quotations. And so it
is we go in quest of a tickling story to cheat the foolish world. These
lumber pies of commonplaces, wherewith so many furnish their studies, are
of little use but to common subjects, and serve but to show us, and not
to direct us: a ridiculous fruit of learning, that Socrates so pleasantly
discusses against Euthydemus. I have seen books made of things that were
never either studied or understood; the author committing to several of
his learned friends the examination of this and t’other matter to compile
it, contenting himself, for his share, with having projected the design,
and by his industry to have tied together this faggot of unknown
provisions; the ink and paper, at least, are his. This is to buy or
borrow a book, and not to make one; ‘tis to show men not that he can make
a book, but that, whereof they may be in doubt, he cannot make one.
A president, where I was, boasted that he had amassed together two
hundred and odd commonplaces in one of his judgments; in telling which,
he deprived himself of the glory he had got by it: in my opinion, a
pusillanimous and absurd vanity for such a subject and such a person.
I do the contrary; and amongst so many borrowed things, am glad if I can
steal one, disguising and altering it for some new service; at the hazard
of having it said that ‘tis for want of understanding its natural use;
I give it some particular touch of my own hand, to the end it may not be
so absolutely foreign. These set their thefts in show and value
themselves upon them, and so have more credit with the laws than I have:
we naturalists I think that there is a great and incomparable preference
in the honour of invention over that of allegation.
If I would have spoken by learning, I had spoken sooner; I had written of
the time nearer to my studies, when I had more wit and better memory, and
should sooner have trusted to the vigour of that age than of this, would
I have made a business of writing. And what if this gracious favour
--[His acquaintance with Mademoiselle de Gournay.]--which Fortune has
lately offered me upon the account of this work, had befallen me in that
time of my life, instead of this, wherein ‘tis equally desirable to
possess, soon to be lost! Two of my acquaintance, great men in this
faculty, have, in my opinion, lost half, in refusing to publish at forty
years old, that they might stay till threescore. Maturity has its
defects as well as green years, and worse; and old age is as unfit for
this kind of business as any other. He who commits his decrepitude to
the press plays the fool if he think to squeeze anything out thence that
does not relish of dreaming, dotage, and drivelling; the mind grows
costive and thick in growing old. I deliver my ignorance in pomp and
state, and my learning meagrely and poorly; this accidentally and
accessorily, that principally and expressly; and write specifically of
nothing but nothing, nor of any science but of that inscience. I have
chosen a time when my life, which I am to give an account of, lies wholly
before me; what remains has more to do with death; and of my death
itself, should I find it a prating death, as others do, I would willingly
give an account at my departure.
Socrates was a perfect exemplar in all great qualities, and I am vexed
that he had so deformed a face and body as is said, and so unsuitable to
the beauty of his soul, himself being so amorous and such an admirer of
beauty: Nature did him wrong. There is nothing more probable than the
conformity and relation of the body to the soul:
“Ipsi animi magni refert, quali in corpore locati sint: multo enim a
corpore existunt, qux acuant mentem: multa qua obtundant;”
[“It is of great consequence in what bodies minds are placed, for
many things spring from the body that may sharpen the mind, and many
that may blunt it.”--Cicero, Tusc. Quaes., i. 33.]
this refers to an unnatural ugliness and deformity of limbs; but we call
ugliness also an unseemliness at first sight, which is principally lodged
in the face, and disgusts us on very slight grounds: by the complexion, a
spot, a rugged countenance, for some reasons often wholly inexplicable,
in members nevertheless of good symmetry and perfect. The deformity,
that clothed a very beautiful soul in La Boetie, was of this predicament:
that superficial ugliness, which nevertheless is always the most
imperious, is of least prejudice to the state of the mind, and of little
certainty in the opinion of men. The other, which is never properly
called deformity, being more substantial, strikes deeper in. Not every
shoe of smooth shining leather, but every shoe well-made, shews the shape
of the foot within. As Socrates said of his, it betrayed equal ugliness
in his soul, had he not corrected it by education; but in saying so, I
hold he was in jest, as his custom was; never so excellent a soul formed
itself.
