How To Live Or A Life Of Montaigne Part 11

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buried alive in heaps of manure, thrown into wells and ditches and left to die, howling like dogs; they had been nailed in boxes without air, walled up in towers without food, and garroted upon trees in the depths of the mountains and forests; they had been stretched in front of fires, their feet frica.s.seed in grease; their women had been raped and those who were pregnant had been aborted; their children had been kidnapped and ransomed, or even roasted alive before the parents.

The wars were fed by religious ardor, but the sufferings of war in turn generated further apocalyptic imaginings. Both Catholics and Protestants thought that events were approaching a point beyond which there could be no more normal history, for all that remained was the final confrontation between G.o.d and the Devil. This is why Catholics celebrated the St. Bartholomew's ma.s.sacres so joyfully: they saw them as a genuine victory over evil, and as a way of driving countless misled individuals back to the true Church before it was too late for them to save their souls.

It all mattered a great deal, because time was short. In the Last Days, Christ would return, the world would be obliterated, and everyone would have to justify his or her actions to G.o.d. There could be no compromise in such a situation, no seeing the other person's point of view, and certainly no mutual understanding between rival faiths. Montaigne, with his praise of ordinary life and of mediocrity, was selling something that could have no market in a doomed world.

Signs of the imminence of this Apocalypse were plentiful. A series of famines, ruined harvests, and freezing winters in the 1570s and 1580s indicated that G.o.d Himself was withdrawing His warmth from the earth. Smallpox, typhus, and whooping cough swept through the country, as well as the worst disease of all: the plague. All four Hors.e.m.e.n of the Apocalypse seemed to have been unleashed: pestilence, war, famine, and death. A werewolf roamed the country, conjoined twins were born in Paris, and a new star-a nova-exploded in the sky. Even those not given to religious extremism had a feeling that everything was speeding towards some indefinable end. Montaigne's editor, Marie de Gournay, later remembered the France of her youth as a place so abandoned to chaos "that one was led to expect a final ruin, rather than a restoration, of the state." Some thought the end was very nigh indeed: the linguist and theologian Guillaume Postel wrote in a letter of 1573 that "within eight days the people will perish."

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The Devil, too, knew that his time of influence on earth was drawing to a close, so he sent armies of demons to win the last few vulnerable souls. They were armies indeed. Jean Wier, in his De praestigis daemonum De praestigis daemonum (1564), had calculated that at least 7,409,127 demons were working for Lucifer, under the middle-management of seventy-nine demon-princes. Alongside them were witches: a dramatic rise in witchcraft cases after the 1560s provided more proof that the Apocalypse was coming. As fast as they were detected, the courts burned them, but the Devil replaced them even faster. (1564), had calculated that at least 7,409,127 demons were working for Lucifer, under the middle-management of seventy-nine demon-princes. Alongside them were witches: a dramatic rise in witchcraft cases after the 1560s provided more proof that the Apocalypse was coming. As fast as they were detected, the courts burned them, but the Devil replaced them even faster.

Contemporary demonologist Jean Bodin argued that, in crisis conditions such as these, standards of evidence must be lowered. Witchcraft was so serious, and so hard to detect using normal methods of proof, that society could not afford to adhere too much to "legal tidiness and normal procedures." Public rumor could be considered "almost infallible": if everyone in a village said that a particular woman was a witch, that was sufficient to justify putting her to the torture. Medieval techniques were revived specifically for such cases, including "swimming" suspects to see if they floated, and searing them with red-hot irons. The numbers of convicted witches kept rising as standards of evidence went down, and the increase amounted to further proof that the crisis was real and that further adjustment of the law was necessary. As history has repeatedly suggested, nothing is more effective for demolishing traditional legal protections than the combined claims that a crime is uniquely dangerous, and that those behind it have exceptional powers of resistance. It was all accepted with hardly a murmur, except by a few writers such as Montaigne, who pointed out that torture was useless for getting at the truth since people will say anything to stop the pain-and that, besides, it was "putting a very high price on one's conjectures" to have someone roasted alive on their account.

