Essays of Michel de Montaigne Part 59

to the beauty of the body, before I proceed any further I should know whether or no we are agreed about the description. 'Tis likely we do not well know what beauty is in nature and in general, since to our own human beauty we give so many divers forms, of which, were there any natural rule and prescription, we should know it in common, as the heat of the fire. But we fancy the forms according to our own appet.i.te and liking:--

Turpis Romano Belgicus ore color:

"A German hue ill suits, a Roman face."

The Indians paint it black and tawny, with great swelled lips, wide flat noses and load the cartilage betwixt the nostrils with great rings of gold, to make it hang down to the mouth; as also the under lip with great hoops, enriched with precious stones, that weigh them down to fall upon the chin, it being with them a singular grace to show their teeth, even below the roots. In Peru the greatest ears are the most beautiful, which they stretch out as far as they can by art. And a man now living says that he has seen in an eastern nation this care of enlarging them in so great repute, and the ear loaded with so ponderous jewels, that he did with great ease put his arm, sleeve and all, through the hole of an ear. There are elsewhere nations that take great care to black their teeth, and hate to see them white, whilst others paint them red. The women are reputed more beautiful, not only in Biscay, but elsewhere, for having their heads shaved; and, which is more, in certain frozen countries, as Pliny reports. The Mexicans esteem a low forehead a great beauty, and though they shave all other parts, they nourish hair on the forehead and increase it by art, and have great b.r.e.a.s.t.s in so great reputation that they affect to give their children suck over their shoulders. We should paint deformity so. The Italians fashion it gross and ma.s.sy; the Spaniards gaunt and slender; and amongst us one has it white, another brown; one soft and delicate, another strong and vigorous; one will have his mistress soft and gentle, others haughty and majestic. Just as the preference in beauty that Plato attributes to the spherical figure the Epicureans gave rather to the pyramidal or square, and cannot swallow a G.o.d in the form of a bowl. But, be it how it will, nature has no more privileged us in this from her common laws than in the rest And if we will judge ourselves aright, we shall find that, if there be some animals less favoured in this than we, there are others, and in greater number, that are more; _a multis animalibus decore vincimur_ "Many animals surpa.s.s us in beauty," even among the terrestrial, our compatriots; for as to those of sea, setting the figure aside, which cannot fall into any manner of proportion, being so much another thing in colour, clearness, smoothness, and arrangement, we sufficiently give place to them; and no less, in all qualities, to the aerial. And this prerogative that the poets make such a mighty matter of, our erect stature, looking towards heaven our original,

p.r.o.naque c.u.m spectent animalia caetera terrain, Os homini sublime dedit, columque tueri Jussit, et erectos ad sidera tollere vultus,

"Whilst all the brutal creatures downward bend Their sight, and to their earthly mother tend, He set man's face aloft, that, with his eyes Uplifted, he might view the starry skies,"

is truly poetical; for there are several little beasts who have their sight absolutely turned towards heaven; and I find the gesture of camels and ostriches much higher raised and more erect than ours. What animals have not their faces above and not before, and do not look opposite, as we do; and that do not in their natural posture discover as much of heaven and earth as man? And what qualities of our bodily const.i.tution, in Plato and Cicero, may not indifferently serve a thousand sorts of beasts? Those that most resemble us are the most despicable and deformed of all the herd; for those, as to outward appearance and form of visage, are baboons:--

Simia quam similis, turp.i.s.sima bestia, n.o.bis?

"How like to man, in visage and in shape, Is, of all beasts the most uncouth, the ape?"

as to the internal and vital parts, the hog. In earnest, when I consider man stark naked, even in that s.e.x which seems to have greatest share of beauty, his defects, natural subjection, and imperfections, I find that we have more reason than any other animal, to cover ourselves; and are to be excused from borrowing of those to whom nature has in this been kinder than to us, to trick ourselves out with their beauties, and hide ourselves under their spoils, their wool, feathers, hair, and silk. Let us observe, as to the rest, that man is the sole animal whose nudities offend his own companions, and the only one who in his natural actions withdraws and hides himself from his own kind. And really 'tis also an effect worth consideration, that they who are masters in the trade prescribe, as a remedy for amorous pa.s.sions, the full and free view of the body a man desires; for that to cool the ardour there needs no more but freely and fully to see what he loves:--

Ille quod obscaenas in aperto corpore partes Viderat, in cursu qui fuit, haesit amor.