I cannot often enough repeat how great an esteem I have for beauty, that
potent and advantageous quality; he (La Boetie) called it “a short
tyranny,” and Plato, “the privilege of nature.” We have nothing that
excels it in reputation; it has the first place in the commerce of men;
it presents itself in the front; seduces and prepossesses our judgments
with great authority and wonderful impression. Phryne had lost her cause
in the hands of an excellent advocate, if, opening her robe, she had not
corrupted her judges by the lustre of her beauty. And I find that Cyrus,
Alexander, and Caesar, the three masters of the world, never neglected
beauty in their greatest affairs; no more did the first Scipio. The same
word in Greek signifies both fair and good; and the Holy Word often says
good when it means fair: I should willingly maintain the priority in good
things, according to the song that Plato calls an idle thing, taken out
of some ancient poet: “health, beauty, riches.” Aristotle says that the
right of command appertains to the beautiful; and that, when there is a
person whose beauty comes near the images of the gods, veneration is
equally due to him. To him who asked why people oftener and longer
frequent the company of handsome persons: “That question,” said he, “is
only to be asked by the blind.” Most of the philosophers, and the
greatest, paid for their schooling, and acquired wisdom by the favour and
mediation of their beauty. Not only in the men that serve me, but also
in the beasts, I consider it within two fingers’ breadth of goodness.
And yet I fancy that those features and moulds of face, and those
lineaments, by which men guess at our internal complexions and our
fortunes to come, is a thing that does not very directly and simply lie
under the chapter of beauty and deformity, no more than every good odour
and serenity of air promises health, nor all fog and stink infection in a
time of pestilence. Such as accuse ladies of contradicting their beauty
by their manners, do not always hit right; for, in a face which is none
of the best, there may dwell some air of probity and trust; as, on the
contrary, I have read, betwixt two beautiful eyes, menaces of a dangerous
and malignant nature. There are favourable physiognomies, so that in a
crowd of victorious enemies, you shall presently choose, amongst men you
never saw before, one rather than another to whom to surrender, and with
whom to intrust your life; and yet not properly upon the consideration of
beauty.
A person’s look is but a feeble warranty; and yet it is something
considerable too; and if I had to lash them, I would most severely
scourge the wicked ones who belie and betray the promises that nature has
planted in their foreheads; I should with greater severity punish malice
under a mild and gentle aspect. It seems as if there were some lucky and
some unlucky faces; and I believe there is some art in distinguishing
affable from merely simple faces, severe from rugged, malicious from
pensive, scornful from melancholic, and such other bordering qualities.
There are beauties which are not only haughty, but sour, and others that
are not only gentle, but more than that, insipid; to prognosticate from
them future events is a matter that I shall leave undecided.
I have, as I have said elsewhere as to my own concern, simply and
implicitly embraced this ancient rule, “That we cannot fail in following
Nature,” and that the sovereign precept is to conform ourselves to her.
I have not, as Socrates did, corrected my natural composition by the
force of reason, and have not in the least disturbed my inclination by
art; I have let myself go as I came: I contend not; my two principal
parts live, of their own accord, in peace and good intelligence, but my
nurse’s milk, thank God, was tolerably wholesome and good. Shall I say
this by the way, that I see in greater esteem than ‘tis worth, and in use
solely among ourselves, a certain image of scholastic probity, a slave to
precepts, and fettered with hope and fear? I would have it such as that
laws and religions should not make, but perfect and authorise it; that
finds it has wherewithal to support itself without help, born and rooted
in us from the seed of universal reason, imprinted in every man by
nature. That reason which strengthens Socrates from his vicious bend
renders him obedient to the gods and men of authority in his city:
courageous in death, not because his soul is immortal, but because he is
mortal. ‘Tis a doctrine ruinous to all government, and much more hurtful
than ingenious and subtle, which persuades the people that a religious
belief is alone sufficient, and without conduct, to satisfy the divine
justice. Use demonstrates to us a vast distinction betwixt devotion and
conscience.