A major development warned of by the theologians was the imminent arrival of the Antichrist. Signs would abound in coming years: in 1583 an old woman in an African country gave birth to an infant with cat's teeth who announced, in an adult voice, that it was the Messiah. Simultaneously, in Babylon, a mountain burst open to reveal a buried column on which was written in Hebrew: "The hour of my nativity is come." The leading French expert on such Antichrist tales was Montaigne's successor in the Bordeaux parlement parlement, Florimond de Raemond, also an enthusiastic witch-burner. Raemond's work L'Antichrist L'Antichrist a.n.a.lyzed portents in the sky, the withering of vegetation and harvests, population movements, and cases of atrocity and cannibalism in the wars, showing how all proved that the Devil was on his way. a.n.a.lyzed portents in the sky, the withering of vegetation and harvests, population movements, and cases of atrocity and cannibalism in the wars, showing how all proved that the Devil was on his way.

To join in ma.s.s violence, in such circ.u.mstances, was to let G.o.d know that you stood with Him. Both Protestant and Catholic extremists made a cult of holy zeal, which amounted to a total gift of yourself to G.o.d and a rejection of the things of this world. Anyone who still paid attention to everyday affairs at such a time might be suspected of moral weakness, at best, and allegiance to the Devil at worst.

In reality, many people did carry on with their lives and keep out of trouble as best they could, remaining faithful to the ordinariness which Montaigne thought was the essence of wisdom. Even if they believed in it, the coming confrontation between Satan and G.o.d interested them no more than the scandals and diplomacy of the royal court. Many Protestants quietly renounced their faith after 1572, or at least concealed it, an implicit admission that they considered the life of this world more important than their belief in the next. But a minority went to the opposite extreme. Radicalized beyond measure, they called for total war against Catholicism and the death of the king-the "tyrant" responsible for the deaths of Coligny and all the other victims. It was in this context that La Boetie's On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude was suddenly taken up and published by Huguenot radicals, who reinvented it as propaganda for a cause La Boetie himself would never have favored. was suddenly taken up and published by Huguenot radicals, who reinvented it as propaganda for a cause La Boetie himself would never have favored.

As it turned out, regicide was unnecessary. Charles IX died of natural causes a year and a half later, on May 30, 1574. The throne pa.s.sed to another of Catherine de' Medici's sons, Henri III, who proved even more unpopular. He was not even liked by many Catholics. Support grew throughout the 1570s for the Catholic extremists known as Ligueurs Ligueurs or Leaguists, who would cause the monarchy at least as much trouble as the Huguenots in coming years, under the leadership of the powerful and ambitious duc de Guise. From now on, the wars in France would be a three-way affair, with the monarchy often caught in the weakest position. Henri tried occasionally to take over leadership of the Leagues himself, to neutralize their threat, but they rejected him, and often portrayed him as a Satanic agent in disguise. or Leaguists, who would cause the monarchy at least as much trouble as the Huguenots in coming years, under the leadership of the powerful and ambitious duc de Guise. From now on, the wars in France would be a three-way affair, with the monarchy often caught in the weakest position. Henri tried occasionally to take over leadership of the Leagues himself, to neutralize their threat, but they rejected him, and often portrayed him as a Satanic agent in disguise.

He may have been too moderate for the Leagues, but Henri III was extremist in other ways, showing no understanding of Montaigne's sense of moderation. Montaigne, who met him several times, did not like him much. On the one hand, Henri filled his court with fops, and turned it into a realm of corruption, luxury, and absurd points of etiquette. He went out dancing every night and, in youth, wore robes and doublets of mulberry satin, with coral bracelets and cloaks slashed to ribbons. He started a fashion for shirts with four sleeves, two for use and two trailing behind like wings. Some of his other affectations were considered even stranger: he used forks at table instead of knives and fingers, he wore nightclothes to bed, and he washed his hair from time to time. On the other hand, Henri also put on exaggerated displays of mysticism and penitence. The more perplexed he became by the problems facing the kingdom, the more frequently he took part in processions of flagellants, trudging with them barefoot over cobbled streets, chanting psalms and scourging himself.

