{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_3592/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_3592","id":"gutenberg_3592","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3592","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Classics of Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","French essays -- Translations into English"],"text":"Produced by David Widger\n\n\n\n\n\nESSAYS OF MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE\n\nTranslated by Charles Cotton\n\nEdited by William Carew Hazilitt\n\n1877\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS OF VOLUME 12.\n\nXVIII.    Of giving the lie.\nXIX.      Of liberty of conscience.\nXX.       That we taste nothing pure.\nXXI.      Against idleness.\nXXII.     Of Posting.\nXXIII.    Of ill means employed to a good end.\nXXIV.     Of the Roman grandeur.\nXXV.      Not to counterfeit being sick.\nXXVI.     Of thumbs.\nXXVII.    Cowardice the mother of cruelty.\nXXVIII.   All things have their season.\nXXIX.     Of virtue.\nXXX.      Of a monstrous child.\nXXXI.     Of anger.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII\n\nOF GIVING THE LIE\n\nWell, but some one will say to me, this design of making a man's self the\nsubject of his writing, were indeed excusable in rare and famous men, who\nby their reputation had given others a curiosity to be fully informed of\nthem.  It is most true, I confess and know very well, that a mechanic\nwill scarce lift his eyes from his work to look at an ordinary man,\nwhereas a man will forsake his business and his shop to stare at an\neminent person when he comes into a town.  It misbecomes any other to\ngive his own character, but him who has qualities worthy of imitation,\nand whose life and opinions may serve for example: Caesar and Xenophon\nhad a just and solid foundation whereon to found their narrations, the\ngreatness of their own performances; and were to be wished that we had\nthe journals of Alexander the Great, the commentaries that Augustus,\nCato, Sylla, Brutus, and others left of their actions; of such persons\nmen love and contemplate the very statues even in copper and marble.\nThis remonstrance is very true; but it very little concerns me:\n\n         \"Non recito cuiquam, nisi amicis, idque coactus;\n          Non ubivis, coramve quibuslibet, in medio qui\n          Scripta foro recitant, sunt multi, quique lavantes.\"\n\n     [\"I repeat my poems only to my friends, and when bound to do so;\n     not before every one and everywhere; there are plenty of reciters\n     in the open market-place and at the baths.\"--Horace, sat. i. 4, 73.]\n\nI do not here form a statue to erect in the great square of a city, in a\nchurch, or any public place:\n\n         \"Non equidem hoc studeo, bullatis ut mihi nugis,\n          Pagina turgescat......\n          Secreti loquimur:\"\n\n     [\"I study not to make my pages swell with empty trifles;\n     you and I are talking in private.\"--Persius, Sat., v. 19.]\n\n'tis for some corner of a library, or to entertain a neighbour,\na kinsman, a friend, who has a mind to renew his acquaintance and\nfamiliarity with me in this image of myself.  Others have been encouraged\nto speak of themselves, because they found the subject worthy and rich;\nI, on the contrary, am the bolder, by reason the subject is so poor and\nsterile that I cannot be suspected of ostentation.  I judge freely of the\nactions of others; I give little of my own to judge of, because they are\nnothing: I do not find so much good in myself, that I cannot tell it\nwithout blushing.\n\nWhat contentment would it not be to me to hear any one thus relate to me\nthe manners, faces, countenances, the ordinary words and fortunes of my\nancestors? how attentively should I listen to it!  In earnest, it would\nbe evil nature to despise so much as the pictures of our friends and\npredecessors, the fashion of their clothes and arms.  I preserve their\nwriting, seal, and a particular sword they wore, and have not thrown the\nlong staves my father used to carry in his hand, out of my closet.\n\n          \"Paterna vestis, et annulus, tanto charior est\n          posteris, quanto erga parentes major affectus.\"\n\n     [\"A father's garment and ring is by so much dearer to his posterity,\n     as there is the greater affection towards parents.\"\n     --St. Aug., De Civat. Dei, i. 13.]\n\nIf my posterity, nevertheless, shall be of another mind, I shall be\navenged on them; for they cannot care less for me than I shall then do\nfor them.  All the traffic that I have in this with the public is, that I\nborrow their utensils of writing, which are more easy and most at hand;\nand in recompense shall, peradventure, keep a pound of butter in the\nmarket from melting in the sun:--[Montaigne semi-seriously speculates on\nthe possibility of his MS. being used to wrap up butter.]\n\n              \"Ne toga cordyllis, ne penula desit olivis;\n               Et laxas scombris saepe dabo tunicas;\"\n\n     [\"Let not wrappers be wanting to tunny-fish, nor olives;\n     and I shall supply loose coverings to mackerel.\"\n     --Martial, xiii.  I, I.]\n\nAnd though nobody should read me, have I wasted time in entertaining\nmyself so many idle hours in so pleasing and useful thoughts?  In\nmoulding this figure upon myself, I have been so often constrained to\ntemper and compose myself in a right posture, that the copy is truly\ntaken, and has in some sort formed itself; painting myself for others,\nI represent myself in a better colouring than my own natural complexion.\nI have no more made my book than my book has made me: 'tis a book\nconsubstantial with the author, of a peculiar design, a parcel of my\nlife, and whose business is not designed for others, as that of all other\nbooks is.  In giving myself so continual and so exact an account of\nmyself, have I lost my time?  For they who sometimes cursorily survey\nthemselves only, do not so strictly examine themselves, nor penetrate so\ndeep, as he who makes it his business, his study, and his employment, who\nintends a lasting record, with all his fidelity, and with all his force:\nThe most delicious pleasures digested within, avoid leaving any trace of\nthemselves, and avoid the sight not only of the people, but of any other\nperson.  How often has this work diverted me from troublesome thoughts?\nand all that are frivolous should be reputed so.  Nature has presented us\nwith a large faculty of entertaining ourselves alone; and often calls us\nto it, to teach us that we owe ourselves in part to society, but chiefly\nand mostly to ourselves.  That I may habituate my fancy even to meditate\nin some method and to some end, and to keep it from losing itself and\nroving at random, 'tis but to give to body and to record all the little\nthoughts that present themselves to it.  I give ear to my whimsies,\nbecause I am to record them.  It often falls out, that being displeased\nat some action that civility and reason will not permit me openly to\nreprove, I here disgorge myself, not without design of public\ninstruction: and also these poetical lashes,\n\n                   \"Zon zur l'oeil, ion sur le groin,\n                    Zon zur le dos du Sagoin,\"\n\n     [\"A slap on his eye, a slap on his snout, a slap on Sagoin's\n     back.\"--Marot. Fripelippes, Valet de Marot a Sagoin.]\n\n\nimprint themselves better upon paper than upon the flesh.  What if I\nlisten to books a little more attentively than ordinary, since I watch if\nI can purloin anything that may adorn or support my own?  I have not at\nall studied to make a book; but I have in some sort studied because I had\nmade it; if it be studying to scratch and pinch now one author, and then\nanother, either by the head or foot, not with any design to form opinions\nfrom them, but to assist, second, and fortify those I already have\nembraced. But whom shall we believe in the report he makes of himself in\nso corrupt an age?  considering there are so few, if, any at all, whom we\ncan believe when speaking of others, where there is less interest to lie.\nThe first thing done in the corruption of manners is banishing truth;\nfor, as Pindar says, to be true is the beginning of a great virtue, and\nthe first article that Plato requires in the governor of his Republic.\nThe truth of these days is not that which really is, but what every man\npersuades another man to believe; as we generally give the name of money\nnot only to pieces of the dust alloy, but even to the false also, if they\nwill pass.  Our nation has long been reproached with this vice; for\nSalvianus of Marseilles, who lived in the time of the Emperor\nValentinian, says that lying and forswearing themselves is with the\nFrench not a vice, but a way of speaking.  He who would enhance this\ntestimony, might say that it is now a virtue in them; men form and\nfashion themselves to it as to an exercise of honour; for dissimulation\nis one of the most notable qualities of this age.\n\nI have often considered whence this custom that we so religiously observe\nshould spring, of being more highly offended with the reproach of a vice\nso familiar to us than with any other, and that it should be the highest\ninsult that can in words be done us to reproach us with a lie.  Upon\nexamination, I find that it is natural most to defend the defects with\nwhich we are most tainted.  It seems as if by resenting and being moved\nat the accusation, we in some sort acquit ourselves of the fault; though\nwe have it in effect, we condemn it in outward appearance.  May it not\nalso be that this reproach seems to imply cowardice and feebleness of\nheart? of which can there be a more manifest sign than to eat a man's own\nwords--nay, to lie against a man's own knowledge?  Lying is a base vice;\na vice that one of the ancients portrays in the most odious colours when\nhe says, \"that it is to manifest a contempt of God, and withal a fear of\nmen.\"  It is not possible more fully to represent the horror, baseness,\nand irregularity of it; for what can a man imagine more hateful and\ncontemptible than to be a coward towards men, and valiant against his\nMaker?  Our intelligence being by no other way communicable to one\nanother but by a particular word, he who falsifies that betrays public\nsociety.  'Tis the only way by which we communicate our thoughts and\nwills; 'tis the interpreter of the soul, and if it deceive us, we no\nlonger know nor have further tie upon one another; if that deceive us, it\nbreaks all our correspondence, and dissolves all the ties of government.\nCertain nations of the newly discovered Indies (I need not give them\nnames, seeing they are no more; for, by wonderful and unheardof example,\nthe desolation of that conquest has extended to the utter abolition of\nnames and the ancient knowledge of places) offered to their gods human\nblood, but only such as was drawn from the tongue and ears, to expiate\nfor the sin of lying, as well heard as pronounced.  That good fellow of\nGreece--[Plutarch, Life of Lysander, c. 4.]--said that children are\namused with toys and men with words.\n\nAs to our diverse usages of giving the lie, and the laws of honour in\nthat case, and the alteration they have received, I defer saying what I\nknow of them to another time, and shall learn, if I can, in the\nmeanwhile, at what time the custom took beginning of so exactly weighing\nand measuring words, and of making our honour interested in them; for it\nis easy to judge that it was not anciently amongst the Romans and Greeks.\nAnd it has often seemed to me strange to see them rail at and give one\nanother the lie without any quarrel.  Their laws of duty steered some\nother course than ours.  Caesar is sometimes called thief, and sometimes\ndrunkard, to his teeth.  We see the liberty of invective they practised\nupon one another, I mean the greatest chiefs of war of both nations,\nwhere words are only revenged with words, and do not proceed any farther.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX\n\nOF LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE\n\n'Tis usual to see good intentions, if carried on without moderation, push\nmen on to very vicious effects.  In this dispute which has at this time\nengaged France in a civil war, the better and the soundest cause no doubt\nis that which maintains the ancient religion and government of the\nkingdom.  Nevertheless, amongst the good men of that party (for I do not\nspeak of those who only make a pretence of it, either to execute their\nown particular revenges or to gratify their avarice, or to conciliate the\nfavour of princes, but of those who engage in the quarrel out of true\nzeal to religion and a holy desire to maintain the peace and government\nof their country), of these, I say, we see many whom passion transports\nbeyond the bounds of reason, and sometimes inspires with counsels that\nare unjust and violent, and, moreover, rash.\n\nIt is certain that in those first times, when our religion began to gain\nauthority with the laws, zeal armed many against all sorts of pagan\nbooks, by which the learned suffered an exceeding great loss, a disorder\nthat I conceive to have done more prejudice to letters than all the\nflames of the barbarians.  Of this Cornelius Tacitus is a very good\ntestimony; for though the Emperor Tacitus, his kinsman, had, by express\norder, furnished all the libraries in the world with it, nevertheless one\nentire copy could not escape the curious examination of those who desired\nto abolish it for only five or six idle clauses that were contrary to our\nbelief.\n\nThey had also the trick easily to lend undue praises to all the emperors\nwho made for us, and universally to condemn all the actions of those who\nwere adversaries, as is evidently manifest in the Emperor Julian,\nsurnamed the Apostate,\n\n     [The character of the Emperor Julian was censured, when Montaigne\n     was at Rome in 1581, by the Master of the Sacred Palace, who,\n     however, as Montaigne tells us in his journal (ii.  35), referred it\n     to his conscience to alter what he should think in bad taste.  This\n     Montaigne did not do, and this chapter supplied Voltaire with the\n     greater part of the praises he bestowed upon the Emperor.--Leclerc.]\n\nwho was, in truth, a very great and rare man, a man in whose soul\nphilosophy was imprinted in the best characters, by which he professed to\ngovern all his actions; and, in truth, there is no sort of virtue of\nwhich he has not left behind him very notable examples: in chastity (of\nwhich the whole of his life gave manifest proof) we read the same of him\nthat was said of Alexander and Scipio, that being in the flower of his\nage, for he was slain by the Parthians at one-and-thirty, of a great many\nvery beautiful captives, he would not so much as look upon one.  As to\nhis justice, he took himself the pains to hear the parties, and although\nhe would out of curiosity inquire what religion they were of,\nnevertheless, the antipathy he had to ours never gave any counterpoise to\nthe balance.  He made himself several good laws, and repealed a great\npart of the subsidies and taxes levied by his predecessors.\n\nWe have two good historians who were eyewitnesses of his actions: one of\nwhom, Marcellinus, in several places of his history sharply reproves an\nedict of his whereby he interdicted all Christian rhetoricians and\ngrammarians to keep school or to teach, and says he could wish that act\nof his had been buried in silence: it is probable that had he done any\nmore severe thing against us, he, so affectionate as he was to our party,\nwould not have passed it over in silence.  He was indeed sharp against\nus, but yet no cruel enemy; for our own people tell this story of him,\nthat one day, walking about the city of Chalcedon, Maris, bishop of the\nplace; was so bold as to tell him that he was impious, and an enemy to\nChrist, at which, they say, he was no further moved than to reply,\n\"Go, poor wretch, and lament the loss of thy eyes,\" to which the bishop\nreplied again, \"I thank Jesus Christ for taking away my sight, that I may\nnot see thy impudent visage,\" affecting in that, they say, a\nphilosophical patience.  But this action of his bears no comparison to\nthe cruelty that he is said to have exercised against us.  \"He was,\" says\nEutropius,  my other witness, \"an enemy to Christianity,  but without\nputting his hand to blood.\"  And, to return to his justice, there is\nnothing in that whereof he can be accused, the severity excepted he\npractised in the beginning of his reign against those who had followed\nthe party of Constantius, his predecessor.  As to his sobriety, he lived\nalways a soldier-like life; and observed a diet and routine, like one\nthat prepared and inured himself to the austerities of war.  His\nvigilance was such, that he divided the night into three or four parts,\nof which the least was dedicated to sleep; the rest was spent either in\nvisiting the state of his army and guards in person, or in study; for\namongst other rare qualities, he was very excellent in all sorts of\nlearning.  