-nam fi quando ad prælia ventum eft
Ut quondam in ftipulis magnus fine viribus ignis
Incaffum furit .

For when to join love's battle they engage,
Like fire in ftraw they vainly spend their rage.

The vices that are ftiffed in thought are not the worst. to conclude this notable commentary, which has escaped from me in a torrent of babble; a torrent impetuous fometimes, and offenfive;

Ut miffum fponfi furtivo munere malum
Procurrit cafto virginis è gremio:
Quod mifera oblite molli fub vefte locatum,
Dum adventu matris profilit excutitur,
Atque illud prono præceps agitur decurfu,
Huic manat trifti confcius ore rubor to

As a fair apple, by a lover sent

To's mistress for a private compliment,.
Which tumbles from the modeft virgin's lap,
Where the had quite forgot it, by mishap;
When, ftarting as her mother opes the door,
And falls out of her garments on the floor!
While as it rolls and the betrays furprize,
A guilty blush her fair complexion dyes.

I say that males and females are caft in the fame mold; and that education and cuftom excepted, the difference between them is not great. Plato calls upon both fexes indifferently to affociate in all the ftudies, exercises, offices, and profeffions, military and civil, in his Republic. And the philofopher Antifthenes § fays, "the virtue of both is the fame." It is much more eafy to accuse one fex, than to excufe the other, according to the proverb, which fays, Vice corrects fin".

Georg. iii. ver. 97. The application which Montaigne here makes of Virgil's words is very extraordinary, as will appear immediately to thofe who will be at the pains confulting the original. + Catull. ad Hortalum, carm. 63. ver. 19, &c. § Diog. Laert. in the life of Antif thenes, lib. vi. § 12.

VOL. III.

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CHAP.

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С НА Р. VI.

of Coaches:

T is very eafy to make it appear that great authors, when they treat of caufes, not only mention those which they judge to be the true causes, but thofe alfo which they think are not fo; provided they have any invention or beauty to recommend them. If what they say be ingenious, it is true and useful enough. We cannot be pofitive what is the chief caufe, and, therefore, muster up feveral to fee if it may not accidentally be amongst

them.

Namque unam dicere caufam

Non fatis eft, verùm plures unde una tamen fit*
And thus my mufe a ftore of caufes brings;
For here, as in a thousand other things,
Tho' by one fingle caufe th' effect is done,
Yet fince 'tis had a thousand must be shown
That we may furely hit that fingle one.

Will you ask me whence comes the custom of bleffing those who sneeze? We produce wind three feveral ways; that which fallies from below is filthy; that which is vented by the mouth bears fome reproach of gluttony; the third eruption is fneezing, which because it comes from the head, and is without offence, we give it this civil reception. Do not laugh at this crafty diftinction; for they fay it is Ariftotle's. I think I had read in Plutarch (who, of all the authors I know, is he who has best mixed art with nature, and judgment with science) giving for a reafon of the rifing of the ftomach in those who go to fea, that it is occafioned by their fear; he having found out fome reafon, by which he proves that fear is capable of producing fuch an effect. I, who am very much fubject to this effect, know very well that it is not

Lucret. lib. vi, ver. 703.

In a tract, intitled, Natural Caufes, Chap. 11. ψυχὴ σαλον έχασα και θορυβημένη συγκινεί καὶ ἀναπίμπησε τὸ σῶμα τῆς ταραχής.

owing to this caufe; and I know it not by argument, but by unavoidable experience. Without inftancing what I have been told, that the fame thing often happens to the beafts, especially to swine, when free from any apprehenfion of danger; and what an acquaintance of mine has told me of himself, that, being very subject to it, his inclination to vomit has gone off two or three times, being terrified to a great degree in a violent ftorm as it happened to that ancient, who faid, Pejus vexabar quàm ut periculum mihi fuccureret; I was too much difordered "for the apprehenfion of danger to relieve me." I never was afraid upon the water; nor indeed, elsewhere (and have often had juft reafons for fear, if death be fuch a caufe) fo as to be difturbed and change countenance. Fear fprings fometimes as well from want of judgment as from want of courage. All the dangers which I have been in I have looked upon, without winking, with a free, folid, and entire countenance; and befides, to be afraid requires courage. It has formerly ferved me better than other courfes, fo to conduct and regulate my flight, that it was,' if not without fear, yet without terror and aftonishment. It was ftirred indeed, but without amazement or ftupefaction. Great fouls go much farther, and represent flights, not only calm and temperate, but, moreover, intrepid. We will mention that which Alcibiades relates of Socrates, his companion in arms; " after our army was routed, I found him and Lachez in the very rear "of those who fled, and viewed him at my leisure, and "in fecurity, for I was mounted on a good horfe and he