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To Montaigne, the notion that the solution to the political crisis could lie in prayer and extreme spiritual exercises made no sense. He recoiled from these processions, and put no credence in comets, freak hailstorms, monstrous births, or any of the other signs of doom. He observed that those who made predictions from such phenomena usually kept them vague, so that later they could claim success whatever happened. Most reports of witchcraft seemed to Montaigne to be the effects of human imagination, not of Satanic activity. In general, he preferred to stick to his motto: "I suspend judgment."

His Skepticism drew some mild criticism; two contemporaries in Bordeaux, Martin-Antoine del Rio and Pierre de Lancre, warned him that it was theologically dangerous to explain apocalyptic events in terms of the human imagination, because it distracted attention from the real threat. On the whole, he managed to avoid serious suspicions, but Montaigne did risk his reputation by speaking out against torture and witch trials. He was already a.s.sociated in many people's minds with a category of thinkers known to their enemies as politiques politiques, who were distinguished by their belief that the kingdom's problems had nothing to do with the Antichrist or the End Times, but were merely political. They deduced that the solution should be political too-hence the nickname. In theory, they supported the king, believing that the one hope for France was unity under a legitimate monarch, though most of them secretly hoped that a more inspiring, more unifying unifying king than Henri III might one day come along. While remaining loyal, they worked to find points of common ground between the other parties, in the hope of halting the wars and laying a foundation for France's future. king than Henri III might one day come along. While remaining loyal, they worked to find points of common ground between the other parties, in the hope of halting the wars and laying a foundation for France's future.

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Unfortunately, the one piece of common ground that really brought extreme Catholics close to extreme Protestants was hatred of politiques politiques. The word itself was an accusation of G.o.dlessness. These were people who paid attention only to political solutions, not to the state of their souls. They were men of masks: deceivers, like Satan himself. "He wears the skin of a lamb," wrote one contemporary of a typical politique politique, "but nevertheless is a raging wolf." Unlike real Protestants, they tried to pa.s.s as something they were not, and, since they were so clever and intellectual, they did not have the excuse of being innocent victims of the Devil's deception. Montaigne's a.s.sociation with the politiques politiques gave him a good reason to emphasize his openness and honesty, as well as his Catholic orthodoxy (though, of course, claiming to be honest is exactly what a wolf in sheep's clothing would do). gave him a good reason to emphasize his openness and honesty, as well as his Catholic orthodoxy (though, of course, claiming to be honest is exactly what a wolf in sheep's clothing would do).

Leaguists accused politiques politiques of untrustworthiness, but of untrustworthiness, but politiques politiques, in turn, accused Leaguists of abandoning themselves to their pa.s.sions and losing their judgment. How strange, reflected Montaigne, that Christianity should lead so often to violent excess, and thence to destruction and pain: Our zeal does wonders when it is seconding our leaning towards hatred, cruelty, ambition, avarice, detraction, rebellion. Against the grain, toward goodness, benignity, moderation, unless as by a miracle some rare nature bears it, it will neither walk nor fly.

"There is no hostility that exceeds Christian hostility," he even wrote at one point. In place of the figure of the burning-eyed Christian zealot, he preferred to contemplate that of the Stoic sage: a person who behaves morally, moderates his emotions, exercises good judgment, and knows how to live.

There was indeed much of Stoic philosophy in the politiques politiques. They did not urge revolution or regicide, but recommended acceptance of life as it is, on the Stoic principle of amor fati amor fati, or love of fate. They also promoted the Stoic sense of continuity: the belief that the world would probably continue to cycle through episodes of decay and rejuvenation, rather than accelerating into a one-directional rush towards the End. While the religious parties imagined the armies of Armageddon a.s.sembling in the sky, politiques politiques suspected that sooner or later everything would calm down and people would come back to their senses. In millenarian times, they were the only people systematically to shift their perspective and think ahead to a time when the "troubles" would have become history-and to plan exactly how to build this future world. suspected that sooner or later everything would calm down and people would come back to their senses. In millenarian times, they were the only people systematically to shift their perspective and think ahead to a time when the "troubles" would have become history-and to plan exactly how to build this future world.