'Tis said of Alexander the Great, that being in bed, for fear\nlest sleep should divert him from his thoughts and studies, he had always\na basin set by his bedside, and held one of his hands out with a ball of\ncopper in it, to the end, that, beginning to fall asleep, and his fingers\nleaving their hold, the ball by falling into the basin, might awake him.\nBut the other had his soul so bent upon what he had a mind to do, and so\nlittle disturbed with fumes by reason of his singular abstinence, that he\nhad no need of any such invention.  As to his military experience, he was\nexcellent in all the qualities of a great captain, as it was likely he\nshould, being almost all his life in a continual exercise of war, and\nmost of that time with us in France, against the Germans and Franks: we\nhardly read of any man who ever saw more dangers, or who made more\nfrequent proofs of his personal valour.\n\nHis death has something in it parallel with that of Epaminondas, for he\nwas wounded with an arrow, and tried to pull it out, and had done so, but\nthat, being edged, it cut and disabled his hand.  He incessantly called\nout that they should carry him again into the heat of the battle, to\nencourage his soldiers, who very bravely disputed the fight without him,\ntill night parted the armies.  He stood obliged to his philosophy for the\nsingular contempt he had for his life and all human things.  He had a\nfirm belief of the immortality of souls.\n\nIn matter of religion he was wrong throughout, and was surnamed the\nApostate for having relinquished ours: nevertheless, the opinion seems to\nme more probable, that he had never thoroughly embraced it, but had\ndissembled out of obedience to the laws, till he came to the empire.\nHe was in his own so superstitious, that he was laughed at for it by\nthose of his own time, of the same opinion, who jeeringly said, that had\nhe got the victory over the Parthians, he had destroyed the breed of oxen\nin the world to supply his sacrifices.  He was, moreover, besotted with\nthe art of divination, and gave authority to all sorts of predictions.\nHe said, amongst other things at his death, that he was obliged to the\ngods, and thanked them, in that they would not cut him off by surprise,\nhaving long before advertised him of the place and hour of his death, nor\nby a mean and unmanly death, more becoming lazy and delicate people; nor\nby a death that was languishing, long, and painful; and that they had\nthought him worthy to die after that noble manner, in the progress of his\nvictories, in the flower of his glory.  He had a vision like that of\nMarcus Brutus, that first threatened him in Gaul, and afterward appeared\nto him in Persia just before his death.  These words that some make him\nsay when he felt himself wounded: \"Thou hast overcome, Nazarene\"; or as\nothers, \"Content thyself, Nazarene\"; would hardly have been omitted, had\nthey been believed, by my witnesses, who, being present in the army, have\nset down to the least motions and words of his end; no more than certain\nother miracles that are reported about it.\n\nAnd to return to my subject, he long nourished, says Marcellinus,\npaganism in his heart; but all his army being Christians, he durst not\nown it.  But in the end, seeing himself strong enough to dare to discover\nhimself, he caused the temples of the gods to be thrown open, and did his\nuttermost to set on foot and to encourage idolatry.  Which the better to\neffect, having at Constantinople found the people disunited, and also the\nprelates of the church divided amongst themselves, having convened them\nall before him, he earnestly admonished them to calm those civil\ndissensions, and that every one might freely, and without fear, follow\nhis own religion.  Which he the more sedulously solicited, in hope that\nthis licence would augment the schisms and factions of their division,\nand hinder the people from reuniting, and consequently fortifying\nthemselves against him by their unanimous intelligence and concord;\nhaving experienced by the cruelty of some Christians, that there is no\nbeast in the world so much to be feared by man as man; these are very\nnearly his words.\n\nWherein this is very worthy of consideration, that the Emperor Julian\nmade use of the same receipt of liberty of conscience to inflame the\ncivil dissensions that our kings do to extinguish them.  So that a man\nmay say on one side, that to give the people the reins to entertain every\nman his own opinion, is to scatter and sow division, and, as it were, to\nlend a hand to augment it, there being no legal impediment or restraint\nto stop or hinder their career; but, on the other side, a man may also\nsay, that to give the people the reins to entertain every man his own\nopinion, is to mollify and appease them by facility and toleration, and\nto dull the point which is whetted and made sharper by singularity,\nnovelty, and difficulty: and I think it is better for the honour of the\ndevotion of our kings, that not having been able to do what they would,\nthey have made a show of being willing to do what they could.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX\n\nTHAT WE TASTE NOTHING PURE\n\nThe feebleness of our condition is such that things cannot, in their\nnatural simplicity and purity, fall into our use; the elements that we\nenjoy are changed, and so 'tis with metals; and gold must be debased with\nsome other matter to fit it for our service.  Neither has virtue, so\nsimple as that which Aristo, Pyrrho, and also the Stoics, made the end of\nlife; nor the Cyrenaic and Aristippic pleasure, been without mixture\nuseful to it.  Of the pleasure and goods that we enjoy, there is not one\nexempt from some mixture of ill and inconvenience:\n\n                         \"Medio de fonte leporum,\n          Surgit amari aliquid, quod in ipsis fioribus angat.\"\n\n     [\"From the very fountain of our pleasure, something rises that is\n     bitter, which even in flowers destroys.\"--Lucretius, iv. 1130.]\n\nOur extremest pleasure has some sort of groaning and complaining in it;\nwould you not say that it is dying of pain?  Nay, when we frame the image\nof it in its full excellence, we stuff it with sickly and painful\nepithets and qualities, languor, softness, feebleness, faintness,\n'morbidezza': a great testimony of their consanguinity and\nconsubstantiality.  The most profound joy has more of severity than\ngaiety, in it.  The highest and fullest contentment offers more of the\ngrave than of the merry:\n\n               \"Ipsa felicitas, se nisi temperat, premit.\"\n\n          [\"Even felicity, unless it moderate itself, oppresses?\"\n          --Seneca, Ep. 74.]\n\nPleasure chews and grinds us; according to the old Greek verse, which\nsays that the gods sell us all the goods they give us; that is to say,\nthat they give us nothing pure and perfect, and that we do not purchase\nbut at the price of some evil.\n\nLabour and pleasure, very unlike in nature, associate, nevertheless,\nby I know not what natural conjunction.  Socrates says, that some god\ntried to mix in one mass and to confound pain and pleasure, but not being\nable to do it; he bethought him at least to couple them by the tail.\nMetrodorus said, that in sorrow there is some mixture of pleasure.  I\nknow not whether or no he intended anything else by that saying; but for\nmy part, I am of opinion that there is design, consent, and complacency\nin giving a man's self up to melancholy. I say, that besides ambition,\nwhich may also have a stroke in the business, there is some shadow of\ndelight and delicacy which smiles upon and flatters us even in the very\nlap of melancholy.  Are there not some constitutions that feed upon it?\n\n                    \"Est quaedam flere voluptas;\"\n\n               [\"'Tis a certain kind of pleasure to weep.\"\n               --Ovid, Trist., iv.  3, 27.]\n\nand one Attalus in Seneca says, that the memory of our lost friends is as\ngrateful to us, as bitterness in wine, when too old, is to the palate:\n\n                    \"Minister vetuli, puer, Falerni\n                    Inger' mi calices amariores\"--\n\n     [\"Boy, when you pour out old Falernian wine, the bitterest put\n     into my bowl.\"--Catullus, xxvii. I.]\n\nand as apples that have a sweet tartness.\n\nNature discovers this confusion to us; painters hold that the same\nmotions and grimaces of the face that serve for weeping; serve for\nlaughter too; and indeed, before the one or the other be finished, do but\nobserve the painter's manner of handling, and you will be in doubt to\nwhich of the two the design tends; and the extreme of laughter does at\nlast bring tears:\n\n               \"Nullum sine auctoramento malum est.\"\n\n          [\"No evil is without its compensation.\"--Seneca, Ep., 69.]\n\nWhen I imagine man abounding with all the conveniences that are to be\ndesired (let us put the case that all his members were always seized with\na pleasure like that of generation, in its most excessive height) I feel\nhim melting under the weight of his delight, and see him utterly unable\nto support so pure, so continual, and so universal a pleasure.  Indeed,\nhe is running away whilst he is there, and naturally makes haste to\nescape, as from a place where he cannot stand firm, and where he is\nafraid of sinking.\n\nWhen I religiously confess myself to myself, I find that the best virtue\nI have has in it some tincture of vice; and I am afraid that Plato, in\nhis purest virtue (I, who am as sincere and loyal a lover of virtue of\nthat stamp as any other whatever), if he had listened and laid his ear\nclose to himself and he did so no doubt--would have heard some jarring\nnote of human mixture, but faint and only perceptible to himself.  Man is\nwholly and throughout but patch and motley.  Even the laws of justice\nthemselves cannot subsist without mixture of injustice; insomuch that\nPlato says, they undertake to cut off the hydra's head, who pretend to\nclear the law of all inconveniences:\n\n          \"Omne magnum exemplum habet aliquid ex iniquo,\n          quod contra singulos utilitate publics rependitur,\"\n\n     [\"Every great example has in it some mixture of injustice, which\n     recompenses the wrong done to particular men by the public utility.\"\n     --Annals, xiv. 44.]\n\nsays Tacitus.\n\nIt is likewise true, that for the use of life and the service of public\ncommerce, there may be some excesses in the purity and perspicacity of\nour minds; that penetrating light has in it too much of subtlety and\ncuriosity: we must a little stupefy and blunt them to render them more\nobedient to example and practice, and a little veil and obscure them, the\nbetter to proportion them to this dark and earthly life.  And therefore\ncommon and less speculative souls are found to be more proper for and\nmore successful in the management of affairs, and the elevated and\nexquisite opinions of philosophy unfit for business.  This sharp vivacity\nof soul, and the supple and restless volubility attending it, disturb our\nnegotiations.  We are to manage human enterprises more superficially and\nroughly, and leave a great part to fortune; it is not necessary to\nexamine affairs with so much subtlety and so deep: a man loses himself in\nthe consideration of many contrary lustres, and so many various forms:\n\n     \"Volutantibus res inter se pugnantes, obtorpuerunt.... animi.\"\n\n     [\"Whilst they considered of things so indifferent in themselves,\n     they were astonished, and knew not what to do.\"--Livy, xxxii. 20.]\n\n'Tis what the ancients say of Simonides, that by reason his imagination\nsuggested to him, upon the question King Hiero had put to him--[What God\nwas.--Cicero, De Nat.  Deor., i.  22.]--(to answer which he had had many\ndays for thought), several sharp and subtle considerations, whilst he\ndoubted which was the most likely, he totally despaired of the truth.\n\nHe who dives into and in his inquisition comprehends all circumstances\nand consequences, hinders his election: a little engine well handled is\nsufficient for executions, whether of less or greater weight.  The best\nmanagers are those who can worst give account how they are so; while the\ngreatest talkers, for the most part, do nothing to purpose; I know one of\nthis sort of men, and a most excellent discourser upon all sorts of good\nhusbandry, who has miserably let a hundred thousand livres yearly revenue\nslip through his hands; I know another who talks, who better advises than\nany man of his counsel, and there is not in the world a fairer show of\nsoul and understanding than he has; nevertheless, when he comes to the\ntest, his servants find him quite another thing; not to make any mention\nof his misfortunes.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI\n\nAGAINST IDLENESS\n\nThe Emperor Vespasian, being sick of the disease whereof he died, did not\nfor all that neglect to inquire after the state of the empire, and even\nin bed continually despatched very many affairs of great consequence; for\nwhich, being reproved by his physician, as a thing prejudicial to his\nhealth, \"An emperor,\" said he, \"must die standing.\"  A fine saying, in my\nopinion, and worthy a great prince.  The Emperor Adrian since made use of\nthe same words, and kings should be often put in mind of them, to make\nthem know that the great office conferred upon them of the command of so\nmany men, is not an employment of ease; and that there is nothing can so\njustly disgust a subject, and make him unwilling to expose himself to\nlabour and danger for the service of his prince, than to see him, in the\nmeantime, devoted to his ease and frivolous amusement, and to be\nsolicitous of his preservation who so much neglects that of his people.\n\nWhoever will take upon him to maintain that 'tis better for a prince to\ncarry on his wars by others, than in his own person, fortune will furnish\nhim with examples enough of those whose lieutenants have brought great\nenterprises to a happy issue, and of those also whose presence has done\nmore hurt than good: but no virtuous and valiant prince can with patience\nendure so dishonourable councils.  Under colour of saving his head, like\nthe statue of a saint, for the happiness of his kingdom, they degrade him\nfrom and declare him incapable of his office, which is military\nthroughout: I know one--[Probably Henry IV.]--who had much rather be\nbeaten, than to sleep whilst another fights for him; and who never\nwithout jealousy heard of any brave thing done even by his own officers\nin his absence.  And Soliman I. said, with very good reason, in my\nopinion, that victories obtained without the master were never complete.\nMuch more would he have said that that master ought to blush for shame,\nto pretend to any share in the honour, having contributed nothing to the\nwork, but his voice and thought; nor even so much as these, considering\nthat in such work as that, the direction and command that deserve honour\nare only such as are given upon the spot, and in the heat of the\nbusiness.  No pilot performs his office by standing still.  The princes\nof the Ottoman family, the chiefest in the world in military fortune,\nhave warmly embraced this opinion, and Bajazet II., with his son, who\nswerved from it, spending their time in science and other retired\nemployments, gave great blows to their empire; and Amurath III., now\nreigning, following their example, begins to find the same.  Was it not\nEdward III., King of England, who said this of our Charles V.: \"There\nnever was king who so seldom put on his armour, and yet never king who\ngave me so much to do.\"  He had reason to think it strange, as an effect\nof chance more than of reason.  And let those seek out some other to join\nwith them than me, who will reckon the Kings of Castile and Portugal\namongst the warlike and magnanimous conquerors, because at the distance\nof twelve hundred leagues from their lazy abode, by the conduct of their\ncaptains, they made themselves masters of both Indies; of which it has to\nbe known if they would have had even the courage to go and in person\nenjoy them.\n\nThe Emperor Julian said yet further, that a philosopher and a brave man\nought not so much as to breathe; that is to say, not to allow any more to\nbodily necessities than what we cannot refuse; keeping the soul and body\nstill intent and busy about honourable, great, and virtuous things.  He\nwas ashamed if any one in public saw him spit, or sweat (which is said by\nsome, also, of the Lacedaemonian young men, and which Xenophon says of\nthe Persian), forasmuch as he conceived that exercise, continual labour,\nand sobriety, ought to have dried up all those superfluities.  What\nSeneca says will not be unfit for this place; which is, that the ancient\nRomans kept their youth always standing, and taught them nothing that\nthey were to learn sitting.