on foot; and thus we had fought. I took notice in "the first place with what deliberation and refolution he "fought, compared with Lachez, and then the gallan"try of his ftep nothing different from his ordinary gait, "his firm and regular countenance, viewing and judging "what paffed about him, looking one while on thofe, "and another while upon other friends and enemies, af"ter fuch a manner as encouraged the one, and fignified

Senec. ep. 53.

edit. in 1602.

Plato in his Banquet, p. 1206. of the Francfort

"to the other, that he would fell his life dear to any on "that offered to take it from him; and fo they faved "themselves, for such men are not fo liable to be at"tacked as those who run away are to be pursued." That was the teftimony of this great commander, which teaches us what we experience every day, that nothing throws us fo much into dangers as an inconfiderate eagernefs to keep clear of them. Quo timoris minus eft, eo * minus ferme periculi eft; "where there is the leaft fear, there " is generally the leaft danger." When a man is ready to decl are that he thinks of death, and forefees it, our people are in the wrong to fay that therefore he is afraid of it. Our forefight of the good or ill that affects us, is equally proper for us. To confider and judge of danger is, in fome fort, the reverse of being astonished at it. I do not find myself strong enough to fuftain the fhock and impetuofity of this paffion of fear, or of any other that is vehement. If I was once conquered and beaten down by it, I should never rife again entire. Whoever fhould once make my foul lofe its footing, would never restore it to its right place. It fearches, and probes itself too deeply and too much to the quick, and would never fuffer the wound it had received to be closed and fkinned over. has been well for me that no fickness has yet difmounted it. Every attack made upon me I oppose with a high hand; by which means the first that should rout me would put it out of my power ever to rally again. I have no after-game to play. On which fide foever the inundation breaks my banks, I lie open, and am drowned without remedy. Epicurus faid, that a wife man can never turn fool; and I have an opinion the reverse of this fentence, that he who has been once an arrant fool, will never after be very wife. God gives me cold according to my cloathing, and paffions proportionable to the ftrength I have to bear them. Nature having laid me open on the one fide, has covered me on the other. She has difarmed me of ftrength, but has armed me with infenfibility, and an apprehenfion that is either moderate or dull. I have not for some time (and much lefs when Titus Livy, lib. xxii. cap. 5.

It

I was young) been reconciled to a coach, litter, or boat; and hate all other riding but on horseback, both in town and country. But to me a litter is more intolerable than a coach, and for the fame reafon I had rather be toffed upon the water, fo as to give me fear, than be rocked in a dead calm. By the little jerks I feel from the oars ftealing the veffel from under me, I find both my head and ftomach difordered I know not how, fince I cannot endure that my feat fhould tremble. When the fail, or current of the water, keeps us upright, or when we are in tow, that regular agitation gives me no uneafinefs. It is an interrupted motion that offends me, and moft of all when it is moft languid; I know not how to express it otherwife. The phyficians have ordered me to squeeze and gird the bottom of my belly with a napkin as a remedy; which, however, I have not tried, being accustomed to ftruggle with my own infirmities, and to overcome them by myself.

The ufe of coaches in battle.

Did my memory ferve me, I would not think my time ill spent in fetting down here the infinite variety that we find in hiftories as to the use of chariots in the fervice of war; various according to the nations, and according to the ages; and, in my opinion, of great effect and neceffity, infomuch that it is a wonder we have loft all knowledge of them. I will only fay this, that very lately, in the time of our fathers, the Hungarians made very advantageous ufe of them against the Turks; every one of them having a targeteer and a mufqueteer, and a number of harquebufiers ready charged, and all covered with a target-fence, like that which defends the rowers in a galley. They fet three thoufand fuch chariots in the front of their battle, and, after their cannon had played, made them all pour in their fhot upon the enemy, and force them to fwallow that discharge, be. fore they tafted of the reft, which was no little advance; or else they drove the faid coaches into their fquadrons to break and open a paffage through them; befides the use which they might make of them in a dangerous place to flank the troops marching into the field, or to cover a

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