Montaigne's Stoic side led him to downplay the wars to an astonishing extent in his writing. Biographers have invariably made much of his experience of war, and with good reason: it did affect his life profoundly. Some critics have based whole readings of Montaigne on the wars. But, after studying any such book, it can come as a surprise to turn back to the Essays Essays and find Montaigne saying things like, "I am amazed to see our wars so gentle and mild," and "It will be a lot if a hundred years from now people remember in a general way that in our time there were civil wars in France." Those living through the present a.s.sume that things are worse than they are, he says, because they cannot escape their local perspective: and find Montaigne saying things like, "I am amazed to see our wars so gentle and mild," and "It will be a lot if a hundred years from now people remember in a general way that in our time there were civil wars in France." Those living through the present a.s.sume that things are worse than they are, he says, because they cannot escape their local perspective: Whoever considers as in a painting the great picture of our mother Nature in her full majesty; whoever reads such universal and constant variety in her face; whoever finds himself there, and not merely himself, but a whole kingdom, as a dot made with a very fine brush; that man alone estimates things according to their true proportions.

Montaigne reminded his contemporaries of the old Stoic lesson: to avoid feeling swamped by a difficult situation, try imagining your world from different angles or at different scales of significance. This is what the ancients did when they looked down on their troubles from above, as upon a commotion in an ant colony. Astrologers now warn of "great and imminent alterations and mutations," writes Montaigne, but they forget the simple fact that, however bad things are, most of life goes on undisturbed. "I do not despair about it," he added lightly.

Admittedly, Montaigne was lucky. The wars ruined his harvests, made him fear being murdered in bed, and forced him to take part in political activities he would have preferred to avoid. They would land him in even greater troubles in the 1580s, when the war entered its last and most desperate phase. But no one could claim that he was badly scarred by these experiences, and, if he ever took up arms himself, he says nothing about it in the Essays Essays. In short, he had a good war. Yet that would not have stopped most people from indulging in lamentation.

And Montaigne was right. Life did go on. The St. Bartholomew's ma.s.sacres, terrible as they were, gave way to years of inconclusive individual suffering rather than heralding the end of the world. The Antichrist did not come. Generation followed generation until a time came when, as Montaigne predicted, many people had only the vaguest idea that his century's wars ever took place. This happened partly because of the work he and his fellow politiques politiques did to restore sanity. Montaigne, affecting ease and comfort, contributed more to saving his country than his zealous contemporaries. Some of his work was directly political, but his greatest contribution was simply to stay out of it and write the did to restore sanity. Montaigne, affecting ease and comfort, contributed more to saving his country than his zealous contemporaries. Some of his work was directly political, but his greatest contribution was simply to stay out of it and write the Essays Essays. This, in the eyes of many, makes him a hero.

HERO.

Those who have adopted Montaigne in this role usually cast him as a hero of an unusual sort: the kind that resists all claim to heroism. Few revere him for doing great public deeds, though he did accomplish some noteworthy things in his later life. More often, he is admired for his stubborn insistence on maintaining normality in extraordinary circ.u.mstances, and his refusal to compromise his independence.

Many contemporaries saw him in this light; the great Stoic political thinker Justus Lipsius told him to keep writing because people needed his example to follow. Long after the sixteenth-century Stoic Montaigne was forgotten, readers in troubled times continued to think of him as a role model. His Essays Essays offered practical wisdom on questions such as how to face up to intimidation, and how to reconcile the conflicting demands of openness and security. He also provided something more nebulous: a sense of how one could survive public catastrophe without losing one's self-respect. Just as you could seek mercy from an enemy forthrightly, without compromising yourself, or defend your property by electing to leave it undefended, so you could get through an inhumane war by remaining human. This message in Montaigne would have a particular appeal to twentieth-century readers who lived through wars, or through Fascist or Communist dictatorships. In such times, it could seem that the structure of civilized society had collapsed and that nothing would ever be the same again. Montaigne was at his most rea.s.suring when he provided the least sympathy for this feeling-when he reminded the reader that, in the end, normality comes back and perspectives shift again. offered practical wisdom on questions such as how to face up to intimidation, and how to reconcile the conflicting demands of openness and security. He also provided something more nebulous: a sense of how one could survive public catastrophe without losing one's self-respect. Just as you could seek mercy from an enemy forthrightly, without compromising yourself, or defend your property by electing to leave it undefended, so you could get through an inhumane war by remaining human. This message in Montaigne would have a particular appeal to twentieth-century readers who lived through wars, or through Fascist or Communist dictatorships. In such times, it could seem that the structure of civilized society had collapsed and that nothing would ever be the same again. Montaigne was at his most rea.s.suring when he provided the least sympathy for this feeling-when he reminded the reader that, in the end, normality comes back and perspectives shift again.