\n\n'Tis a generous desire to wish to die usefully and like a man, but the\neffect lies not so much in our resolution as in our good fortune; a\nthousand have proposed to themselves in battle, either to overcome or to\ndie, who have failed both in the one and the other, wounds and\nimprisonment crossing their design and compelling them to live against\ntheir will.  There are diseases that overthrow even our desires, and our\nknowledge.  Fortune ought not to second the vanity of the Roman legions,\nwho bound themselves by oath, either to overcome or die:\n\n     \"Victor, Marce Fabi, revertar ex acie: si fallo, Jovem patrem,\n     Gradivumque Martem aliosque iratos invoco deos.\"\n\n     [\"I will return, Marcus Fabius, a conqueror, from the fight:\n     and if I fail, I invoke Father Jove, Mars Gradivus, and the\n     other angry gods.\"--Livy, ii. 45.]\n\nThe Portuguese say that in a certain place of their conquest of the\nIndies, they met with soldiers who had condemned themselves, with\nhorrible execrations, to enter into no other composition but either to\ncause themselves to be slain, or to remain victorious; and had their\nheads and beards shaved in token of this vow.  'Tis to much purpose for\nus to hazard ourselves and to be obstinate: it seems as if blows avoided\nthose who present themselves too briskly to them, and do not willingly\nfall upon those who too willingly seek them, and so defeat them of their\ndesign.  Such there have been, who, after having tried all ways, not\nhaving been able with all their endeavour to obtain the favour of dying\nby the hand of the enemy, have been constrained, to make good their\nresolution of bringing home the honour of victory or of losing their\nlives, to kill themselves even in the heat of battle.  Of which there are\nother examples, but this is one: Philistus, general of the naval army of\nDionysius the younger against the Syracusans, presented them battle which\nwas sharply disputed, their forces being equal: in this engagement, he\nhad the better at the first, through his own valour: but the Syracusans\ndrawing about his gally to environ him, after having done great things in\nhis own person to disengage himself and hoping for no relief, with his\nown hand he took away the life he had so liberally, and in vain, exposed\nto the enemy.\n\nMule Moloch, king of Fez, who lately won against Sebastian, king of\nPortugal, the battle so famous for the death of three kings, and for the\ntransmission of that great kingdom to the crown of Castile, was extremely\nsick when the Portuguese entered in an hostile manner into his dominions;\nand from that day forward grew worse and worse, still drawing nearer to\nand foreseeing his end; yet never did man better employ his own\nsufficiency more vigorously and bravely than he did upon this occasion.\nHe found himself too weak to undergo the pomp and ceremony of entering.\ninto his camp, which after their manner is very magnificent, and\ntherefore resigned that honour to his brother; but this was all of the\noffice of a general that he resigned; all the rest of greatest utility\nand necessity he most, exactly and gloriously performed in his own\nperson; his body lying upon a couch, but his judgment and courage upright\nand firm to his last gasp, and in some sort beyond it.  He might have\nwasted his enemy, indiscreetly advanced into his dominions, without\nstriking a blow; and it was a very unhappy occurrence, that for want of a\nlittle life or somebody to substitute in the conduct of this war and the\naffairs of a troubled state, he was compelled to seek a doubtful and\nbloody victory, having another by a better and surer way already in his\nhands.  Notwithstanding, he wonderfully managed the continuance of his\nsickness in consuming the enemy, and in drawing them far from the\nassistance of the navy and the ports they had on the coast of Africa,\neven till the last day of his life, which he designedly reserved for this\ngreat battle.  He arranged his battalions in a circular form, environing\nthe Portuguese army on every side, which round circle coming to close in\nand to draw up close together, not only hindered them in the conflict\n(which was very sharp through the valour of the young invading king),\nconsidering that they had every way to present a front, but prevented\ntheir flight after the defeat, so that finding all passages possessed and\nshut up by the enemy, they were constrained to close up together again:\n\n          \"Coacerventurque non solum caede, sed etiam fuga,\"\n\n          [\"Piled up not only in slaughter but in flight.\"]\n\nand there they were slain in heaps upon one another, leaving to the\nconqueror a very bloody and entire victory.  Dying, he caused himself to\nbe carried and hurried from place to place where most need was, and\npassing along the files, encouraged the captains and soldiers one after\nanother; but a corner of his main battalions being broken, he was not to\nbe held from mounting on horseback with his sword in his hand; he did his\nutmost to break from those about him, and to rush into the thickest of\nthe battle, they all the while withholding him, some by the bridle, some\nby his robe, and others by his stirrups.  This last effort totally\noverwhelmed the little life he had left; they again laid him upon his\nbed; but coming to himself, and starting as it were out of his swoon, all\nother faculties failing, to give his people notice that they were to\nconceal his death the most necessary command he had then to give, that\nhis soldiers might not be discouraged (with the news) he expired with his\nfinger upon his mouth, the ordinary sign of keeping silence.  Who ever\nlived so long and so far into death? whoever died so erect, or more like\na man?\n\nThe most extreme degree of courageously treating death, and the most\nnatural, is to look upon it not only without astonishment but without\ncare, continuing the wonted course of life even into it, as Cato did,\nwho entertained himself in study, and went to sleep, having a violent and\nbloody death in his heart, and the weapon in his hand with which he was\nresolved to despatch himself.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII\n\nOF POSTING\n\nI have been none of the least able in this exercise, which is proper for\nmen of my pitch, well-knit and short; but I give it over; it shakes us\ntoo much to continue it long.  I was at this moment reading,  that King\nCyrus, the better to have news brought him from all parts of the empire,\nwhich was of a vast extent, caused it to be tried how far a horse could\ngo in a day without baiting, and at that distance appointed men, whose\nbusiness it was to have horses always in readiness, to mount those who\nwere despatched to him; and some say, that this swift way of posting is\nequal to that of the flight of cranes.\n\nCaesar says, that Lucius Vibullius Rufus, being in great haste to carry\nintelligence to Pompey, rode night and day, still taking fresh horses for\nthe greater diligence and speed; and he himself, as Suetonius reports,\ntravelled a hundred miles a day in a hired coach; but he was a furious\ncourier, for where the rivers stopped his way he passed them by swimming,\nwithout turning out of his way to look for either bridge or ford.\nTiberius Nero, going to see his brother Drusus, who was sick in Germany,\ntravelled two hundred miles in four-and-twenty hours, having three\ncoaches.  In the war of the Romans against King Antiochus, T. Sempronius\nGracchus, says Livy:\n\n         \"Per dispositos equos prope incredibili celeritate\n          ab Amphissa tertio die Pellam pervenit.\"\n\n     [\"By pre-arranged relays of horses, he, with an almost incredible\n     speed, rode in three days from Amphissa to Pella.\"\n     --Livy, xxxvii. 7.]\n\nAnd it appears that they were established posts, and not horses purposely\nlaid in upon this occasion.\n\nCecina's invention to send back news to his family was much more quick,\nfor he took swallows along with him from home, and turned them out\ntowards their nests when he would send back any news; setting a mark of\nsome colour upon them to signify his meaning, according to what he and\nhis people had before agreed upon.\n\nAt the theatre at Rome masters of families carried pigeons in their\nbosoms to which they tied letters when they had a mind to send any orders\nto their people at home; and the pigeons were trained up to bring back an\nanswer.  D. Brutus made use of the same device when besieged in Modena,\nand others elsewhere have done the same.\n\nIn Peru they rode post upon men, who took them upon their shoulders in a\ncertain kind of litters made for that purpose, and ran with such agility\nthat, in their full speed, the first couriers transferred their load to\nthe second without making any stop.\n\nI understand that the Wallachians, the grand Signior's couriers, perform\nwonderful journeys, by reason they have liberty to dismount the first\nperson they meet upon the road, giving him their own tired horses; and\nthat to preserve themselves from being weary, they gird themselves\nstraight about the middle with a broad girdle;  but I could never find\nany benefit from this.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII\n\nOF ILL MEANS EMPLOYED TO A GOOD END\n\nThere is wonderful relation and correspondence in this universal\ngovernment of the works of nature, which very well makes it appear that\nit is neither accidental nor carried on by divers masters.  The diseases\nand conditions of our bodies are, in like manner, manifest in states and\ngovernments; kingdoms and republics are founded, flourish, and decay with\nage as we do.  We are subject to a repletion of humours, useless and\ndangerous: whether of those that are good (for even those the physicians\nare afraid of; and seeing we have nothing in us that is stable, they say\nthat a too brisk and vigorous perfection of health must be abated by art,\nlest our nature, unable to rest in any certain condition, and not having\nwhither to rise to mend itself, make too sudden and too disorderly a\nretreat; and therefore prescribe wrestlers to purge and bleed, to qualify\nthat superabundant health), or else a repletion of evil humours, which is\nthe ordinary cause of sickness.  States are very often sick of the like\nrepletion, and various sorts of purgations have commonly been applied.\nSome times a great multitude of families are turned out to clear the\ncountry, who seek out new abodes elsewhere and encroach upon others.\nAfter this manner our ancient Franks came from the remotest part of\nGermany to seize upon Gaul, and to drive thence the first inhabitants;\nso was that infinite deluge of men made up who came into Italy under the\nconduct of Brennus and others; so the Goths and Vandals, and also the\npeople who now possess Greece, left their native country to go settle\nelsewhere, where they might have more room; and there are scarce two or\nthree little corners in the world that have not felt the effect of such\nremovals.  The Romans by this means erected their colonies; for,\nperceiving their city to grow immeasurably populous, they eased it of the\nmost unnecessary people, and sent them to inhabit and cultivate the lands\nconquered by them; sometimes also they purposely maintained wars with\nsome of their enemies, not only to keep their own men in action, for fear\nlest idleness, the mother of corruption, should bring upon them some\nworse inconvenience:\n\n              \"Et patimur longae pacis mala; saevior armis\n               Luxuria incumbit.\"\n\n     [\"And we suffer the ills of a long peace; luxury is more pernicious\n     than war.\"--Juvenal, vi. 291.]\n\nbut also to serve for a blood-letting to their Republic, and a little to\nevaporate the too vehement heat of their youth, to prune and clear the\nbranches from the stock too luxuriant in wood; and to this end it was\nthat they maintained so long a war with Carthage.\n\nIn the treaty of Bretigny, Edward III., king of England, would not, in\nthe general peace he then made with our king, comprehend the controversy\nabout the Duchy of Brittany, that he might have a place wherein to\ndischarge himself of his soldiers, and that the vast number of English he\nhad brought over to serve him in his expedition here might not return\nback into England.  And this also was one reason why our King Philip\nconsented to send his son John upon a foreign expedition, that he might\ntake along with him a great number of hot young men who were then in his\npay.\n\nThere--are many in our times who talk at this rate, wishing that\nthis hot emotion that is now amongst us might discharge itself in some\nneighbouring war, for fear lest all the peccant humours that now reign in\nthis politic body of ours may diffuse themselves farther, keep the fever\nstill in the height, and at last cause our total ruin; and, in truth, a\nforeign is much more supportable than a civil war, but I do not believe\nthat God will favour so unjust a design as to offend and quarrel with\nothers for our own advantage:\n\n              \"Nil mihi tam valde placeat, Rhamnusia virgo,\n               Quod temere invitis suscipiatur heris.\"\n\n     [\"Rhamnusian virgin, let nothing ever so greatly please me which is\n     taken without justice from the unwilling owners\"\n     --Catullus, lxviii. 77.]\n\nAnd yet the weakness of our condition often pushes us upon the necessity\nof making use of ill means to a good end.  Lycurgus, the most perfect\nlegislator that ever was, virtuous and invented this very unjust practice\nof making the helots, who were their slaves, drunk by force, to the end\nthat the Spartans, seeing them so lost and buried in wine, might abhor\nthe excess of this vice.  And yet those were still more to blame who of\nold gave leave that criminals, to what sort of death soever condemned,\nshould be cut up alive by the physicians, that they might make a true\ndiscovery of our inward parts, and build their art upon greater\ncertainty; for, if we must run into excesses, it is more excusable to do\nit for the health of the soul than that of the body; as the Romans\ntrained up the people to valour and the contempt of dangers and death by\nthose furious spectacles of gladiators and fencers, who, having to fight\nit out to the last, cut, mangled, and killed one another in their\npresence:\n\n         \"Quid vesani aliud sibi vult ars impia ludi,\n          Quid mortes juvenum, quid sanguine pasta voluptas?\"\n\n     [\"What other end does the impious art of the gladiators propose to\n     itself, what the slaughter of young men, what pleasure fed with\n     blood.\"--Prudentius, Contra Symmachum, ii. 643.]\n\nand this custom continued till the Emperor Theodosius' time:\n\n         \"Arripe dilatam tua, dux, in tempora famam,\n          Quodque patris superest, successor laudis habeto\n          Nullus in urbe cadat, cujus sit poena voluptas....\n          Jam solis contenta feris, infamis arena\n          Nulla cruentatis homicidia ludat in armis.\"\n\n     [\"Prince, take the honours delayed for thy reign, and be successor\n     to thy fathers; henceforth let none at Rome be slain for sport.  Let\n     beasts' blood stain the infamous arena, and no more homicides be\n     there acted.\"--Prudentius, Contra Symmachum, ii. 643.]\n\nIt was, in truth, a wonderful example, and of great advantage for the\ntraining up the people, to see every day before their eyes a hundred; two\nhundred, nay, a thousand couples of men armed against one another, cut\none another to pieces with so great a constancy of courage, that they\nwere never heard to utter so much as one syllable of weakness or\ncommiseration; never seen to turn their backs, nor so much as to make one\ncowardly step to evade a blow, but rather exposed their necks to the\nadversary's sword and presented themselves to receive the stroke; and\nmany of them, when wounded to death, have sent to ask the spectators if\nthey were satisfied with their behaviour, before they lay down to die\nupon the place.  It was not enough for them to fight and to die bravely,\nbut cheerfully too; insomuch that they were hissed and cursed if they\nmade any hesitation about receiving their death.  The very girls\nthemselves set them on:\n\n              \"Consurgit ad ictus,\n               Et, quoties victor ferrum jugulo inserit, illa\n               Delicias ait esse suas, pectusque jacentis\n               Virgo modesta jubet converso pollice rumpi.\"\n\n     [\"The modest virgin is so delighted with the sport, that she\n     applauds the blow, and when the victor bathes his sword in his\n     fellow's throat, she says it is her pleasure, and with turned thumb\n     orders him to rip up the bosom of the prostrate victim.\"\n     --Prudentius, Contra Symmachum, ii. 617.]\n\nThe first Romans only condemned criminals to this example: but they\nafterwards employed innocent slaves in the work, and even freemen too,\nwho sold themselves to this purpose, nay, moreover, senators and knights\nof Rome, and also women:\n\n         \"Nunc caput in mortem vendunt, et funus arena,\n          Atque hostem sibi quisque parat, cum bella quiescunt.