I have a favourable aspect, both in form and in interpretation:
“Quid dixi, habere me? imo habui, Chreme.”
[“What did I say? that I have? no, Chremes, I had.”
--Terence, Heaut., act i., sec. 2, v. 42.]
“Heu! tantum attriti corporis ossa vides;”
[“Alas! of a worn body thou seest only the bones”]
and that makes a quite contrary show to that of Socrates. It has often
befallen me, that upon the mere credit of my presence and air, persons
who had no manner of knowledge of me have put a very great confidence in
me, whether in their own affairs or mine; and I have in foreign parts
thence obtained singular and rare favours. But the two following
examples are, peradventure, worth particular relation. A certain person
planned to surprise my house and me in it; his scheme was to come to my
gates alone, and to be importunate to be let in. I knew him by name,
and had fair reason to repose confidence in him, as being my neighbour
and something related to me. I caused the gates to be opened to him,
as I do to every one. There I found him, with every appearance of alarm,
his horse panting and very tired. He entertained me with this story:
“That, about half a league off, he had met with a certain enemy of his,
whom I also knew, and had heard of their quarrel; that his enemy had
given him a very brisk chase, and that having been surprised in disorder,
and his party being too weak, he had fled to my gates for refuge;
and that he was in great trouble for his followers, whom (he said) he
concluded to be all either dead or taken.” I innocently did my best to
comfort, assure, and refresh him. Shortly after came four or five of his
soldiers, who presented themselves in the same countenance and affright,
to get in too; and after them more, and still more, very well mounted and
armed, to the number of five-and-twenty or thirty, pretending that they
had the enemy at their heels. This mystery began a little to awaken my
suspicion; I was not ignorant what an age I lived in, how much my house
might be envied, and I had several examples of others of my acquaintance
to whom a mishap of this sort had happened. But thinking there was
nothing to be got by having begun to do a courtesy, unless I went through
with it, and that I could not disengage myself from them without spoiling
all, I let myself go the most natural and simple way, as I always do, and
invited them all to come in. And in truth I am naturally very little
inclined to suspicion and distrust; I willingly incline towards excuse
and the gentlest interpretation; I take men according to the common
order, and do not more believe in those perverse and unnatural
inclinations, unless convinced by manifest evidence, than I do in
monsters and miracles; and I am, moreover, a man who willingly commit
myself to Fortune, and throw myself headlong into her arms; and I have
hitherto found more reason to applaud than to blame myself for so doing,
having ever found her more discreet about, and a greater friend to, my
affairs than I am myself. There are some actions in my life whereof the
conduct may justly be called difficult, or, if you please, prudent; of
these, supposing the third part to have been my own, doubtless the other
two-thirds were absolutely hers. We make, methinks, a mistake in that we
do not enough trust Heaven with our affairs, and pretend to more from our
own conduct than appertains to us; and therefore it is that our designs
so often miscarry. Heaven is jealous of the extent that we attribute to
the right of human prudence above its own, and cuts it all the shorter by
how much the more we amplify it. The last comers remained on horseback
in my courtyard, whilst their leader, who was with me in the parlour,
would not have his horse put up in the stable, saying he should
immediately retire, so soon as he had news of his men. He saw himself
master of his enterprise, and nothing now remained but its execution.
He has since several times said (for he was not ashamed to tell the story
himself) that my countenance and frankness had snatched the treachery out
of his hands. He again mounted his horse; his followers, who had their
eyes intent upon him, to see when he would give the signal, being very
much astonished to find him come away and leave his prey behind him.
Another time, relying upon some truce just published in the army, I took
a journey through a very ticklish country. I had not ridden far, but I
was discovered, and two or three parties of horse, from various places,
were sent out to seize me; one of them overtook me on the third day, and
I was attacked by fifteen or twenty gentlemen in vizors, followed at a
distance by a band of foot-soldiers. I was taken, withdrawn into the
thick of a neighbouring forest, dismounted, robbed, my trunks rifled, my
money-box taken, and my horses and equipage divided amongst new masters.