Among the many readers who have responded to this aspect of the Essays Essays, one can stand for all: the Austrian Jewish writer Stefan Zweig, who, living in enforced exile in South America during the Second World War, calmed and distracted himself by writing a long personal essay on Montaigne-his nonheroic hero.

When Zweig first came across the Essays Essays as a young man in turn-of-the-century Vienna, he admitted, the book made little impression. Like Lamartine and Sand before him, he found it too dispa.s.sionate. It lacked "the leap of electricity from soul to soul"; he could see no relevance to his own life. "What appeal could there be to a 20-year-old youth in the rambling excursus of a Sieur de Montaigne on the 'Ceremony of interview of kings' or his 'Considerations on Cicero'?" Even when Montaigne turned to topics that ought to have been more appealing, such as s.e.x and politics, his "mild, temperate wisdom" and his feeling that it was wiser not to involve oneself too much in the world repelled Zweig. "It is in the nature of youth that it does not want to be advised to be mild or skeptical. Every doubt seems to it to be a limitation." Young people crave beliefs; they want to be roused. as a young man in turn-of-the-century Vienna, he admitted, the book made little impression. Like Lamartine and Sand before him, he found it too dispa.s.sionate. It lacked "the leap of electricity from soul to soul"; he could see no relevance to his own life. "What appeal could there be to a 20-year-old youth in the rambling excursus of a Sieur de Montaigne on the 'Ceremony of interview of kings' or his 'Considerations on Cicero'?" Even when Montaigne turned to topics that ought to have been more appealing, such as s.e.x and politics, his "mild, temperate wisdom" and his feeling that it was wiser not to involve oneself too much in the world repelled Zweig. "It is in the nature of youth that it does not want to be advised to be mild or skeptical. Every doubt seems to it to be a limitation." Young people crave beliefs; they want to be roused.

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Moreover, in 1900, the freedom of the individual hardly seemed to require defense. "Had not all that long ago become a self-evident matter, guaranteed by law and custom to a humanity long since liberated from tyranny and serfdom?" Zweig's generation-he was born in 1881-a.s.sumed that prosperity and personal freedom would just keep growing. Why should things go backwards? No one felt that civilization was in danger; no one had to retreat into their private selves to preserve their spiritual freedom. "Montaigne seemed pointlessly to rattle chains that we considered broken long ago."

Of course, history proved Zweig's generation wrong. Just as Montaigne himself had grown up into a world full of hope only to see it degenerate, so Zweig was born into the luckiest of countries and centuries, and had it all fall apart around him. The chains were reforged, stronger and heavier than ever.

Zweig survived the First World War, but this was followed by the rise of Hitler. He fled Austria and was forced to wander for years as a refugee, first to Britain, then to the United States, and finally to Brazil. His exile made him "defenseless as a fly, helpless as a snail," as he put it in his autobiography. He felt himself to be a condemned man, waiting in his cell for execution, and ever less able to engage with his hosts' world around him. He kept sane by throwing himself into work. In his exile, he produced a biography of Balzac, a series of novellas and short stories, an autobiography, and, finally, the essay on Montaigne-all without proper sources or notes, since he was cut off from his possessions. He never achieved Montaigne's att.i.tude of nonchalance, but then, his situation was far worse than Montaigne's: I belong nowhere, and everywhere am a stranger, a guest at best. Europe, the homeland of my heart's choice, is lost to me, since it has torn itself apart suicidally a second time in a war of brother against brother. Against my will I have witnessed the most terrible defeat of reason and the wildest triumph of brutality in the chronicle of the ages.