\"\n\n     [\"They sell themselves to death and the circus, and, since the wars\n     are ceased, each for himself a foe prepares.\"\n     --Manilius, Astron., iv. 225.]\n\n              \"Hos inter fremitus novosque lusus....\n               Stat sexus rudis insciusque ferri,\n               Et pugnas capit improbus viriles;\"\n\n\n     [\"Amidst these tumults and new sports, the tender sex, unskilled in\n     arms, immodestly engaged in manly fights.\"\n     --Statius, Sylv., i. 6, 51.]\n\nwhich I should think strange and incredible, if we were not accustomed\nevery day to see in our own wars many thousands of men of other nations,\nfor money to stake their blood and their lives in quarrels wherein they\nhave no manner of concern.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV\n\nOF THE ROMAN GRANDEUR\n\nI will only say a word or two of this infinite argument, to show the\nsimplicity of those who compare the pitiful greatness of these times with\nthat of Rome.  In the seventh book of Cicero's Familiar Epistles (and let\nthe grammarians put out that surname of familiar if they please, for in\ntruth it is not very suitable; and they who, instead of familiar, have\nsubstituted \"ad Familiares,\" may gather something to justify them for so\ndoing out of what Suetonius says in the Life of Caesar, that there was a\nvolume of letters of his \"ad Familiares \") there is one directed to\nCaesar, then in Gaul, wherein Cicero repeats these words, which were in\nthe end of another letter that Caesar had written to him: \"As to what\nconcerns Marcus Furius, whom you have recommended to me, I will make him\nking of Gaul, and if you would have me advance any other friend of yours\nsend him to me.\"  It was no new thing for a simple citizen of Rome, as\nCaesar then was, to dispose of kingdoms, for he took away that of King\nDeiotarus from him to give it to a gentleman of the city of Pergamus,\ncalled Mithridates; and they who wrote his Life record several cities\nsold by him; and Suetonius says, that he had once from King Ptolemy three\nmillions and six hundred thousand crowns, which was very like selling him\nhis own kingdom:\n\n          \"Tot Galatae, tot Pontus, tot Lydia, nummis.\"\n\n          [\"So much for Galatia, so much for Pontus,\n          so much for Lydia.\"--Claudius in Eutrop., i. 203.]\n\nMarcus Antonius said, that the greatness of the people of Rome was not\nso much seen in what they took, as in what they gave; and, indeed, some\nages before Antonius, they had dethroned one amongst the rest with so\nwonderful authority, that in all the Roman history I have not observed\nanything that more denotes the height of their power.  Antiochus\npossessed all Egypt, and was, moreover, ready to conquer Cyprus and other\nappendages of that empire: when being upon the progress of his victories,\nC. Popilius came to him from the Senate, and at their first meeting\nrefused to take him by the hand, till he had first read his letters,\nwhich after the king had read, and told him he would consider of them,\nPopilius made a circle about him with his cane, saying:--\"Return me an\nanswer, that I may carry it back to the Senate, before thou stirrest out\nof this circle.\"   Antiochus, astonished at the roughness of so positive\na command, after a little pause, replied, \"I will obey the Senate's\ncommand.\"  Then Popilius saluted him as friend of the Roman people.\nTo have renounced claim to so great a monarchy, and a course of such\nsuccessful fortune, from the effects of three lines in writing!  Truly\nhe had reason, as he afterwards did, to send the Senate word by his\nambassadors, that he had received their order with the same respect as if\nit had come from the immortal gods.\n\nAll the kingdoms that Augustus gained by the right of war, he either\nrestored to those who had lost them or presented them to strangers.  And\nTacitus, in reference to this, speaking of Cogidunus, king of England,\ngives us, by a marvellous touch, an instance of that infinite power: the\nRomans, says he, were from all antiquity accustomed to leave the kings\nthey had subdued in possession of their kingdoms under their authority.\n\n          \"Ut haberent instruments servitutis et reges.\"\n\n     [\"That they might have even kings to be their slaves.\"\n     --Livy, xlv. 13.]\n\n'Tis probable that Solyman, whom we have seen make a gift of Hungary and\nother principalities, had therein more respect to this consideration than\nto that he was wont to allege, viz., that he was glutted and overcharged\nwith so many monarchies and so much dominion, as his own valour and that\nof his ancestors had acquired.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV\n\nNOT TO COUNTERFEIT BEING SICK\n\nThere is an epigram in Martial, and one of the very good ones--for he has\nof all sorts--where he pleasantly tells the story of Caelius, who, to\navoid making his court to some great men of Rome, to wait their rising,\nand to attend them abroad, pretended to have the gout; and the better to\ncolour this anointed his legs, and had them lapped up in a great many\nswathings, and perfectly counterfeited both the gesture and countenance\nof a gouty person; till in the end, Fortune did him the kindness to make\nhim one indeed:\n\n              \"Quantum curs potest et ars doloris\n               Desiit fingere Caelius podagram.\"\n\n     [\"How great is the power of counterfeiting pain: Caelius has ceased\n     to feign the gout; he has got it.\"--Martial, Ep., vii. 39, 8.]\n\nI think I have read somewhere in Appian a story like this, of one who to\nescape the proscriptions of the triumvirs of Rome, and the better to be\nconcealed from the discovery of those who pursued him, having hidden\nhimself in a disguise, would yet add this invention, to counterfeit\nhaving but one eye; but when he came to have a little more liberty, and\nwent to take off the plaster he had a great while worn over his eye, he\nfound he had totally lost the sight of it indeed, and that it was\nabsolutely gone.  'Tis possible that the action of sight was dulled from\nhaving been so long without exercise, and that the optic power was wholly\nretired into the other eye: for we evidently perceive that the eye we\nkeep shut sends some part of its virtue to its fellow, so that it will\nswell and grow bigger; and so inaction, with the heat of ligatures and,\nplasters, might very well have brought some gouty humour upon the\ncounterfeiter in Martial.\n\nReading in Froissart the vow of a troop of young English gentlemen, to\nkeep their left eyes bound up till they had arrived in France and\nperformed some notable exploit upon us, I have often been tickled with\nthis thought, that it might have befallen them as it did those others,\nand they might have returned with but an eye a-piece to their mistresses,\nfor whose sakes they had made this ridiculous vow.\n\nMothers have reason to rebuke their children when they counterfeit having\nbut one eye, squinting, lameness, or any other personal defect; for,\nbesides that their bodies being then so tender, may be subject to take an\nill bent, fortune, I know not how, sometimes seems to delight in taking\nus at our word; and I have heard several examples related of people who\nhave become really sick, by only feigning to be so.  I have always used,\nwhether on horseback or on foot, to carry a stick in my hand, and even to\naffect doing it with an elegant air; many have threatened that this fancy\nwould one day be turned into necessity: if so, I should be the first of\nmy family to have the gout.\n\nBut let us a little lengthen this chapter, and add another anecdote\nconcerning blindness.  Pliny reports of one who, dreaming he was blind,\nfound himself so indeed in the morning without any preceding infirmity in\nhis eyes.  The force of imagination might assist in this case, as I have\nsaid elsewhere, and Pliny seems to be of the same opinion; but it is more\nlikely that the motions which the body felt within, of which physicians,\nif they please, may find out the cause, taking away his sight, were the\noccasion of his dream.\n\nLet us add another story, not very improper for this subject, which\nSeneca relates in one of his epistles: \"You know,\" says he, writing to\nLucilius, \"that Harpaste, my wife's fool, is thrown upon me as an\nhereditary charge, for I have naturally an aversion to those monsters;\nand if I have a mind to laugh at a fool, I need not seek him far; I can\nlaugh at myself.  This fool has suddenly lost her sight: I tell you a\nstrange, but a very true thing she is not sensible that she is blind, but\neternally importunes her keeper to take her abroad, because she says the\nhouse is dark.  That what we laugh at in her, I pray you to believe,\nhappens to every one of us: no one knows himself to be avaricious or\ngrasping; and, again, the blind call for a guide, while we stray of our\nown accord.  I am not ambitious, we say; but a man cannot live otherwise\nat Rome; I am not wasteful, but the city requires a great outlay; 'tis\nnot my fault if I am choleric--if I have not yet established any certain\ncourse of life: 'tis the fault of youth.  Let us not seek our disease out\nof ourselves; 'tis in us, and planted in our bowels; and the mere fact\nthat we do not perceive ourselves to be sick, renders us more hard to be\ncured.  If we do not betimes begin to see to ourselves, when shall we\nhave provided for so many wounds and evils wherewith we abound?  And yet\nwe have a most sweet and charming medicine in philosophy; for of all the\nrest we are sensible of no pleasure till after the cure: this pleases and\nheals at once.\"  This is what Seneca says, that has carried me from my\nsubject, but there is advantage in the change.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI\n\nOF THUMBS\n\nTacitus reports, that amongst certain barbarian kings their manner was,\nwhen they would make a firm obligation, to join their right hands close\nto one another, and intertwist their thumbs; and when, by force of\nstraining the blood, it appeared in the ends, they lightly pricked them\nwith some sharp instrument, and mutually sucked them.\n\nPhysicians say that the thumbs are the master fingers of the hand, and\nthat their Latin etymology is derived from \"pollere.\" The Greeks called\nthem 'Avtixeip', as who should say, another hand.  And it seems that the\nLatins also sometimes take it in this sense for the whole hand:\n\n              \"Sed nec vocibus excitata blandis,\n               Molli pollici nec rogata, surgit.\"\n\n          [\"Neither to be excited by soft words or by the thumb.\"\n          --Mart., xii. 98, 8.]\n\nIt was at Rome a signification of favour to depress and turn in the\nthumbs:\n\n          \"Fautor utroque tuum laudabit pollice ludum:\"\n\n          [\"Thy patron will applaud thy sport with both thumbs\"\n          --Horace.]\n\nand of disfavour to elevate and thrust them outward:\n\n                         \"Converso pollice vulgi,\n                    Quemlibet occidunt populariter.\"\n\n          [\"The populace, with inverted thumbs, kill all that\n          come before them.\"--Juvenal, iii. 36]\n\nThe Romans exempted from war all such as were maimed in the thumbs, as\nhaving no more sufficient strength to hold their weapons.  Augustus\nconfiscated the estate of a Roman knight who had maliciously cut off the\nthumbs of two young children he had, to excuse them from going into the\narmies; and, before him, the Senate, in the time of the Italic war, had\ncondemned Caius Vatienus to perpetual imprisonment, and confiscated all\nhis goods, for having purposely cut off the thumb of his left hand, to\nexempt himself from that expedition.  Some one, I have forgotten who,\nhaving won a naval battle, cut off the thumbs of all his vanquished\nenemies, to render them incapable of fighting and of handling the oar.\nThe Athenians also caused the thumbs of the AEginatans to be cut off,\nto deprive them of the superiority in the art of navigation.\n\nIn Lacedaemon, pedagogues chastised their scholars by biting their\nthumbs.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII\n\nCOWARDICE THE MOTHER OF CRUELTY\n\nI have often heard it said that cowardice is the mother of cruelty; and I\nhave found by experience that malicious and inhuman animosity and\nfierceness are usually accompanied with feminine weakness.  I have seen\nthe most cruel people, and upon frivolous occasions, apt to cry.\nAlexander, the tyrant of Pheres, durst not be a spectator of tragedies in\nthe theatre, for fear lest his citizens should see him weep at the\nmisfortunes of Hecuba and Andromache, who himself without pity caused so\nmany people every day to be murdered.  Is it not meanness of spirit that\nrenders them so pliable to all extremities?  Valour, whose effect is only\nto be exercised against resistance--\n\n          \"Nec nisi bellantis gaudet cervice juvenci\"--\n\n          [\"Nor delights in killing a bull unless he resists.\"\n          --Claudius, Ep. ad Hadrianum, v. 39.]\n\nstops when it sees the enemy at its mercy; but pusillanimity, to say that\nit was also in the game, not having dared to meddle in the first act of\ndanger, takes as its part the second, of blood and massacre.  The murders\nin victories are commonly performed by the rascality and hangers-on of an\narmy, and that which causes so many unheard of cruelties in domestic wars\nis, that this canaille makes war in imbruing itself up to the elbows in\nblood, and ripping up a body that lies prostrate at its feet, having no\nsense of any other valour:\n\n         \"Et lupus, et turpes instant morientibus ursi,\n          Et quaecunque minor nobilitate fera est:\"\n\n     [\"Wolves and the filthy bears, and all the baser beasts,\n     fall upon the dying.\"--Ovid, Trist., iii. 5, 35.]\n\nlike cowardly dogs, that in the house worry and tear the skins of wild\nbeasts, they durst not come near in the field.  What is it in these times\nof ours that makes our quarrels mortal; and that, whereas our fathers had\nsome degrees of revenge, we now begin with the last in ours, and at the\nfirst meeting nothing is to be said but, kill?  What is this but\ncowardice?\n\nEvery one is sensible that there is more bravery and disdain in subduing\nan enemy, than in cutting, his throat; and in making him yield, than in\nputting him to the sword: besides that the appetite of revenge is better\nsatisfied and pleased because its only aim is to make itself felt: And\nthis is the reason why we do not fall upon a beast or a stone when they\nhurt us, because they are not capable of being sensible of our revenge;\nand to kill a man is to save him from the injury and offence we intend\nhim.  And as Bias cried out to a wicked fellow, \"I know that sooner or\nlater thou wilt have thy reward, but I am afraid I shall not see it\";\n--[Plutarch, on the Delay in Divine Justice, c. 2.]--and pitied the\nOrchomenians that the penitence of Lyciscus for the treason committed\nagainst them, came at a season when there was no one remaining alive of\nthose who had been interested in the offence, and whom the pleasure of\nthis penitence should affect: so revenge is to be pitied, when the person\non whom it is executed is deprived of means of suffering under it: for as\nthe avenger will look on to enjoy the pleasure of his revenge, so the\nperson on whom he takes revenge should be a spectator too, to be\nafflicted and to repent.  \"He will repent it,\" we say, and because we\nhave given him a pistol-shot through the head, do we imagine he will\nrepent?  On the contrary, if we but observe, we shall find, that he makes\nmouths at us in falling, and is so far from penitency, that he does not\nso much as repine at us; and we do him the kindest office of life, which\nis to make him die insensibly, and soon: we are afterwards to hide\nourselves, and to shift and fly from the officers of justice, who pursue\nus, whilst he is at rest.  Killing is good to frustrate an offence to\ncome, not to revenge one that is already past; and more an act of fear\nthan of bravery; of precaution than of courage; of defence than of\nenterprise.  It is manifest that by it we lose both the true end of\nrevenge and the care of our reputation; we are afraid, if he lives he\nwill do us another injury as great as the first; 'tis not out of\nanimosity to him, but care of thyself, that thou gettest rid of him.\n\nIn the kingdom of Narsingah this expedient would be useless to us, where\nnot only soldiers, but tradesmen also, end their differences by the\nsword.  The king never denies the field to any who wish to fight; and\nwhen they are persons of quality; he looks on, rewarding the victor with\na chain of gold,--for which any one who pleases may fight with him again,\nso that, by having come off from one combat, he has engaged himself in\nmany.\n\nIf we thought by virtue to be always masters of our enemies, and to\ntriumph over them at pleasure, we should be sorry they should escape from\nus as they do, by dying: but we have a mind to conquer, more with safety\nthan honour, and, in our quarrel, more pursue the end than the glory.