"The love that's tilting when those parts appear Open to view, flags in the hot career,"

And, although this receipt may peradventure proceed from a nice and cold humour, it is notwithstanding a very great sign of our deficiencies that use and acquaintance should make us disgust one another. It is not modesty, so much as cunning and prudence, that makes our ladies so circ.u.mspect to refuse us admittance into their cabinets before they are painted and tricked up for the public view:--

Nec Veneres nostras hoc fallit; quo magis ipsae Omnia summopere hos vitae postscenia celant, Quos retinere volunt, adstrictoque esse in amore:

"Of this our ladies are full well aware, Which make them, with such privacy and care, Behind the scene all those defects remove, Likely to check the flame of those they love,"

whereas, in several animals there is nothing that we do not love, and that does not please our senses; so that from their very excrements we do not only extract wherewith to heighten our sauces, but also our richest ornaments and perfumes. This discourse reflects upon none but the ordinary sort of women, and is not so sacrilegious as to comprehend those divine, supernatural, and extraordinary beauties, which we see shine occasionally among us like stars under a corporeal and terrestrial veil.

As to the rest, the very share that we allow to beasts of the bounty of nature, by our own confession, is very much to their advantage. We attribute to ourselves imaginary and fantastic good, future and absent good, for which human capacity cannot of herself be responsible; or good, that we falsely attribute to ourselves by the license of opinion, as reason, knowledge, and honour, and leave to them for their dividend, essential, durable, and palpable good, as peace, repose, security, innocence, and health; health, I say, the fairest and richest present that nature can make us. Insomuch that philosophy, even the Stoic, is so bold as to say, "That Herac.l.i.tus and Pherecides, could they have trucked their wisdom for health, and have delivered themselves, the one of his dropsy, and the other of the lousy disease that tormented him, they had done well." By which they set a greater value upon wisdom, comparing and putting it into the balance with health, than they do with this other proposition, which is also theirs; they say that if Circe had presented Ulysses with the two potions, the one to make a fool become a wise man, and the other to make a wise man become a fool, that Ulysses ought rather to have chosen the last, than consent to that by which Circe changed his human figure into that of a beast; and say that wisdom itself would have spoke to him after this manner: "Forsake me, let me alone, rather than lodge me under the body and figure of an a.s.s." How!

the philosophers, then will abandon this great and divine wisdom for this corporeal and terrestrial covering? It is then no more by reason, by discourse, and by the soul, that we excel beasts; 'tis by our beauty, our fair complexion, and our fine symmetry of parts, for which we must quit our intelligence, our prudence, and all the rest. Well, I accept this open and free confession; certainly they knew that those parts, upon which we so much value ourselves, are no other than vain fancy.

If beasts then had all the virtue, knowledge, wisdom, and stoical perfection, they would still be beasts, and would not be comparable to man, miserable, wicked, mad, man. For, in short, whatever is not as we are is nothing worth; and G.o.d, to procure himself an esteem among us, must put himself into that shape, as we shall show anon. By which it appears that it is not upon any true ground of reason, but by a foolish pride and vain opinion, that we prefer ourselves before other animals, and separate ourselves from their society and condition.

But to return to what I was upon before; we have for our part inconstancy, irresolution, incert.i.tude, sorrow, superst.i.tion, solicitude of things to come, even after we shall be no more, ambition, avarice, jealousy, envy, irregular, frantic, and untamed appet.i.tes, war, lying, disloyalty, detraction, and curiosity. Doubtless, we have strangely overpaid this fine reason, upon which we so much glorify ourselves, and this capacity of judging and knowing, if we have bought it at the price of this infinite number of pa.s.sions to which we are eternally subject.

Unless we shall also think fit, as even Socrates does, to add to the counterpoise that notable prerogative above beasts, That whereas nature has prescribed them certain seasons and limits for the delights of Venus, she has given us the reins at all hours and all seasons." _Ut vinum ogrotis, quia prodest raro, nocet sop.i.s.sime, melius est non adhibere omnino, quam, spe dubio salutis, in apertam per-niciem incurrere; sic, haud scio an melius fuerit humano generi motum istum celerem cogitationis, ac.u.men, solertiam, quam rationem vocamus, quoniam pestifera sint multis, ad-modum paucis saluiaria, non dari omnino, quam tam muniice et tam large dari?_ As it falls out that wine often hurting the sick, and very rarely doing them good, it is better not to give them any at all than to run into an apparent danger out of hope of an uncertain benefit, so I know not whether it had not been better for mankind that this quick motion, this penetration, this subtlety that we call reason, had not been given to man at all; considering how pestiferous it is to many, and useful but to few, than to have been conferred in so abundant manner, and with so liberal a hand." Of what advantage can we conceive the knowledge of so many things was to Yarro and Aristotle? Did it exempt them from human inconveniences? Were they by it freed from the accidents that lay heavy upon the shoulders of a porter? Did they extract from their logic any consolation for the gout? Or, for knowing how this humour is lodged in the joints, did they feel it the less?