By the time he reached Brazil in 1941, he was at several removes from any sense of home, and, although he was grateful to the country for taking him in, he found it hard to maintain hope. Finding a volume of the Essays Essays in the house where he was staying, he reread it and discovered that it had transformed itself out of all recognition. The book that had once seemed stuffy and irrelevant now spoke to him with directness and intimacy, as if it were written for him alone, or perhaps for his whole generation. He at once thought of writing about Montaigne. In a letter to a friend, he wrote: "The similarity of his epoch and situation to ours is astonishing. I am not writing a biography; I propose simply to present as an example his fight for interior freedom." In the essay itself, he admitted: "In this brothership of fate, for me Montaigne has become the indispensable helper, confidant, and friend." in the house where he was staying, he reread it and discovered that it had transformed itself out of all recognition. The book that had once seemed stuffy and irrelevant now spoke to him with directness and intimacy, as if it were written for him alone, or perhaps for his whole generation. He at once thought of writing about Montaigne. In a letter to a friend, he wrote: "The similarity of his epoch and situation to ours is astonishing. I am not writing a biography; I propose simply to present as an example his fight for interior freedom." In the essay itself, he admitted: "In this brothership of fate, for me Montaigne has become the indispensable helper, confidant, and friend."

His Montaigne essay did turn out to be a biography of sorts, but a highly personal one, unapologetically bringing out the similarities between Montaigne's experience and his own. In a time such as that of the Second World War, or in civil-war France, Zweig writes, ordinary people's lives are sacrificed to the obsessions of fanatics, so the question for any person of integrity becomes not so much "How do I survive?" as "How do I remain fully human?" The question comes in many variants: How do I preserve my true self? How do I ensure that I go no further in my speech or actions than I think is right? How do I avoid losing my soul? Above all: How do I remain free? Montaigne was no freedom fighter in the usual sense, Zweig admits. "He has none of the rolling tirades and the beautiful verve of a Schiller or Lord Byron, none of the aggression of a Voltaire." His constant a.s.sertions that he is lazy, f.e.c.kless, and irresponsible make him sound a poor hero, yet these are not really failings at all. They are essential to his battle to preserve his particular self as it is.

Zweig knew that Montaigne disliked preaching, yet he managed to extract a series of general rules from the Essays Essays. He did not list them as such, but paraphrased them in such a way as to resolve them into eight separate commandments-which could also be called the eight freedoms: Be free from vanity and pride.Be free from belief, disbelief, convictions, and parties.Be free from habit. Be free from ambition and greed.Be free from family and surroundings.Be free from fanaticism.Be free from fate; be master of your own life.Be free from death; life depends on the will of others, but death on our own will.

Zweig was selecting a very Stoic Montaigne, thus returning to a sixteenth-century way of reading him. And, in the end, the freedom Zweig took most to heart was the last one on the list, which comes straight from Seneca. Having fallen into depression, Zweig chose the ultimate form of internal emigration. He killed himself, with the drug Vironal, on February 23, 1942; his wife chose to die with him. In his farewell message, Zweig expressed his grat.i.tude to Brazil, "this wonderful land" which had taken him in so hospitably, and concluded, "I salute all my friends! May it be granted them yet to see the dawn after the long night! I, all too impatient, go on before."

It seemed-and this was how Zweig himself saw it-that the real value of Montaigne could be seen only when one had been pushed close to this extreme point. One must reach a state where one had nothing left to defend but one's naked "I": one's simple existence.

Only a person who has lived through a time that threatens his life and that valuable substance, his individual freedom, with war, power, and tyrannical ideologies-only he knows how much courage, how much honesty and determination are needed to maintain the inner self in such a time of herd insanity.

He would have agreed with Leonard Woolf, when Woolf said that Montaigne's vision of interlinked I's was the essence of civilization. It was the basis on which a future could be built once the terror had pa.s.sed and the war was over-though Zweig could not wait that long.

Does Montaigne's vision of private integrity and political hope have the same moral authority today? Some certainly think so. Books have been written promoting Montaigne as a hero for the twenty-first century; French journalist Joseph Mace-Scaron specifically argues that Montaigne should be adopted as an antidote to the new wars of religion. Others might feel that the last thing needed today is someone who encourages us to relax and withdraw into our private realms. People spend enough time in isolation as it is, at the expense of civil responsibilities.