\n\nAsnius Pollio, who, as being a worthy man, was the less to be excused,\ncommitted a like, error, when, having written a libel against Plancus, he\nforbore to publish it till he was dead; which is to bite one's thumb at a\nblind man, to rail at one who is deaf, to wound a man who has no feeling,\nrather than to run the hazard of his resentment.  And it was also said of\nhim that it was only for hobgoblins to wrestle with the dead.\n\nHe who stays to see the author die, whose writings he intends to\nquestion, what does he say but that he is weak in his aggressiveness?\nIt was told to Aristotle that some one had spoken ill of him: \"Let him\ndo more,\" said he; \"let him whip me too, provided I am not there.\"\n\nOur fathers contented themselves with revenging an insult with the lie,\nthe lie with a box of the ear, and so forward; they were valiant enough\nnot to fear their adversaries, living and provoked we tremble for fear so\nsoon as we see them on foot.  And that this is so, does not our noble\npractice of these days, equally to prosecute to death both him that has\noffended us and him we have offended, make it out?  'Tis also a kind\nof cowardice that has introduced the custom of having seconds, thirds,\nand fourths in our duels; they were formerly duels; they are now\nskirmishes, rencontres, and battles.  Solitude was, doubtless, terrible\nto those who were the first inventors of this practice:\n\n               \"Quum in se cuique minimum fiduciae esset,\"\n\nfor naturally any company whatever is consolatory in danger.  Third\npersons were formerly called in to prevent disorder and foul play only,\nand to be witness of the fortune of the combat; but now they have brought\nit to this pass that the witnesses themselves engage; whoever is invited\ncannot handsomely stand by as an idle spectator, for fear of being\nsuspected either of want of affection or of courage.  Besides the\ninjustice and unworthiness of such an action, of engaging other strength\nand valour in the protection of your honour than your own, I conceive it\na disadvantage to a brave man, and who wholly relies upon himself, to\nshuffle his fortune with that of a second; every one runs hazard enough\nhimself without hazarding for another, and has enough to do to assure\nhimself in his own valour for the defence of his life, without intrusting\na thing so dear in a third man's hand.  For, if it be not expressly\nagreed upon before to the contrary, 'tis a combined party of all four,\nand if your second be killed, you have two to deal withal, with good\nreason; and to say that it is foul play, it is so indeed, as it is, well\narmed, to attack a man who has but the hilt of a broken sword in his\nhand, or, clear and untouched, a man who is desperately wounded: but if\nthese be advantages you have got by fighting, you may make use of them\nwithout reproach.  The disparity and inequality are only weighed and\nconsidered from the condition of the combatants when they began; as to\nthe rest, you must take your chance: and though you had, alone, three\nenemies upon you at once, your two companions being killed, you have no\nmore wrong done you, than I should do in a battle, by running a man\nthrough whom I should see engaged with one of our own men, with the like\nadvantage.  The nature of society will have it so that where there is\ntroop against troop, as where our Duke of Orleans challenged Henry, king\nof England, a hundred against a hundred; three hundred against as many,\nas the Argians against the Lacedaemonians; three to three, as the Horatii\nagainst the Curiatii, the multitude on either side is considered but as\none single man: the hazard, wherever there is company, being confused and\nmixed.\n\nI have a domestic interest in this discourse; for my brother, the Sieur\nde Mattecoulom, was at Rome asked by a gentleman with whom he had no\ngreat acquaintance, and who was a defendant challenged by another, to be\nhis second; in this duel he found himself matched with a gentleman much\nbetter known to him.  (I would fain have an explanation of these rules of\nhonour, which so often shock and confound those of reason.)  After having\ndespatched his man, seeing the two principals still on foot and sound, he\nran in to disengage his friend.  What could he do less? should he have\nstood still, and if chance would have ordered it so, have seen him he was\ncome thither to defend killed before his face? what he had hitherto done\nhelped not the business; the quarrel was yet undecided.  The courtesy\nthat you can, and certainly ought to shew to your enemy, when you have\nreduced him to an ill condition and have a great advantage over him, I do\nnot see how you can do it, where the interest of another is concerned,\nwhere you are only called in as an assistant, and the quarrel is none of\nyours: he could neither be just nor courteous, at the hazard of him he\nwas there to serve.  And he was therefore enlarged from the prisons of\nItaly at the speedy and solemn request of our king.  Indiscreet nation!\nwe are not content to make our vices and follies known to the world by\nreport only, but we must go into foreign countries, there to show them\nwhat fools we are.  Put three Frenchmen into the deserts of Libya, they\nwill not live a month together without fighting; so that you would say\nthis peregrination were a thing purposely designed to give foreigners the\npleasure of our tragedies, and, for the most part, to such as rejoice and\nlaugh at our miseries.  We go into Italy to learn to fence, and exercise\nthe art at the expense of our lives before we have learned it; and yet,\nby the rule of discipline, we should put the theory before the practice.\nWe discover ourselves to be but learners:\n\n              \"Primitae juvenum miserae, bellique futuri\n               Dura rudimenta.\"\n\n     [\"Wretched the elementary trials of youth, and hard the\n     rudiments of approaching war.\"--Virgil, AEneid, xi. 156.]\n\nI know that fencing is an art very useful to its end (in a duel betwixt\ntwo princes, cousin-germans, in Spain, the elder, says Livy, by his skill\nand dexterity in arms, easily overcoming the greater and more awkward\nstrength of the younger), and of which the knowledge, as I experimentally\nknow, has inspired some with courage above their natural measure; but\nthis is not properly valour, because it supports itself upon address, and\nis founded upon something besides itself.  The honour of combat consists\nin the jealousy of courage, and not of skill; and therefore I have known\na friend of mine, famed as a great master in this exercise, in his\nquarrels make choice of such arms as might deprive him of this advantage\nand that wholly depended upon fortune and assurance, that they might not\nattribute his victory rather to his skill in fencing than his valour.\nWhen I was young, gentlemen avoided the reputation of good fencers as\ninjurious to them, and learned to fence with all imaginable privacy as a\ntrade of subtlety, derogating from true and natural valour:\n\n              \"Non schivar non parar, non ritirarsi,\n               Voglion costor, ne qui destrezza ha parte;\n               Non danno i colpi or finti, or pieni, or scarsi!\n               Toglie l'ira a il furor l'uso de l'arte.\n               Odi le spade orribilmente utarsi\n               A mezzo il ferro; il pie d'orma non parte,\n               Sempre a il pie fermo, a la man sempre in moto;\n               Ne scende taglio in van, ne punta a voto.\"\n\n          [\"They neither shrank, nor vantage sought of ground,\n          They travers'd not, nor skipt from part to part,\n          Their blows were neither false, nor feigned found:\n          In fight, their rage would let them use no art.\n          Their swords together clash with dreadful sound,\n          Their feet stand fast, and neither stir nor start,\n          They move their hands, steadfast their feet remain.\n          Nor blow nor foin they strook, or thrust in vain.\"\n          --Tasso, Gierus.  Lib., c. 12, st. 55, Fairfax's translation.]\n\nButts, tilting, and barriers, the feint of warlike fights, were the\nexercises of our forefathers: this other exercise is so much the less\nnoble, as it only respects a private end; that teaches us to destroy one\nanother against law and justice, and that every way always produces very\nill effects.  It is much more worthy and more becoming to exercise\nourselves in things that strengthen than that weaken our government and\nthat tend to the public safety and common glory.  The consul, Publius\nRutilius,  was the first who taught the soldiers to handle their arms\nwith skill, and joined art with valour, not for the rise of private\nquarrel, but for war and the quarrels of the people of Rome; a popular\nand civil defence.  And besides the example of Caesar,  who commanded his\nmen to shoot chiefly at the face of Pompey's soldiers in the battle of\nPharsalia, a thousand other commanders have also bethought them to invent\nnew forms of weapons and new ways of striking and defending, according as\noccasion should require.\n\nBut as Philopoemen condemned wrestling, wherein he excelled, because the\npreparatives that were therein employed were differing from those that\nappertain to military discipline, to which alone he conceived men of\nhonour ought wholly to apply themselves; so it seems to me that this\naddress to which we form our limbs, those writhings and motions young men\nare taught in this new school, are not only of no use, but rather\ncontrary and hurtful to the practice of fight in battle; and also our\npeople commonly make use of particular weapons, and peculiarly designed\nfor duel; and I have seen, when it has been disapproved, that a gentleman\nchallenged to fight with rapier and poignard appeared in the array of a\nman-at-arms, and that another should take his cloak instead of his\npoignard.  It is worthy of consideration that Laches in Plato, speaking\nof learning to fence after our manner, says that he never knew any great\nsoldier come out of that school, especially the masters of it: and,\nindeed, as to them, our experience tells as much.  As to the rest, we may\nat least conclude that they are qualities of no relation or\ncorrespondence; and in the education of the children of his government,\nPlato interdicts the art of boxing, introduced by Amycus and Epeius, and\nthat of wrestling, by Antaeus and Cercyo, because they have another end\nthan to render youth fit for the service of war and contribute nothing to\nit.  But I see that I have somewhat strayed from my theme.\n\nThe Emperor Mauricius, being advertised by dreams and several\nprognostics, that one Phocas, an obscure soldier, should kill him,\nquestioned his son-in-law, Philip, who this Phocas was, and what were his\nnature, qualities, and manners; and so soon as Philip, amongst other\nthings, had told him that he was cowardly and timorous, the emperor\nimmediately concluded then that he was a murderer and cruel.  What is it\nthat makes tyrants so sanguinary?  'Tis only the solicitude for their own\nsafety, and that their faint hearts can furnish them with no other means\nof securing themselves than in exterminating those who may hurt them,\neven so much as women, for fear of a scratch:\n\n               \"Cuncta ferit, dum cuncta timer.\"\n\n               [\"He strikes at all who fears all.\"\n               --Claudius, in Eutrop., i. 182.]\n\nThe first cruelties are exercised for themselves thence springs the fear\nof a just revenge, which afterwards produces a series of new cruelties,\nto obliterate one another.  Philip, king of Macedon, who had so much to\ndo with the people of Rome, agitated with the horror of so many murders\ncommitted by his order, and doubting of being able to keep himself secure\nfrom so many families, at divers times mortally injured and offended by\nhim, resolved to seize all the children of those he had caused to be\nslain, to despatch them daily one after another, and so to establish his\nown repose.\n\nFine matter is never impertinent, however placed; and therefore I, who\nmore consider the weight and utility of what I deliver than its order and\nconnection, need not fear in this place to bring in an excellent story,\nthough it be a little by-the-by; for when they are rich in their own\nnative beauty, and are able to justify themselves, the least end of a\nhair will serve to draw them into my discourse.\n\nAmongst others condemned by Philip, had been one Herodicus, prince of\nThessaly; he had, moreover, after him caused his two sons-in-law to be\nput to death, each leaving a son very young behind him.  Theoxena and\nArcho were their two widows.  Theoxena, though highly courted to it,\ncould not be persuaded to marry again: Archo married Poris, the greatest\nman among the AEnians, and by him had a great many children, whom she,\ndying, left at a very tender age.  Theoxena, moved with a maternal\ncharity towards her nephews, that she might have them under her own eyes\nand in her own protection, married Poris: when presently comes a\nproclamation of the king's edict.  This brave-spirited mother, suspecting\nthe cruelty of Philip, and afraid of the insolence of the soldiers\ntowards these charming and tender children was so bold as to declare hat\nshe would rather kill them with her own hands than deliver them.  Poris,\nstartled at this protestation, promised her to steal them away, and to\ntransport them to Athens, and there commit them to the custody of some\nfaithful friends of his.  They took, therefore, the opportunity of an\nannual feast which was celebrated at AEnia in honour of AEneas, and\nthither they went.  Having appeared by day at the public ceremonies and\nbanquet, they stole the night following into a vessel laid ready for the\npurpose, to escape away by sea.  The wind proved contrary, and finding\nthemselves in the morning within sight of the land whence they had\nlaunched overnight, and being pursued by the guards of the port, Poris\nperceiving this, laboured all he could to make the mariners do their\nutmost to escape from the pursuers.  But Theoxena, frantic with affection\nand revenge, in pursuance of her former resolution, prepared both weapons\nand poison, and exposing them before them; \"Go to, my children,\" said\nshe, \"death is now the only means of your defence and liberty, and shall\nadminister occasion to the gods to exercise their sacred justice: these\nsharp swords, and these full cups, will open you the way into it;\ncourage, fear nothing!  And thou, my son, who art the eldest, take this\nsteel into thy hand, that thou mayest the more bravely die.\"  The\nchildren having on one side so powerful a counsellor, and the enemy at\ntheir throats on the other, run all of them eagerly upon what was next to\nhand; and, half dead, were thrown into the sea.  Theoxena, proud of\nhaving so gloriously provided for the safety of her children, clasping\nher arms with great affection about her husband's neck.  \"Let us, my\nfriend,\" said she, \"follow these boys, and enjoy the same sepulchre they\ndo\"; and so, having embraced, they threw themselves headlong into the\nsea; so that the ship was carried--back without the owners into the\nharbour.\n\nTyrants, at once both to kill and to make their anger felt, have employed\ntheir capacity to invent the most lingering deaths.  They will have their\nenemies despatched, but not so fast that they may not have leisure to\ntaste their vengeance.  And therein they are mightily perplexed; for if\nthe torments they inflict are violent, they are short; if long, they are\nnot then so painful as they desire; and thus plague themselves in choice\nof the greatest cruelty.  Of this we have a thousand examples in\nantiquity, and I know not whether we, unawares, do not retain some traces\nof this barbarity.\n\nAll that exceeds a simple death appears to me absolute cruelty.  Our\njustice cannot expect that he, whom the fear of dying by being beheaded\nor hanged will not restrain, should be any more awed by the imagination\nof a languishing fire, pincers, or the wheel.  And I know not, in the\nmeantime, whether we do not throw them into despair; for in what\ncondition can be the soul of a man, expecting four-and-twenty hours\ntogether to be broken upon a wheel, or after the old way, nailed to a\ncross?  Josephus relates that in the time of the war the Romans made in\nJudaea, happening to pass by where they had three days before crucified\ncertain Jews, he amongst them knew three of his own friends, and obtained\nthe favour of having them taken down, of whom two, he says, died; the\nthird lived a great while after.\n\nChalcondylas, a writer of good credit, in the records he has left behind\nhim of things that happened in his time, and near him, tells us, as of\nthe most excessive torment, of that the Emperor Mohammed very often\npractised, of cutting off men in the middle by the diaphragm with one\nblow of a scimitar, whence it followed that they died as it were two\ndeaths at once; and both the one part, says he, and the other, were seen\nto stir and strive a great while after in very great torment.  