Did they enter into composition with death by knowing that some nations rejoice at his approach; or with cuckoldry, by knowing that in some parts of the world wives are in common? On the contrary, having been reputed the greatest men for knowledge, the one amongst the Romans and the other amongst the Greeks, and in a time when learning did most flourish, we have not heard, nevertheless, that they had any particular excellence in their lives; nay, the Greek had enough to do to clear himself from some notable blemishes in his. Have we observed that pleasure and health have a better relish with him that understands astrology and grammar than with others?

Illiterati num minus nervi rigent?

"Th' illiterate ploughman is as fit For Venus' service as the wit:"

or shame and poverty less troublesome to the first than to the last?

Scilicet et morbis et debilitate carebis, Et luctum et curam effugies, et tempora vitae Longa tibi post haec fato meliore dabuntur.

"Disease thy couch shall flee, And sorrow and care; yes, thou, be sure, wilt see Long years of happiness, till now unknown."

I have known in my time a hundred artisans, a hundred labourers, wiser and more happy than the rectors of the university, and whom I had much rather have resembled. Learning, methinks, has its place amongst the necessary, things of life, as glory, n.o.bility, dignity, or at the most, as beauty, riches, and such other qualities, which indeed are useful to it, but remotely, and more by opinion than by nature. We stand very little more in need of offices, rules, and laws of living in our society, than cranes and ants do in theirs; and yet we see that these carry themselves very regularly without erudition. If man was wise, he would take the true value of every thing according as it was useful and proper to his life. Whoever will number us by our actions and deportments will find many more excellent men amongst the ignorant than among the learned; aye, in all sorts of virtue. Old Rome seems to me to have been of much greater value, both for peace and war, than that learned Rome that ruined itself. And, though all the rest should be equal, yet integrity and innocency would remain to the ancients, for they cohabit singularly well with simplicity. But I will leave this discourse, that would lead me farther than I am willing to follow; and shall only say this further, 'tis only humility and submission that can make a complete good man. We are not to leave the knowledge of his duty to every man's own judgment; we are to prescribe it to him, and not suffer him to choose it at his own discretion; otherwise, according to the imbecility, and infinite variety of our reasons and opinions, we should at large forge ourselves duties that would, as Epicurus says, enjoin us to eat one another.

The first law that ever G.o.d gave to man was a law of pure obedience; it was a commandment naked and simple, wherein man had nothing to inquire after, nor to dispute; forasmuch as to obey is the proper office of a rational soul, acknowledging a heavenly superior and benefactor. From obedience and submission spring all other virtues, as all sin does from selfopinion. And, on the contrary, the first temptation that by the devil was offered to human nature, its first poison insinuated itself into us by the promise made us of knowledge and wisdom; _Eritis sicut Dii, scientes bonum et malum._ "Ye shall be as G.o.ds, knowing good and evil." And the sirens, in Homer, to allure Ulysses, and draw him within the danger of their snares, offered to give him knowledge. The plague of man is the opinion of wisdom; and for this reason it is that ignorance is so recommended to us, by our religion, as proper to faith and obedience; _Cavete ne quis vos decipiat per philosophiam et inanes seductiones, secundum elementa mundi._ "Take heed, lest any man deceive you by philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, and the rudiments of the world." There is in this a general consent amongst all sorts of philosophers, that the sovereign good consists in the tranquillity of the soul and body; but where shall we find it?

Ad summum, sapiens uno minor est Jove, dives, Liber, honoratus, pulcher, rex deniqne regum; Praecipue sa.n.u.s, nisi c.u.m pituita molesta est:

"In short, the wise is only less than Jove, Rich, free, and handsome; nay, a king above All earthly kings; with health supremely blest, Excepting when a cold disturbs his rest!"

It seems, in truth, that nature, for the consolation of our miserable and wretched state, has only given us presumption for our inheritance.

'Tis as Epictetus says, that man has nothing properly his own, but the use of his opinion; we have nothing but wind and smoke for our portion.