Those who take Montaigne as a hero, or as a supportive companion, would argue that he did not advocate a "do-as-thou-wilt" approach to social duty. Instead, he thought that the solution to a world out of joint was for each person to get themselves back in joint: to learn "how to live," beginning with the art of keeping your feet on the ground. You can indeed find a message of inactivity, laziness, and disengagement in Montaigne, and probably also a justification for doing nothing when tyranny takes over, rather than resisting it. But many pa.s.sages in the Essays Essays seem rather to suggest that you should engage with the future; specifically, you should not turn your back on the real historical world in order to dream of paradise and religious transcendence. Montaigne provides all the encouragement anyone could need to respect others, to refrain from murder on the pretense of pleasing G.o.d, and to resist the urge that periodically makes humans destroy everything around them and "set back life to its beginnings." As Flaubert told his friends, "Read Montaigne...He will calm you." But, as he also added: "Read him in order to live." seem rather to suggest that you should engage with the future; specifically, you should not turn your back on the real historical world in order to dream of paradise and religious transcendence. Montaigne provides all the encouragement anyone could need to respect others, to refrain from murder on the pretense of pleasing G.o.d, and to resist the urge that periodically makes humans destroy everything around them and "set back life to its beginnings." As Flaubert told his friends, "Read Montaigne...He will calm you." But, as he also added: "Read him in order to live."

13. Q. How to live? A. Do something no one has done before

BAROQUE BEST SELLER.

THROUGH THE 1570s, with their alternating episodes of peace and war, Montaigne got on with life, and with his book. He spent much of the decade writing and tinkering with his first crop of essays, then published them in 1580 at the press of local Bordeaux publisher Simon Millanges. 1570s, with their alternating episodes of peace and war, Montaigne got on with life, and with his book. He spent much of the decade writing and tinkering with his first crop of essays, then published them in 1580 at the press of local Bordeaux publisher Simon Millanges.

Millanges was an interesting choice. He had only been established in the city for a few years-for about as long as Montaigne had been writing. Montaigne would have had little difficulty finding a Parisian publisher; he had dealt with them before, and the value of a work like the Essays Essays would not have escaped them. Even in its first edition, it was unique, yet it slotted neatly into the established marketing genres of cla.s.sical miscellanies and commonplace books. It had that perfect commercial combination: startling originality and easy cla.s.sification. Yet Montaigne insisted on staying with a local man, either because of a personal connection or as a matter of Gascon principle. would not have escaped them. Even in its first edition, it was unique, yet it slotted neatly into the established marketing genres of cla.s.sical miscellanies and commonplace books. It had that perfect commercial combination: startling originality and easy cla.s.sification. Yet Montaigne insisted on staying with a local man, either because of a personal connection or as a matter of Gascon principle.

This first version of Montaigne's book was quite different from the one usually read now. It filled only two fairly small volumes and, although the "Apology" was already outsized, most chapters remained relatively simple. They often oscillated between rival points of view, but they did not wash around like vast turbulent rivers or fan out into deltas, as later essays did. Some of them even kept to their supposed point. Yet they were already suffused with Montaigne's curious, questioning, restless personality, and they often opened up puzzles or quirks in human behavior. Contemporary readers had an eye for quality; the work at once found an enthusiastic audience.

Millanges's first edition was probably small, perhaps around five or six hundred copies, and it soon sold out. Two years later he issued another edition with a few changes. Five years later, in 1587, this edition was revised again and republished in Paris by Jean Richer. By now it had become the the fashionable reading for the French n.o.bility of the early 1580s. In 1584, the bibliographer La Croix du Maine held up Montaigne as the one contemporary author worth cla.s.sing with the ancients-just four years after his publication by a modest press in Bordeaux. Montaigne himself wrote that the fashionable reading for the French n.o.bility of the early 1580s. In 1584, the bibliographer La Croix du Maine held up Montaigne as the one contemporary author worth cla.s.sing with the ancients-just four years after his publication by a modest press in Bordeaux. Montaigne himself wrote that the Essays Essays did better than he had expected, and that it became a sort of coffee-table book, popular with ladies: "a public article of furniture, an article for the parlor." did better than he had expected, and that it became a sort of coffee-table book, popular with ladies: "a public article of furniture, an article for the parlor."