We had, in this copse, a very long contest about my ransom, which they
set so high, that it was manifest that I was not known to them. They
were, moreover, in a very great debate about my life; and, in truth,
there were various circumstances that clearly showed the danger I was in:
“Tunc animis opus, AEnea, tunc pectore firmo.”
[“Then, AEneas, there is need of courage, of a firm heart.”
--AEneid, vi. 261.]
I still insisted upon the truce, too willing they should have the gain of
what they had already taken from me, which was not to be despised,
without promise of any other ransom. After two or three hours that we
had been in this place, and that they had mounted me upon a horse that
was not likely to run from them, and committed me to the guard of fifteen
or twenty harquebusiers, and dispersed my servants to others, having
given order that they should carry us away prisoners several ways, and I
being already got some two or three musket-shots from the place,
“Jam prece Pollucis, jam Castoris, implorata,”
[“By a prayer addressed now to Pollux, now to Castor.”
--Catullus, lxvi. 65.]
behold a sudden and unexpected alteration; I saw the chief return to me
with gentler language, making search amongst the troopers for my
scattered property, and causing as much as could be recovered to be
restored to me, even to my money-box; but the best present they made was
my liberty, for the rest did not much concern me at that time. The true
cause of so sudden a change, and of this reconsideration, without any
apparent impulse, and of so miraculous a repentance, in such a time, in a
planned and deliberate enterprise, and become just by usage (for, at the
first dash, I plainly confessed to them of what party I was, and whither
I was going), truly, I do not yet rightly understand. The most prominent
amongst them, who pulled off his vizor and told me his name, repeatedly
told me at the time, over and over again, that I owed my deliverance to
my countenance, and the liberty and boldness of my speech, that rendered
me unworthy of such a misadventure, and should secure me from its
repetition. ‘Tis possible that the Divine goodness willed to make use of
this vain instrument for my preservation; and it, moreover, defended me
the next day from other and worse ambushes, of which these my assailants
had given me warning. The last of these two gentlemen is yet living
himself to tell the story; the first was killed not long ago.
If my face did not answer for me, if men did not read in my eyes and in
my voice the innocence of intention, I had not lived so long without
quarrels and without giving offence, seeing the indiscreet whatever comes
into my head, and to judge so rashly of things. This way may, with
reason, appear uncivil, and ill adapted to our way of conversation; but
I have never met with any who judged it outrageous or malicious, or that
took offence at my liberty, if he had it from my own mouth; words
repeated have another kind of sound and sense. Nor do I hate any person;
and I am so slow to offend, that I cannot do it, even upon the account of
reason itself; and when occasion has required me to sentence criminals,
I have rather chosen to fail in point of justice than to do it:
“Ut magis peccari nolim, quam satis animi
ad vindicanda peccata habeam.”
[“So that I had rather men should not commit faults than that I
should have sufficient courage to condemn them.”---Livy, xxxix. 21.]
Aristotle, ‘tis said, was reproached for having been too merciful to a
wicked man: “I was indeed,” said he, “merciful to the man, but not to his
wickedness.” Ordinary judgments exasperate themselves to punishment by
the horror of the fact: but it cools mine; the horror of the first murder
makes me fear a second; and the deformity of the first cruelty makes me
abhor all imitation of it.’ That may be applied to me, who am but a
Squire of Clubs, which was said of Charillus, king of Sparta: “He cannot
be good, seeing he is not evil even to the wicked.” Or thus--for
Plutarch delivers it both these ways, as he does a thousand other things,
variously and contradictorily--“He must needs be good, because he is so
even to the wicked.” Even as in lawful actions I dislike to employ
myself when for such as are displeased at it; so, to say the truth, in
unlawful things I do not make conscience enough of employing myself when
it is for such as are willing.