I do not\nthink there was any great suffering in this motion the torments that are\nthe most dreadful to look on are not always the greatest to endure; and I\nfind those that other historians relate to have been practised by him\nupon the Epirot lords, are more horrid and cruel, where they were\ncondemned to be flayed alive piecemeal, after so malicious a manner that\nthey continued fifteen days in that misery.\n\nAnd these other two: Croesus, having caused a gentleman, the favourite of\nhis brother Pantaleon, to be seized, carried him into a fuller's shop,\nwhere he caused him to be scratched and carded with the cards and combs\nbelonging to that trade, till he died.  George Sechel, chief commander of\nthe peasants of Poland, who committed so many mischiefs under the title\nof the Crusade, being defeated in battle and taken bu the Vayvode of\nTransylvania, was three days bound naked upon the rack exposed to all\nsorts of torments that any one could contrive against him: during which\ntime many other prisoners were kept fasting; in the end, he living and\nlooking on, they made his beloved brother Lucat, for whom alone he\nentreated, taking on himself the blame of all their evil actions drink\nhis blood, and caused twenty of his most favoured captains to feed upon\nhim, tearing his flesh in pieces with their teeth, and swallowing the\nmorsels.  The remainder of his body and his bowels, so soon as he was\ndead, were boiled, and others of his followers compelled to eat them.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVIII\n\nALL THINGS HAVE THEIR SEASON\n\nSuch as compare Cato the Censor with the younger Cato, who killed\nhimself, compare two beautiful natures, much resembling one another.\nThe first acquired his reputation several ways, and excels in military\nexploits and the utility of his public employments; but the virtue of the\nyounger, besides that it were blasphemy to compare any to it in vigour,\nwas much more pure and unblemished.  For who could absolve that of the\nCensor from envy and ambition, having dared to attack the honour of\nScipio, a man in goodness and all other excellent qualities infinitely\nbeyond him or any other of his time?\n\nThat which they, report of him, amongst other things, that in his extreme\nold age he put himself upon learning the Greek tongue with so greedy an\nappetite, as if to quench a long thirst, does not seem to me to make much\nfor his honour; it being properly what we call falling into second\nchildhood.  All things have their seasons, even good ones, and I may say\nmy Paternoster out of time; as they accused T. Quintus Flaminius, that\nbeing general of an army, he was seen praying apart in the time of a\nbattle that he won.\n\n          \"Imponit finem sapiens et rebus honestis.\"\n\n     [\"The wise man limits even honest things.\"--Juvenal, vi. 444]\n\nEudemonidas, seeing Xenocrates when very old, still very intent upon his\nschool lectures: \"When will this man be wise,\" said he, \"if he is yet\nlearning?\"  And Philopaemen, to those who extolled King Ptolemy for every\nday inuring his person to the exercise of arms: \"It is not,\" said he,\n\"commendable in a king of his age to exercise himself in these things; he\nought now really to employ them.\"  The young are to make their\npreparations, the old to enjoy them, say the sages: and the greatest vice\nthey observe in us is that our desires incessantly grow young again; we\nare always re-beginning to live.\n\nOur studies and desires should sometime be sensible of age; yet we have\none foot in the grave and still our appetites and pursuits spring every\nday anew within us:\n\n                   \"Tu secanda marmora\n                    Locas sub ipsum funus, et, sepulcri\n                    Immemor, struis domos.\"\n\n     [\"You against the time of death have marble cut for use, and,\n     forgetful of the tomb, build houses.\"--Horace, Od., ii. 18, 17.]\n\nThe longest of my designs is not of above a year's extent; I think of\nnothing now but ending; rid myself of all new hopes and enterprises; take\nmy last leave of every place I depart from, and every day dispossess\nmyself of what I have.\n\n          \"Olim jam nec perit quicquam mihi, nec acquiritur....\n          plus superest viatici quam viae.\"\n\n     [\"Henceforward I will neither lose, nor expect to get: I have more\n     wherewith to defray my journey, than I have way to go.\"  (Or):\n     \"Hitherto nothing of me has been lost or gained; more remains to pay\n     the way than there is way.\"--Seneca, Ep., 77.  (The sense seems to\n     be that so far he had met his expenses, but that for the future he\n     was likely to have more than he required.)]\n\n          \"Vixi, et, quem dederat cursum fortuna, peregi.\"\n\n     [\"I have lived and finished the career Fortune placed before me.\"\n     --AEneid, iv. 653.]\n\n'Tis indeed the only comfort I find in my old age, that it mortifies in\nme several cares and desires wherewith my life has been disturbed; the\ncare how the world goes, the care of riches, of grandeur, of knowledge,\nof health, of myself.  There are men who are learning to speak at a time\nwhen they should learn to be silent for ever.  A man may always study,\nbut he must not always go to school what a contemptible thing is an old\nAbecedarian!--[Seneca, Ep. 36]\n\n              \"Diversos diversa juvant; non omnibus annis\n               Omnia conveniunt.\"\n\n          [\"Various things delight various men; all things are not\n          for all ages.\"--Gall., Eleg., i. 104.]\n\nIf we must study, let us study what is suitable to our present condition,\nthat we may answer as he did, who being asked to what end he studied in\nhis decrepit age, \"that I may go out better,\" said he, \"and at greater\nease.\"  Such a study was that of the younger Cato, feeling his end\napproach, and which he met with in Plato's Discourse of the Eternity of\nthe Soul: not, as we are to believe, that he was not long before\nfurnished with all sorts of provision for such a departure; for of\nassurance, an established will and instruction, he had more than Plato\nhad in all his writings; his knowledge and courage were in this respect\nabove philosophy; he applied himself to this study, not for the service\nof his death; but, as a man whose sleeps were never disturbed in the\nimportance of such a deliberation, he also, without choice or change,\ncontinued his studies with the other accustomary actions of his life.\nThe night that he was denied the praetorship he spent in play; that\nwherein he was to die he spent in reading.  The loss either of life\nor of office was all one to him.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIX\n\nOF VIRTUE\n\nI find by experience, that there is a good deal to be said betwixt the\nflights and emotions of the soul or a resolute and constant habit; and\nvery well perceive that there is nothing we may not do, nay, even to the\nsurpassing the Divinity itself, says a certain person, forasmuch as it is\nmore to render a man's self impassible by his own study and industry,\nthan to be so by his natural condition; and even to be able to conjoin to\nman's imbecility and frailty a God-like resolution and assurance; but it\nis by fits and starts; and in the lives of those heroes of times past\nthere are sometimes miraculous impulses, and that seem infinitely to\nexceed our natural force; but they are indeed only impulses: and 'tis\nhard to believe, that these so elevated qualities in a man can so\nthoroughly tinct and imbue the soul that they should become ordinary,\nand, as it were, natural in him.  It accidentally happens even to us,\nwho are but abortive births of men, sometimes to launch our souls, when\nroused by the discourses or examples of others, much beyond their\nordinary stretch; but 'tis a kind of passion which pushes and agitates\nthem, and in some sort ravishes them from themselves: but, this\nperturbation once overcome, we see that they insensibly flag and slacken\nof themselves, if not to the lowest degree, at least so as to be no more\nthe same; insomuch as that upon every trivial occasion, the losing of a\nbird, or the breaking, of a glass, we suffer ourselves to be moved little\nless than one of the common people.  I am of opinion, that order,\nmoderation, and constancy excepted, all things are to be done by a man\nthat is very imperfect and defective in general.  Therefore it is, say\nthe Sages, that to make a right judgment of a man, you are chiefly to pry\ninto his common actions, and surprise him in his everyday habit.\n\nPyrrho, he who erected so pleasant a knowledge upon ignorance,\nendeavoured, as all the rest who were really philosophers did, to make\nhis life correspond with his doctrine.  And because he maintained the\nimbecility of human judgment to be so extreme as to be incapable of any\nchoice or inclination, and would have it perpetually wavering and\nsuspended, considering and receiving all things as indifferent, 'tis\nsaid, that he always comforted himself after the same manner and\ncountenance: if he had begun a discourse, he would always end what he had\nto say, though the person he was speaking to had gone away: if he walked,\nhe never stopped for any impediment that stood in his way, being\npreserved from precipices, collision with carts, and other like\naccidents, by the care of his friends: for, to fear or to avoid anything,\nhad been to shock his own propositions, which deprived the senses\nthemselves of all election and certainty.  Sometimes he suffered incision\nand cauteries with so great constancy as never to be seen so much as to\nwince.  'Tis something to bring the soul to these imaginations; 'tis more\nto join the effects, and yet not impossible; but to conjoin them with\nsuch perseverance and constancy as to make them habitual, is certainly,\nin attempts so remote from the common usage, almost incredible to be\ndone.  Therefore it was, that being sometime taken in his house sharply\nscolding with his sister, and being reproached that he therein\ntransgressed his own rules of indifference: \"What!\" said he, \"must this\nbit of a woman also serve for a testimony to my rules?\"  Another time,\nbeing seen to defend himself against a dog: \"It is,\" said he, \"very hard\ntotally to put off man; and we must endeavour and force ourselves to\nresist and encounter things, first by effects, but at least by reason and\nargument.\"\n\nAbout seven or eight years since, a husbandman yet living, but two\nleagues from my house, having long been tormented with his wife's\njealousy, coming one day home from his work, and she welcoming him with\nher accustomed railing, entered into so great fury that with a sickle he\nhad yet in his hand, he totally cut off all those parts that she was\njealous of and threw them in her face.  And, 'tis said that a young\ngentleman of our nation, brisk and amorous, having by his perseverance at\nlast mollified the heart of a fair mistress, enraged, that upon the point\nof fruition he found himself unable to perform, and that,\n\n                         \"Nec viriliter\n          Iners senile penis extulit caput.\"\n\n     [(The 19th or 20th century translators leave this phrase\n     untranslated and with no explanation. D.W.)\n     --Tibullus, Priap.  Carm., 84.]\n\nas soon as ever he came home he deprived himself of the rebellious\nmember, and sent it to his mistress, a cruel and bloody victim for the\nexpiation of his offence.  If this had been done upon mature\nconsideration, and upon the account of religion, as the priests of Cybele\ndid, what should we say of so high an action?\n\nA few days since, at Bergerac, five leagues from my house, up the river\nDordogne, a woman having overnight been beaten and abused by her husband,\na choleric ill-conditioned fellow, resolved to escape from his ill-usage\nat the price of her life; and going so soon as she was up the next\nmorning to visit her neighbours, as she was wont to do, and having let\nsome words fall in recommendation of her affairs, she took a sister of\nhers by the hand, and led her to the bridge; whither being come, and\nhaving taken leave of her, in jest as it were, without any manner of\nalteration in her countenance, she threw herself headlong from the top\ninto the river, and was there drowned.  That which is the most remarkable\nin this is, that this resolution was a whole night forming in her head.\n\nIt is quite another thing with the Indian women for it being the custom\nthere for the men to have many wives, and the best beloved of them to\nkill herself at her husband's decease, every one of them makes it the\nbusiness of her whole life to obtain this privilege and gain this\nadvantage over her companions; and the good offices they do their\nhusbands aim at no other recompense but to be preferred in accompanying\nhim in death:\n\n              \"Ubi mortifero jacta est fax ultima lecto,\n               Uxorum fusis stat pia turba comis\n               Et certamen habent lethi, quae viva sequatur\n               Conjugium: pudor est non licuisse mori.\n               Ardent victrices, et flammae pectora praebent,\n               Imponuntque suis ora perusta viris.\"\n\n     [\"For when they threw the torch on the funeral bed, the pious wives\n     with hair dishevelled, stand around striving, which, living, shall\n     accompany her spouse; and are ashamed that they may not die; they\n     who are preferred expose their breasts to the flame, and they lay\n     their scorched lips on those of their husbands.\"\n     --Propertius, iii. 13, 17.]\n\nA certain author of our times reports that he has seen in those Oriental\nnations this custom in practice, that not only the wives bury themselves\nwith their husbands, but even the slaves he has enjoyed also; which is\ndone after this manner: The husband being dead, the widow may if she will\n(but few will) demand two or three months' respite wherein to order her\naffairs.  The day being come, she mounts on horseback, dressed as fine as\nat her wedding, and with a cheerful countenance says she is going to\nsleep with her spouse, holding a looking-glass in her left hand and an\narrow in the other.  Being thus conducted in pomp, accompanied with her\nkindred and friends and a great concourse of people in great joy, she is\nat last brought to the public place appointed for such spectacles: this\nis a great space, in the midst of which is a pit full of wood, and\nadjoining to it a mount raised four or five steps, upon which she is\nbrought and served with a magnificent repast; which being done, she falls\nto dancing and singing, and gives order, when she thinks fit, to kindle\nthe fire.  This being done, she descends, and taking the nearest of her\nhusband's relations by the hand, they walk to the river close by, where\nshe strips herself stark naked, and having distributed her clothes and\njewels to her friends, plunges herself into the water, as if there to\ncleanse herself from her sins; coming out thence, she wraps herself in a\nyellow linen of five-and-twenty ells long, and again giving her hand to\nthis kinsman of her husband's, they return back to the mount, where she\nmakes a speech to the people, and recommends her children to them, if she\nhave any.  Betwixt the pit and the mount there is commonly a curtain\ndrawn to screen the burning furnace from their sight, which some of them,\nto manifest the greater courage, forbid.  Having ended what she has to\nsay, a woman presents her with a vessel of oil, wherewith to anoint her\nhead and her whole body, which when done with she throws into the fire,\nand in an instant precipitates herself after.  Immediately, the people\nthrow a good many billets and logs upon her that she may not be long in\ndying, and convert all their joy into sorrow and mourning.  If they are\npersons of meaner condition, the body of the defunct is carried to the\nplace of sepulture, and there placed sitting, the widow kneeling before\nhim, embracing the dead body; and they continue in this posture whilst\nthe people build a wall about them, which so soon as it is raised to the\nheight of the woman's shoulders, one of her relations comes behind her,\nand taking hold of her head, twists her neck; so soon as she is dead, the\nwall is presently raised up, and closed, and there they remain entombed.\n\nThere was, in this same country, something like this in their\ngymnosophists; for not by constraint of others nor by the impetuosity of\na sudden humour, but by the express profession of their order, their\ncustom was, as soon as they arrived at a certain age, or that they saw\nthemselves threatened by any disease, to cause a funeral pile to be\nerected for them, and on the top a stately bed, where, after having\njoyfully feasted their friends and acquaintance, they laid them down with\nso great resolution, that fire being applied to it, they were never seen\nto stir either hand or foot; and after this manner, one of them, Calanus\nby name; expired in the presence of the whole army of Alexander the\nGreat.  