Among its admirers was Henri III himself. When Montaigne traveled through Paris later in 1580, he presented the king with a copy, as was conventional. Henri told him that he liked the book, to which Montaigne is said to have replied, "Sir, then Your Majesty must like me"-because, as he always maintained, he and his book were the same.

This, in fact, should have been an obstacle to its success. By writing so openly about his everyday observations and inner life, Montaigne was breaking a taboo. You were not supposed to record yourself in a book, only your great deeds, if you had any. The few Renaissance autobiographies so far written, such as Benvenuto Cellini's Vita sua Vita sua and Girolamo Cardano's and Girolamo Cardano's De vita propria De vita propria, had been left unpublished largely for this reason. St. Augustine had written about himself, but as a spiritual exercise and to doc.u.ment his search for G.o.d, not to celebrate the wonders of being Augustine.

Montaigne did celebrate being Montaigne. This disturbed some readers. The cla.s.sical scholar Joseph Justus Scaliger was especially annoyed about Montaigne's revelation, in his later edition of 1588, that he preferred white wine to red. (Actually Scaliger was oversimplifying. Montaigne tells us that he changed his tastes from red to white, then back to red, then to white again.) Pierre Dupuy, another scholar, asked, "Who the h.e.l.l wants to know what he liked?" Naturally it annoyed Pascal and Malebranche too; Malebranche called it "effrontery," and Pascal thought Montaigne should have been told to stop.

Only with the coming of Romanticism was Montaigne's openness about himself not merely appreciated, but loved. It especially charmed readers on the other side of the Channel. The English critic Mark Pattison wrote in 1856 that Montaigne's supposed egotism made him come as vividly to life on the page as a character in a novel. And Bayle St. John observed that all true "relishers of Montaigne" loved his inconsequential "twaddling," because it made his character real and enabled readers to find themselves in him. The Scottish critic John Sterling contrasted Montaigne's way of writing about himself with the more socially acceptable tradition of memoirs by public figures attending only to the boring "din and whirl" of external events. Montaigne gave us "the very man": the "kernel" of himself. In the Essays Essays, "the inward is that which is clearest."

Even in his 1580 version, Montaigne was fascinated by his inner world. It was not in some adventurous late chapter, but in his first edition that he wrote: I turn my gaze inward, I fix it there and keep it busy. Everyone looks in front of him; as for me, I look inside of me; I have no business but with myself; I continually observe myself, I take stock of myself, I taste myself...I roll about in myself.

The image is intensely physical. One sees Montaigne rolling about in himself like a puppy in long gra.s.s. When he is not rolling, he folds folds. "I refold my gaze inward" would be a more literal translation of the first sentence of this pa.s.sage: je replie ma veue au dedans je replie ma veue au dedans. He seems constantly to turn back on himself, thickening and deepening, fold upon fold. The result is a sort of baroque drapery, all billowing and turbulence. No wonder Montaigne has sometimes been described as the first writer of the Baroque period, although he predated it; less anachronistically, he has been called a Mannerist writer. Mannerist art, flourishing just before Baroque, was even more elaborate and anarchic, featuring optical illusions, misshapes, clutter, and odd angles of all kinds, in a violent rejection of the cla.s.sical ideals of poise and proportion which had dominated the Renaissance. Montaigne, who described his Essays Essays as "grotesques" and as "monstrous bodies...without definite shape, having no order, sequence, or proportion other than accidental," sounds the very type of the Mannerist. According to the cla.s.sical principles put forward by Horace, one should not even mention monsters in one's art, because they are so ill-made, yet Montaigne compares his entire book to one. as "grotesques" and as "monstrous bodies...without definite shape, having no order, sequence, or proportion other than accidental," sounds the very type of the Mannerist. According to the cla.s.sical principles put forward by Horace, one should not even mention monsters in one's art, because they are so ill-made, yet Montaigne compares his entire book to one.

Montaigne, the political conservative, proved himself a literary revolutionary from the start, writing like no one else and letting his pen follow the natural rhythms of conversation instead of formal lines of construction. He omitted connections, skipped steps of reasoning, and left his material lying in solid chunks, coupe coupe or "cut" like freshly chopped steaks. "I do not see the whole of anything," he wrote. or "cut" like freshly chopped steaks. "I do not see the whole of anything," he wrote.

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