The G.o.ds have health in essence, says philosophy, and sickness in intelligence. Man, on the contrary, possesses his goods by fancy, his ills in essence. We have reason to magnify the power of our imagination; for all our goods are only in dream. Hear this poor calamitous animal huff! "There is nothing," says Cicero, "so charming as the employment of letters; of letters, I say, by means whereof the infinity of things, the immense grandeur of nature, the heavens even in this world, the earth, and the seas are discovered to us; 'tis they that have taught us religion, moderation, and the grandeur of courage, and that have rescued our souls from darkness, to make her see all things, high, low, first, last, and middling; 'tis they that furnish us wherewith to live happily and well, and conduct us to pa.s.s over our lives without displeasure, and without offence." Does not this man seem to speak of the condition of the ever-living and almighty G.o.d? But as to effects, a thousand little countrywomen have lived lives more equal, more sweet, and constant than his.

Deus ille fuit, deus, inclyte Memmi, Qui princeps vitae rationem invenit earn, quae Nunc appellatur sapientia; quique per artem Fluctibus e tantis vitam, tantisque tenebris, In tam tranquilla et tam clara luce locavit:

"That G.o.d, great Memmus, was a G.o.d no doubt Who, prince of life, first found that reason out Now wisdom called; and by his art, who did That life in tempests tost, and darkness hid, Place in so great a calm, and clear a light:"

here are brave ranting words; but a very slight accident put this man's understanding in a worse condition than that of the meanest shepherd, notwithstanding this instructing G.o.d, this divine wisdom. Of the same stamp and impudence is the promise of Democritus's book: "I am going to speak of all things;" and that foolish t.i.tle that Aristotle prefixes to one of his, order only afforded him a few lucid intervals which he employed in composing his book, and at last made him kill himself,--Eusebius's Chronicon.

Of the Mortal G.o.ds; and the judgment of Chrysippus, that "Dion was as virtuous as G.o.d;" and my Seneca himself says, that "G.o.d had given him life; but that to live well was his own;" conformably to this other: _In virtute vere gloriamur; quod non contingeret, si id donum a Deo, non a n.o.bis haberemus:_ "We truly glory in our virtue; which would not be, if it was given us of G.o.d, and not by ourselves;" this is also Seneca's saying; "that the wise man hath fort.i.tude equal with G.o.d, but that his is in spite of human frailty, wherein therefore he more than equals G.o.d." There is nothing so ordinary as to meet with sallies of the like temerity; there is none of us, who take so much offence to see himself equalled with G.o.d, as he does to see himself undervalued by being ranked with other creatures; so much more are we jealous of our own interest than that of our Creator.

But we must trample under foot this foolish vanity, and briskly and boldly shake the ridiculous foundation upon which these false opinions are founded. So long as man shall believe he has any means and power of himself, he will never acknowledge what he owes to his Maker; his eggs shall always be chickens, as the saying is; we must therefore strip him to his shirt. Let us see some notable examples of the effects of his philosophy: Posidonius being tormented with a disease so painful as made him writhe his arms and gnash his teeth, thought he sufficiently scorned the dolour, by crying out against it: "Thou mayst do thy worst, I will not confess that thou art an evil." He was as sensible of the pain as my footman, but he made a bravado of bridling his tongue, at least, and restraining it within the laws of his sect: _Re succ.u.mbere non oportebat, verbis gloriantem._ "It did not become him, that spoke so big, to confess his frailty when he came to the test." Arcesilas being ill of the gout, and Car-neades, who had come to see him, going away troubled at his condition, he called him back, and showing him his feet and breast: "There is nothing comes thence hither," said he. This has something a better grace, for he feels himself in pain, and would be disengaged from it; but his heart, notwithstanding, is not conquered nor subdued by it. The other stands more obstinately to his point, but, I fear, rather verbally than really. And Dionysius Heracleotes, afflicted with a vehement smarting in his eyes, was reduced to quit these stoical resolutions. But even though knowledge should, in effect, do as they say, and could blunt the point, and dull the edge, of the misfortunes that attend us, what does she, more than what ignorance does more purely and evidently?--The philosopher Pyrrho, being at sea in very great danger, by reason of a mighty storm, presented nothing to the imitation of those who were with him, in that extremity, but a hog they had on board, that was fearless and unconcerned at the tempest. Philosophy, when she has said all she can, refers us at last to the example of a gladiator, wrestler, or muleteer, in which sort of people we commonly observe much less apprehension of death, sense of pain, and other inconveniences, and more of endurance, than ever knowledge furnished any one withal, that was not bom and bred to hardship. What is the cause that we make incisions, and cut the tender limbs of an infant, and those of a horse, more easily than our own--but ignorance only? How many has mere force of imagination made sick? We often see men cause themselves to be let blood, purged, and physicked, to be cured of diseases they only feel in opinion.--When real infirmities fail us, knowledge lends us her's; that colour, that complexion, portend some catarrhous defluxion; this hot season threatens us with a fever; this breach in the life-line of your left hand gives you notice of some near and dangerous indisposition; and at last she roundly attacks health itself; saying, this sprightliness and vigour of youth cannot continue in this posture; there must be blood taken, and the heat abated, lest it turn against yourself. Compare the life of a man subjected to such imaginations, to that of a labourer that suffers himself to be led by his natural appet.i.te, measuring things only by the present sense, without knowledge, and without prognostic, that feels no pain or sickness, but when he is really ill. Whereas the other has the stone in his soul, before he has it in his bladder; as if it were not time enough to suffer the evil when it shall come, he must antic.i.p.ate it by fancy, and run to meet it.