And he was neither reputed holy nor happy amongst them who did\nnot thus destroy himself, dismissing his soul purged and purified by the\nfire, after having consumed all that was earthly and mortal.  This\nconstant premeditation of the whole life is that which makes the wonder.\n\nAmongst our other controversies, that of 'Fatum' has also crept in; and\nto tie things to come, and even our own wills, to a certain and\ninevitable necessity, we are yet upon this argument of time past:\n\"Since God foresees that all things shall so fall out, as doubtless He\ndoes, it must then necessarily follow, that they must so fall out\": to\nwhich our masters reply: \"that the seeing anything come to pass, as we\ndo, and as God Himself also does (for all things being present with him,\nHe rather sees, than foresees), is not to compel an event: that is, we\nsee because things do fall out, but things do not fall out because we\nsee: events cause knowledge, but knowledge does not cause events.  That\nwhich we see happen, does happen; but it might have happened otherwise:\nand God, in the catalogue of the causes of events which He has in His\nprescience, has also those which we call accidental and voluntary,\ndepending upon the liberty.  He has given our free will, and knows that\nwe do amiss because we would do so.\"\n\nI have seen a great many commanders encourage their soldiers with this\nfatal necessity; for if our time be limited to a certain hour, neither\nthe enemies' shot nor our own boldness, nor our flight and cowardice,\ncan either shorten or prolong our lives.  This is easily said, but see\nwho will be so easily persuaded; and if it be so that a strong and lively\nfaith draws along with it actions of the same kind, certainly this faith\nwe so much brag of, is very light in this age of ours, unless the\ncontempt it has of works makes it disdain their company.  So it is, that\nto this very purpose the Sire de Joinville, as credible a witness as any\nother whatever, tells us of the Bedouins, a nation amongst the Saracens,\nwith whom the king St. Louis had to do in the Holy Land, that they, in\ntheir religion, so firmly believed the number of every man's days to be\nfrom all eternity prefixed and set down by an inevitable decree, that\nthey went naked to the wars, excepting a Turkish sword, and their bodies\nonly covered with a white linen cloth: and for the greatest curse they\ncould invent when they were angry, this was always in their mouths:\n\"Accursed be thou, as he that arms himself for fear of death.\"  This is a\ntestimony of faith very much beyond ours.  And of this sort is that also\nthat two friars of Florence gave in our fathers' days.  Being engaged in\nsome controversy of learning, they agreed to go both of them into the\nfire in the sight of all the people, each for the verification of his\nargument, and all things were already prepared, and the thing just upon\nthe point of execution, when it was interrupted by an unexpected\naccident.--[7th April 1498.  Savonarola issued the challenge.  After many\ndelays from demands and counter-demands by each side as to the details of\nthe fire, both parties found that they had important business to transact\nin another county--both just barely escaped assassination at the hands of\nthe disappointed spectators.  D.W.]\n\nA young Turkish lord, having performed a notable exploit in his own\nperson in the sight of both armies, that of Amurath and that of Huniades,\nready to join battle, being asked by Amurath, what in such tender and\ninexperienced years (for it was his first sally into arms) had inspired\nhim with so brave a courage, replied, that his chief tutor for valour was\na hare.  \"For being,\" said he, \"one day a hunting, I found a hare\nsitting, and though I had a brace of excellent greyhounds with me, yet\nmethought it would be best for sureness to make use of my bow; for she\nsat very fair.  I then fell to letting fly my arrows, and shot forty that\nI had in my quiver, not only without hurting, but without starting her\nfrom her form.  At last I slipped my dogs after her, but to no more\npurpose than I had shot: by which I understood that she had been secured\nby her destiny; and, that neither darts nor swords can wound without the\npermission of fate, which we can neither hasten nor defer.\"  This story\nmay serve, by the way, to let us see how flexible our reason is to all\nsorts of images.\n\nA person of great years, name, dignity, and learning boasted to me that\nhe had been induced to a certain very important change in his faith by a\nstrange and whimsical incitation, and one otherwise so inadequate, that I\nthought it much stronger, taken the contrary way: he called it a miracle,\nand so I look upon it, but in a different sense.  The Turkish historians\nsay, that the persuasion those of their nation have imprinted in them of\nthe fatal and unalterable prescription of their days, manifestly conduces\nto the giving them great assurance in dangers.  And I know a great prince\nwho makes very fortunate use of it, whether it be that he really believes\nit, or that he makes it his excuse for so wonderfully hazarding himself:\nlet us hope Fortune may not be too soon weary of her favour to him.\n\nThere has not happened in our memory a more admirable effect of\nresolution than in those two who conspired the death of the Prince of\nOrange.\n\n     [The first of these was Jehan de Jaureguy, who wounded the Prince\n     18th March 1582; the second, by whom the Prince was killed 10th July\n     1584., was Balthazar Gerard.]\n\n'Tis marvellous how the second who executed it, could ever be persuaded\ninto an attempt, wherein his companion, who had done his utmost, had had\nso ill success; and after the same method, and with the same arms, to go\nattack a lord, armed with so recent a late lesson of distrust, powerful\nin followers and bodily strength, in his own hall, amidst his guards, and\nin a city wholly at his devotion.  Assuredly, he employed a very resolute\narm and a courage enflamed with furious passion.  A poignard is surer for\nstriking home; but by reason that more motion and force of hand is\nrequired than with a pistol, the blow is more subject to be put by or\nhindered.  That this man did not run to a certain death, I make no great\ndoubt; for the hopes any one could flatter him withal, could not find\nplace in any sober understanding, and the conduct of his exploit\nsufficiently manifests that he had no want of that, no more than of\ncourage.  The motives of so powerful a persuasion may be diverse, for our\nfancy does what it will, both with itself and us.  The execution that was\ndone near Orleans--[The murder of the Duke of Guise by Poltrot.]--was\nnothing like this; there was in this more of chance than vigour; the\nwound was not mortal, if fortune had not made it so, and to attempt to\nshoot on horseback, and at a great distance, by one whose body was in\nmotion from the motion of his horse, was the attempt of a man who had\nrather miss his blow than fail of saving himself.  This was apparent from\nwhat followed; for he was so astonished and stupefied with the thought of\nso high an execution, that he totally lost his judgment both to find his\nway to flight and to govern his tongue.  What needed he to have done more\nthan to fly back to his friends across the river?  'Tis what I have done\nin less dangers, and that I think of very little hazard, how broad soever\nthe river may be, provided your horse have easy going in, and that you\nsee on the other side easy landing according to the stream.  The other,\n--[Balthazar Gerard.]--when they pronounced his dreadful sentence,\n\"I was prepared for this,\" said he, \"beforehand, and I will make you\nwonder at my patience.\"\n\nThe Assassins, a nation bordering upon Phoenicia,\n\n     [Or in Egypt, Syria, and Persia.  Derivation of 'assassin' is from\n     Hassan-ben-Saba, one of their early leaders, and they had an\n     existence for some centuries.  They are classed among the secret\n     societies of the Middle Ages.  D.W.]\n\nare reputed amongst the Mohammedans a people of very great devotion and\npurity of manners.  They hold that the nearest way to gain Paradise is to\nkill some one of a contrary religion; which is the reason they have often\nbeen seen, being but one or two, and without armour, to attempt against\npowerful enemies, at the price of a certain death and without any\nconsideration of their own danger.  So was our Raymond, Count of Tripoli,\nassassinated (which word is derived from their name) in the heart of his\ncity,--[in 1151]--during our enterprises of the Holy War: and likewise\nConrad, Marquis of Monteferrat, the murderers at their execution bearing\nthemselves with great pride and glory that they had performed so brave an\nexploit.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXX.\n\nOF A MONSTROUS CHILD\n\nThis story shall go by itself; for I will leave it to physicians to\ndiscourse of.  Two days ago I saw a child that two men and a nurse, who\nsaid they were the father, the uncle, and the aunt of it, carried about\nto get money by showing it, by reason it was so strange a creature.  It\nwas, as to all the rest, of a common form, and could stand upon its feet;\ncould go and gabble much like other children of the same age; it had\nnever as yet taken any other nourishment but from the nurse's breasts,\nand what, in my presence, they tried to put into the mouth of it, it only\nchewed a little and spat it out again without swallowing; the cry of it\nseemed indeed a little odd and particular, and it was just fourteen\nmonths old.  Under the breast it was joined to another child, but without\na head, and which had the spine of the back without motion, the rest\nentire; for though it had one arm shorter than the other, it had been\nbroken by accident at their birth; they were joined breast to breast, and\nas if a lesser child sought to throw its arms about the neck of one\nsomething bigger.  The juncture and thickness of the place where they\nwere conjoined was not above four fingers, or thereabouts, so that if you\nthrust up the imperfect child you might see the navel of the other below\nit, and the joining was betwixt the paps and the navel.  The navel of the\nimperfect child could not be seen, but all the rest of the belly, so that\nall that was not joined of the imperfect one, as arms, buttocks, thighs,\nand legs, hung dangling upon the other, and might reach to the mid-leg.\nThe nurse, moreover, told us that it urined at both bodies, and that the\nmembers of the other were nourished, sensible, and in the same plight\nwith that she gave suck to, excepting that they were shorter and less.\nThis double body and several limbs relating to one head might be\ninterpreted a favourable prognostic to the king,--[Henry III.]--of\nmaintaining these various parts of our state under the union of his laws;\nbut lest the event should prove otherwise, 'tis better to let it alone,\nfor in things already past there needs no divination,\n\n          \"Ut quum facts sunt, tum ad conjecturam\n          aliqui interpretatione revocentur;\"\n\n     [\"So as when they are come to pass, they may then by some\n     interpretation be recalled to conjecture\"\n     --Cicero, De Divin., ii. 31.]\n\nas 'tis said of Epimenides, that he always prophesied backward.\n\nI have just seen a herdsman in Medoc, of about thirty years of age, who\nhas no sign of any genital parts; he has three holes by which he\nincessantly voids his water; he is bearded, has desire, and seeks contact\nwith women.\n\nThose that we call monsters are not so to God, who sees in the immensity\nof His work the infinite forms that He has comprehended therein; and it\nis to be believed that this figure which astonishes us has relation to\nsome other figure of the same kind unknown to man.  From His all wisdom\nnothing but good, common; and regular proceeds; but we do not discern the\ndisposition and relation:\n\n          \"Quod crebro videt, non miratur, etiamsi,\n          cur fiat, nescit.  Quod ante non vidit, id,\n          si evenerit, ostentum esse censet.\"\n\n     [\"What he often sees he does not admire, though he be ignorant how\n     it comes to pass.  When a thing happens he never saw before, he\n     thinks that it is a portent.\"--Cicero, De Divin., ii.  22.]\n\nWhatever falls out contrary to custom we say is contrary to nature, but\nnothing, whatever it be, is contrary to her.  Let, therefore, this\nuniversal and natural reason expel the error and astonishment that\nnovelty brings along with it.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXXI\n\nOF ANGER\n\nPlutarch is admirable throughout, but especially where he judges of human\nactions.  What fine things does he say in the comparison of Lycurgus and\nNuma upon the subject of our great folly in abandoning children to the\ncare and government of their fathers?  The most of our civil governments,\nas Aristotle says, \"leave, after the manner of the Cyclopes, to every one\nthe ordering of their wives and children, according to their own foolish\nand indiscreet fancy; and the Lacedaemonian and Cretan are almost the\nonly governments that have committed the education of children to the\nlaws.  Who does not see that in a state all depends upon their nurture\nand bringing up? and yet they are left to the mercy of parents, let them\nbe as foolish and ill-conditioned as they may, without any manner of\ndiscretion.\"\n\nAmongst other things, how often have I, as I have passed along our\nstreets, had a good mind to get up a farce, to revenge the poor boys whom\nI have seen hided, knocked down, and miserably beaten by some father or\nmother, when in their fury and mad with rage?  You shall see them come\nout with fire and fury sparkling in their eyes:\n\n              \"Rabie jecur incendente, feruntur,\n               Praecipites; ut saxa jugis abrupta, quibus mons\n               Subtrahitur, clivoque latus pendente recedit,\"\n\n     [\"They are headlong borne with burning fury as great stones torn\n     from the mountains, by which the steep sides are left naked and\n     bare.\"--Juvenal, Sat., vi. 647.]\n\n(and according to Hippocrates, the most dangerous maladies are they that\ndisfigure the countenance), with a roaring and terrible voice, very often\nagainst those that are but newly come from nurse, and there they are\nlamed and spoiled with blows, whilst our justice takes no cognisance of\nit, as if these maims and dislocations were not executed upon members of\nour commonwealth:\n\n         \"Gratum est, quod patria; civem populoque dedisti,\n          Si facis, ut patrix sit idoneus, utilis agris,\n          Utilis et bellorum et pacis rebus agendis.\"\n\n     [\"It is well when to thy country and the people thou hast given a\n     citizen, provided thou make fit for his country's service; useful to\n     till the earth, useful in affairs of war and peace\"\n     --Juvenal, Sat., xiv. 70.]\n\nThere is no passion that so much transports men from their right judgment\nas anger.  No one would demur upon punishing a judge with death who\nshould condemn a criminal on the account of his own choler; why, then,\nshould fathers and pedagogues be any more allowed to whip and chastise\nchildren in their anger?  'Tis then no longer correction, but revenge.\nChastisement is instead of physic to children; and would we endure a\nphysician who should be animated against and enraged at his patient?\n\nWe ourselves, to do well, should never lay a hand upon our servants\nwhilst our anger lasts.  When the pulse beats, and we feel emotion in\nourselves, let us defer the business; things will indeed appear otherwise\nto us when we are calm and cool.  'Tis passion that then commands, 'tis\npassion that speaks, and not we.  Faults seen through passion appear much\ngreater to us than they really are, as bodies do when seen through a\nmist.  He who is hungry uses meat; but he who will make use of\nchastisement should have neither hunger nor thirst to it.  And, moreover,\nchastisements that are inflicted with weight and discretion are much\nbetter received and with greater benefit by him who suffers; otherwise,\nhe will not think himself justly condemned by a man transported with\nanger and fury, and will allege his master's excessive passion, his\ninflamed countenance, his unwonted oaths, his emotion and precipitous\nrashness, for his own justification:\n\n              \"Ora tument ira, nigrescunt sanguine venae,\n               Lumina Gorgoneo saevius igne micant.\"\n\n     [\"Their faces swell, their veins grow black with rage, and their\n     eyes sparkle with Gorgonian fire.\"--Ovid, De Art. Amandi, iii. 503.]\n\nSuetonius reports that Caius Rabirius having been condemned by Caesar,\nthe thing that most prevailed upon the people (to whom he had appealed)\nto determine the cause in his favour, was the animosity and vehemence\nthat Caesar had manifested in that sentence.