ETEXT EDITOR’S BOOKMARKS:
A man should abhor lawsuits as much as he may
A person’s look is but a feeble warranty
Accept all things we are not able to refute
Admiration is the foundation of all philosophy
Advantageous, too, a little to recede from one’s right
All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice
Apt to promise something less than what I am able to do
As if anything were so common as ignorance
Authority of the number and antiquity of the witnesses
Best test of truth is the multitude of believers in a crowd
Books have not so much served me for instruction as exercise
Books of things that were never either studied or understood
Condemn the opposite affirmation equally
Courageous in death, not because his soul is immortal--Socrates
Death conduces more to birth and augmentation than to loss
Decree that says, “The court understands nothing of the matter”
Deformity of the first cruelty makes me abhor all imitation
Enters lightly into a quarrel is apt to go as lightly out of it
Establish this proposition by authority and huffing
Extend their anger and hatred beyond the dispute in question
Fabric goes forming and piling itself up from hand to hand
Fortune heaped up five or six such-like incidents
Hard to resolve a man’s judgment against the common opinions
Haste trips up its own heels, fetters, and stops itself
He cannot be good, seeing he is not evil even to the wicked
He who stops not the start will never be able to stop the course
“How many things,” said he, “I do not desire!”
How much easier is it not to enter in than it is to get out
I am a little tenderly distrustful of things that I wish
I am no longer in condition for any great change
I am not to be cuffed into belief
I am plain and heavy, and stick to the solid and the probable
I do not judge opinions by years
I ever justly feared to raise my head too high
I would as willingly be lucky as wise
If I stand in need of anger and inflammation, I borrow it
If they hear no noise, they think men sleep
Impose them upon me as infallible
Inconveniences that moderation brings (in civil war)
Lend himself to others, and only give himself to himself
Let not us seek illusions from without and unknown
“Little learning is needed to form a sound mind.”--Seneca
Long toleration begets habit; habit, consent and imitation
Men are not always to rely upon the personal confessions
Merciful to the man, but not to his wickedness--Aristotle
Miracles and strange events have concealed themselves from me
My humour is no friend to tumult
Nosegay of foreign flowers, having furnished nothing of my own
Not believe from one, I should not believe from a hundred
Nothing is so supple and erratic as our understanding
Number of fools so much exceeds the wise
Opinions we have are taken on authority and trust
Others adore all of their own side
Pitiful ways and expedients to the jugglers of the law
Prepare ourselves against the preparations of death
Profession of knowledge and their immeasurable self-conceit
Quiet repose and a profound sleep without dreams
Reasons often anticipate the effect
Refusin to justify, excuse, or explain myself
Remotest witness knows more about it than those who were nearest
Restoring what has been lent us, wit usury and accession
Richer than we think we are; but we are taught to borrow
Right of command appertains to the beautiful-Aristotle
Rude and quarrelsome flatly to deny a stated fact
Suffer my judgment to be made captive by prepossession
Swell and puff up their souls, and their natural way of speaking
Taught to be afraid of professing our ignorance
The last informed is better persuaded than the first
The mind grows costive and thick in growing old
The particular error first makes the public error
Their souls seek repose in agitation
They gently name them, so they patiently endure them (diseases)
Those oppressed with sorrow sometimes surprised by a smile
Threats of the day of judgment
Tis better to lean towards doubt than assurance--Augustine
Tis no matter; it may be of use to some others
To forbear doing is often as generous as to do
To kill men, a clear and strong light is required
Too contemptible to be punished
True liberty is to be able to do what a man will with himself
Vast distinction betwixt devotion and conscience
We have naturally a fear of pain, but not of death
What did I say? that I have? no, Chremes, I had
Who discern no riches but in pomp and show
Whoever will be cured of ignorance must confess it
Would have every one in his party blind or a blockhead
Wrong the just side when they go about to assist it with fraud
Yet at least for ambition’s sake, let us reject ambition



ESSAYS OF MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE
Translated by Charles Cotton
Edited by William Carew Hazlitt
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