What I say of physic may generally serve in example for all other sciences. Thence is derived that ancient opinion of the philosophers that placed the sovereign good in the discovery of the weakness of our judgment My ignorance affords me as much occasion of hope as of fear; and having no other rule for my health than that of the examples of others, and of events I see elsewhere upon the like occasion, I find of all sorts, and rely upon those which by comparison are most favourable to me. I receive health with open arms, free, full, and entire, and by so much the more whet my appet.i.te to enjoy it, by how much it is at present less ordinary and more rare; so far am I from troubling its repose and sweetness with the bitterness of a new and constrained manner of living. Beasts sufficiently show us how much the agitation of our minds brings infirmities and diseases upon us. That which is told us of those of Brazil, that they never die but of old age, is attributed to the serenity and tranquillity of the air they live in; but I rather attribute it to the serenity and tranquillity of their souls, free from all pa.s.sion, thought, or employment, extended or unpleasing, a people that pa.s.s over their lives in a wonderful simplicity and ignorance, without letters, without law, without king, or any manner of religion.

And whence comes that, which we find by experience, that the heaviest and dullest men are most able; and the most to be desired in amorous performances; and that the love of a muleteer often renders itself more acceptable than that of a gentleman, if it be not that the agitation of the soul in the latter disturbs his physical ability, dissolves and tires it, as it also ordinarily troubles and tires itself. What puts the soul beside itself, and more usually throws it into madness, but her own promptness, vigour, and agility, and, finally, her own proper force? Of what is the most subtle folly made, but of the most subtle wisdom? As great friendships spring from great enmities, and vigorous health from mortal diseases, so from the rare and vivid agitations of our souls proceed the most wonderful and most distracted frenzies; 'tis but half a turn of the toe from the one to the other. In the actions of madmen we see how infinitely madness resembles the most vigorous operations of the soul. Who does not know how indiscernible the difference is betwixt folly and the sprightly elevations of a free soul, and the effects of a supreme and extraordinary virtue? Plato says that melancholy persons are the most capable of discipline, and the most excellent; and accordingly in none is there so great a propension to madness. Great wits are ruined by their own proper force and pliability; into what a condition, through his own agitation and promptness of fancy, is one of the most judicious, ingenious, and nearest formed, of any other Italian poet, to the air of the ancient and true poesy, lately fallen! Has he not vast obligation to this vivacity that has destroyed him? to this light that has blinded him? to this exact and subtle apprehension of reason that has put him beside his own? to this curious and laborious search after sciences, that has reduced him to imbecility? and to this rare apt.i.tude to the exercises of the soul, that has rendered him without exercise and without soul? I was more angry, if possible, than compa.s.sionate, to see him at Ferrara in so pitiful a condition surviving himself, forgetting both himself and his works, which, without his knowledge, though before his face, have been published unformed and incorrect.

Would you have a man healthy, would you have him regular, and in a steady and secure posture? m.u.f.fle him up in the shades of stupidity and sloth. We must be made beasts to be made wise, and hoodwinked before we are fit to be led. And if one shall tell me that the advantage of having a cold and dull sense of pain and other evils, brings this disadvantage along with it, to render us consequently less sensible also in the fruition of good and pleasure, this is true; but the misery of our condition is such that we have not so much to enjoy as to avoid, and that the extremest pleasure does not affect us to the degree that a light grief does: _Segnius homines bona quam mala sentiunt._ We are not so sensible of the most perfect health as we are of the least sickness.

Pungit In cute vix sum ma violatum plagula corpus; Quando valere nihil quemquam movet. Hoc juvat unum, Quod me non torquet latus, aut pes; Caetera quisquam Vix queat aut sanum sese, aut sentire valentem.

"The body with a little sting is griev'd, When the most perfect health is not perceiv'd, This only pleases me, that spleen nor gout Neither offend my side nor wring my foot; Excepting these, scarce any one can tell, Or e'er observes, when he's in health and well."