\n\nSaying is a different thing from doing; we are to consider the sermon\napart and the preacher apart.  These men lent themselves to a pretty\nbusiness who in our times have attempted to shake the truth of our Church\nby the vices of her ministers; she extracts her testimony elsewhere; 'tis\na foolish way of arguing and that would throw all things into confusion.\nA man whose morals are good may have false opinions, and a wicked man may\npreach truth, even though he believe it not himself.  'Tis doubtless a\nfine harmony when doing and saying go together; and I will not deny but\nthat saying, when the actions follow, is not of greater authority and\nefficacy, as Eudamidas said, hearing a philosopher talk of military\naffairs: \"These things are finely said, but he who speaks them is not to\nbe believed for his ears have never been used to the sound of the\ntrumpet.\"  And Cleomenes, hearing an orator declaiming upon valour, burst\nout into laughter, at which the other being angry; \"I should,\" said he to\nhim, \"do the same if it were a swallow that spoke of this subject; but if\nit were an eagle I should willingly hear him.\"  I perceive, methinks, in\nthe writings of the ancients, that he who speaks what he thinks, strikes\nmuch more home than he who only feigns.  Hear Cicero speak of the love of\nliberty: hear Brutus speak of it, the mere written words of this man\nsound as if he would purchase it at the price of his life.  Let Cicero,\nthe father of eloquence, treat of the contempt of death; let Seneca do\nthe same: the first languishingly drawls it out so you perceive he would\nmake you resolve upon a thing on which he is not resolved himself; he\ninspires you not with courage, for he himself has none; the other\nanimates and inflames you.  I never read an author, even of those who\ntreat of virtue and of actions, that I do not curiously inquire what kind\nof a man he was himself; for the Ephori at Sparta, seeing a dissolute\nfellow propose a wholesome advice to the people, commanded him to hold\nhis peace, and entreated a virtuous man to attribute to himself the\ninvention, and to propose it.  Plutarch's writings, if well understood,\nsufficiently bespeak their author, and so that I think I know him even\ninto his soul; and yet I could wish that we had some fuller account of\nhis life.  And I am thus far wandered from my subject, upon the account\nof the obligation I have to Aulus Gellius, for having left us in writing\nthis story of his manners, that brings me back to my subject of anger.\nA slave of his, a vicious, ill-conditioned fellow, but who had the\nprecepts of philosophy often ringing in his ears, having for some offence\nof his been stript by Plutarch's command, whilst he was being whipped,\nmuttered at first, that it was without cause and that he had done nothing\nto deserve it; but at last falling in good earnest to exclaim against and\nrail at his master, he reproached him that he was no philosopher, as he\nhad boasted himself to be: that he had often heard him say it was\nindecent to be angry, nay, had written a book to that purpose; and that\nthe causing him to be so cruelly beaten, in the height of his rage,\ntotally gave the lie to all his writings; to which Plutarch calmly and\ncoldly answered, \"How, ruffian,\" said he, \"by what dost thou judge that\nI am now angry?  Does either my face, my colour, or my voice give any\nmanifestation of my being moved?  I do not think my eyes look fierce,\nthat my countenance appears troubled, or that my voice is dreadful: am I\nred, do I foam, does any word escape my lips I ought to repent?  Do I\nstart?  Do I tremble with fury?  For those, I tell thee, are the true\nsigns of anger.\"  And so, turning to the fellow that was whipping him,\n\"Ply on thy work,\" said he, \"whilst this gentleman and I dispute.\"  This\nis his story.\n\nArchytas Tarentinus, returning from a war wherein he had been\ncaptain-general, found all things in his house in very great disorder,\nand his lands quite out of tillage, through the ill husbandry of his\nreceiver, and having caused him to be called to him; \"Go,\" said he, \"if I\nwere not in anger I would soundly drub your sides.\"  Plato likewise,\nbeing highly offended with one of his slaves, gave Speusippus order to\nchastise him, excusing himself from doing it because he was in anger.\nAnd Carillus, a Lacedaemonian, to a Helot, who carried himself insolently\ntowards him: \"By the gods,\" said he, \"if I was not angry, I would\nimmediately cause thee to be put to death.\"\n\n'Tis a passion that is pleased with and flatters itself.  How often,\nbeing moved under a false cause, if the person offending makes a good\ndefence and presents us with a just excuse, are we angry against truth\nand innocence itself?  In proof of which, I remember a marvellous example\nof antiquity.\n\nPiso, otherwise a man of very eminent virtue, being moved against a\nsoldier of his, for that returning alone from forage he could give him no\naccount where he had left a companion of his, took it for granted that he\nhad killed him, and presently condemned him to death.  He was no sooner\nmounted upon the gibbet, but, behold, his wandering companion arrives, at\nwhich all the army were exceedingly glad, and after many embraces of the\ntwo comrades, the hangman carried both the one and the other into Piso's\npresence, all those present believing it would be a great pleasure even\nto himself; but it proved quite contrary; for through shame and spite,\nhis fury, which was not yet cool, redoubled; and by a subtlety which his\npassion suddenly suggested to him, he made three criminals for having\nfound one innocent, and caused them all to be despatched: the first\nsoldier, because sentence had passed upon him; the second, who had lost\nhis way, because he was the cause of his companion's death; and the\nhangman, for not having obeyed the order which had been given him.\nSuch as have had to do with testy and obstinate women, may have\nexperimented into what a rage it puts them to oppose silence and coldness\nto their fury, and that a man disdains to nourish their anger.  The\norator Celius was wonderfully choleric by nature; and to one who supped\nin his company, a man of a gentle and sweet conversation, and who, that\nhe might not move him, approved and consented to all he said; he,\nimpatient that his ill-humour should thus spend itself without aliment:\n\"For the love of the gods deny me something,\" said he, \"that we may be\ntwo.\"  Women, in like manner, are only angry that others may be angry\nagain, in imitation of the laws of love.  Phocion, to one who interrupted\nhis speaking by injurious and very opprobrious words, made no other\nreturn than silence, and to give him full liberty and leisure to vent his\nspleen; which he having accordingly done, and the storm blown over,\nwithout any mention of this disturbance, he proceeded in his discourse\nwhere he had left off before.  No answer can nettle a man like such a\ncontempt.\n\nOf the most choleric man in France (anger is always an imperfection, but\nmore excusable in, a soldier, for in that trade it cannot sometimes be\navoided) I often say, that he is the most patient man that I know, and\nthe most discreet in bridling his passions; which rise in him with so\ngreat violence and fury,\n\n                    \"Magno veluti cum flamma sonore\n          Virgea suggeritur costis undantis ahem,\n          Exsultantque aatu latices, furit intus aquae vis.\n          Fumidus atque alte spumis exuberat amnis,\n          Nec jam se capit unda; volat vapor ater ad auras;\"\n\n     [\"When with loud crackling noise, a fire of sticks is applied to the\n     boiling caldron's side, by the heat in frisky bells the liquor\n     dances; within the water rages, and high the smoky fluid in foam\n     overflows.  Nor can the wave now contain itself; the black steam\n     flies all abroad.\"--AEneid, vii. 462.]\n\n\nthat he must of necessity cruelly constrain himself to moderate it.  And\nfor my part, I know no passion which I could with so much violence to\nmyself attempt to cover and conceal; I would not set wisdom at so high a\nprice; and do not so much consider what a man does, as how much it costs\nhim to do no worse.\n\nAnother boasted himself to me of the regularity and gentleness of his\nmanners, which are to truth very singular; to whom I replied, that it was\nindeed something, especially m persons of so eminent a quality as\nhimself, upon whom every one had their eyes, to present himself always\nwell-tempered to the world; but that the principal thing was to make\nprovision for within and for himself; and that it was not in my opinion\nvery well to order his business outwardly well, and to grate himself\nwithin, which I was afraid he did, in putting on and maintaining this\nmask and external appearance.\n\nA man incorporates anger by concealing it, as Diogenes told Demosthenes,\nwho, for fear of being seen in a tavern, withdrew himself the more\nretiredly into it: \"The more you retire backward, the farther you enter\nin.\"  I would rather advise that a man should give his servant a box of\nthe ear a little unseasonably, than rack his fancy to present this grave\nand composed countenance; and had rather discover my passions than brood\nover them at my own expense; they grow less inventing and manifesting\nthemselves; and 'tis much better their point should wound others without,\nthan be turned towards ourselves within:\n\n     \"Omnia vitia in aperto leviora sunt: et tunc perniciosissima,\n     quum simulata sanitate subsident.\"\n\n     [\"All vices are less dangerous when open to be seen, and then most\n     pernicious when they lurk under a dissembled good nature.\"\n     --Seneca, Ep. 56]\n\nI admonish all those who have authority to be angry in my family, in the\nfirst place to manage their anger and not to lavish it upon every\noccasion, for that both lessens the value and hinders the effect: rash\nand incessant scolding runs into custom, and renders itself despised; and\nwhat you lay out upon a servant for a theft is not felt, because it is\nthe same he has seen you a hundred times employ against him for having\nill washed a glass, or set a stool out of place.  Secondly, that they be\nnot angry to no purpose, but make sure that their reprehension reach him\nwith whom they are offended; for, ordinarily, they rail and bawl before\nhe comes into their presence, and continue scolding an age after he is\ngone:\n\n               \"Et secum petulans amentia certat:\"\n\n          [\"And petulant madness contends with itself.\"\n          --Claudian in Eutrop., i. 237.]\n\nthey attack his shadow, and drive the storm in a place where no one is\neither chastised or concerned, but in the clamour of their voice.\nI likewise in quarrels condemn those who huff and vapour without an\nenemy: those rhodomontades should be reserved to discharge upon the\noffending party:\n\n         \"Mugitus veluti cum prima in praelia taurus\n          Terrificos ciet, atque irasci in cornua tentat,\n          Arboris obnixus trunco, ventospue lacessit\n          Ictibus, et sparsa ad pugnum proludit arena.\"\n\n     [\"As when a bull to usher in the fight, makes dreadful bellowings,\n     and whets his horns against the trunk of a tree; with blows he beats\n     the air, and rehearses the fight by scattering the sand.\"\n     --AEneid, xii. 103.]\n\nWhen I am angry, my anger is very sharp but withal very short, and as\nprivate as I can; I lose myself indeed in promptness and violence, but\nnot in trouble; so that I throw out all sorts of injurious words at\nrandom, and without choice, and never consider pertinently to dart my\nlanguage where I think it will deepest wound, for I commonly make use of\nno other weapon than my tongue.\n\nMy servants have a better bargain of me in great occasions than in\nlittle; the little ones surprise me; and the misfortune is, that when you\nare once upon the precipice, 'tis no matter who gave you the push, you\nalways go to the bottom; the fall urges, moves, and makes haste of\nitself.  In great occasions this satisfies me, that they are so just\nevery one expects a reasonable indignation, and then I glorify myself in\ndeceiving their expectation; against these, I fortify and prepare myself;\nthey disturb my head, and threaten to transport me very far, should I\nfollow them.  I can easily contain myself from entering into one of these\npassions, and am strong enough, when I expect them, to repel their\nviolence, be the cause never so great; but if a passion once prepossess\nand seize me, it carries me away, be the cause never so small.  I bargain\nthus with those who may contend with me when you see me moved first, let\nme alone, right or wrong; I'll do the same for you.  The storm is only\nbegot by a concurrence of angers, which easily spring from one another,\nand are not born together.  Let every one have his own way, and we shall\nbe always at peace.  A profitable advice, but hard to execute.  Sometimes\nalso it falls out that I put on a seeming anger, for the better governing\nof my house, without any real emotion.  As age renders my humours more\nsharp, I study to oppose them, and will, if I can, order it so, that for\nthe future I may be so much the less peevish and hard to please, as I\nhave more excuse and inclination to be so, although I have heretofore\nbeen reckoned amongst those who have the greatest patience.\n\nA word more to conclude this argument.  Aristotle says, that anger\nsometimes serves for arms to virtue and valour.  That is probable;\nnevertheless, they who contradict him  pleasantly answer, that 'tis a\nweapon of novel use, for we move all other arms, this moves us; our hand\nguides it not, 'tis it that guides our hand; it holds us, we hold not it.\n\n\n\n\n     ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:\n\n     A man may always study, but he must not always go to school\n     Accursed be thou, as he that arms himself for fear of death\n     All things have their seasons, even good ones\n     All those who have authority to be angry in my family\n     \"An emperor,\" said he, \"must die standing\"\n     Ancient Romans kept their youth always standing at school\n     And we suffer the ills of a long peace\n     Be not angry to no purpose\n     Best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice\n     By resenting the lie we acquit ourselves of the fault\n     \"By the gods,\" said he, \"if I was not angry, I would execute you\"\n     Children are amused with toys and men with words\n     Consent, and complacency in giving a man's self up to melancholy\n     Defend most the defects with which we are most tainted\n     Emperor Julian, surnamed the Apostate\n     Fortune sometimes seems to delight in taking us at our word\n     Greatest talkers, for the most part, do nothing to purpose\n     Have more wherewith to defray my journey, than I have way to go\n     Hearing a philosopher talk of military affairs\n     How much it costs him to do no worse\n     I need not seek a fool from afar; I can laugh at myself\n     Idleness, the mother of corruption\n     If a passion once prepossess and seize me, it carries me away\n     In sorrow there is some mixture of pleasure\n     Killing is good to frustrate an offence to come, not to revenge\n     Laws cannot subsist without mixture of injustice\n     Least end of a hair will serve to draw them into my discourse\n     Let us not seek our disease out of ourselves; 'tis in us\n     Look on death not only without astonishment but without care\n     Melancholy: Are there not some constitutions that feed upon it?\n     Most cruel people, and upon frivolous occasions, apt to cry.\n     No beast in the world so much to be feared by man as man\n     Our extremest pleasure has some sort of groaning\n     Our fancy does what it will, both with itself and us\n     Owe ourselves chiefly and mostly to ourselves\n     Petulant madness contends with itself\n     Rage it puts them to oppose silence and coldness to their fury\n     Rash and incessant scolding runs into custom\n     Revenge, which afterwards produces a series of new cruelties\n     See how flexible our reason is\n     Seeming anger, for the better governing of my house\n     Shake the truth of our Church by the vices of her ministers\n     Take my last leave of every place I depart from\n     The gods sell us all the goods they give us\n     The storm is only begot by a concurrence of angers\n     Though nobody should read me, have I wasted time\n     Tis said of Epimenides, that he always prophesied backward\n     Tis then no longer correction, but revenge\n     Upon the precipice, 'tis no matter who gave you the push\n     \"When will this man be wise,\" said he, \"if he is yet learning?\"\n     When you see me moved first, let me alone, right or wrong\n     Young are to make their preparations, the old to enjoy them","title":"Essays of Michel de Montaigne \u2014 Volume 12","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":23324}