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face of vice in pleafure; nor does that difguft which years have now brought upon me, hinder me from difcerning the face of pleasure in vice. Now that my days of pleasure are over, I judge of it as if they were not. I, who strictly and attentively ranfack my reason, find it the very fame it was in my moft licentious age, if it be not perhaps a little weakened and impaired by being grown old; and I am of opinion, that as it does not permit me to embark in pleasure, for the fake of my bodily health, it would not give me more allowance now than heretofore for the fake of my foul's health. I do not reckon my reafon the more vigorous because it has nothing to combat. My temptations are fo fhattered and mortified that they are not worth its oppofition, for with only ftretching out my hands I overcome them. Should my former concupifcence be replaced in its view, I fear it would not have fo much strength to refift it as it had heretofore. I do not find that it has any other notion of pleasure now than it had then, nor that it has acquired any new light; wherefore if there be a recovery it is a fcurvy one. Miferable kind of remedy where health is not to be obtained without a disease. It is not for our misfortune to perform this office, but for the good fortune of our judgment. I am not influenced by injuries and afflictions to do any thing but to curse them. This is for people who are not to be rouzed till they feel the fcourge. My reafon indeed acts with more freedom in profperity, but is more distracted and harder put to it, to digeft misfortunes than pleasures. I fee beft in a clear fky; health premonishes me with more alacrity and more benefit than fickness. I did all that I could to repair and regulate myself when I had health to enjoy them. I would be afhamed and vexed that the mifery and misfortune of my old age fhould be preferred before my good, healthful, fpiritely, and vigorous years; and that men fhould judge of me, not by what I have been, but by what I am now that I have as it were ceased to be.

In my opinion it is in happy living, and not in dying happily, as Antifthenes faid, that human felicity confifts. I have not aimed to make a monstrous addition

Wherein human according to felicity confifts, Montaigne.

of a pilofopher's tail to the head and body of a libertine, nor that this wretched remainder of life fhould contradict and give the lye to the pleasanteft, foundeft, and longest part of it. I would fain reprefent my felf uniform throughout. Were I to lead my life over again, I would live juft as I have done. I neither complain of the paft, nor fear the future; and, if I do not deceive myfelf, I have been much the fame within as without. I am principally obliged to my fortune, that the courfe of my bodily estate has been carried on in every thing in its feafon. I have feen it in its bud, bloffoms, and fruit, and now fee it withered; happily however because naturally. I bear the ailments I have the better as they are at their crifis, and also because they give me the more pleafing remembrance of the long felicity of my paft life. My wifdom alfo may, perhaps, have been of the fame pitch in both ages, but it was more active, and graceful, when young, fpiritely, and natural, than now that it is broken, peevifh, and painful. I therefore renounce thofe cafual and dolorous reformations. God muft touch our hearts, and our confciences must amend of themselves by the aid of our reafon, and not by the decay of our appetites.

What is the wifdom of old men.

Pleasure is in itself neither pafe nor dif coloured for being difcerned by eyes that are dim and diftempered. We ought to love temperance for its own fake, and in refpect to God, who has commanded both that and chastity. What we derive from catarrhs, and what I am obliged for to my cholic, is neither chastity nor temperance. A man cannot boaft that he defpifes and refifts pleasure, if he does not fee it, and if he does not know it, together with its charms, power, and most alluring beauty. I know both the one and the other, I have a right to fay it: but it feems to me that in old age our minds are fubject to more troublesome maladies and imperfections than they are in youth. I faid the fame when I was young, and when I was reproached with the want of a beard; and I fay the fame now that my grey hairs gain me authority. We call the crabbednefs of our tempers, and the difrelish of prefent things, wifdom; but in truth we do not fo much forefake vices as change them, and in my opinion for

worse.

worfe. Befides a foolish groundless pride, naufeous babble, froward and unfociable humours, fuperftition, and a ridiculous thirft after riches, when the use of them is loft, I find in old age more envy, injuftice, and malignity. It furrows the mind with more wrinkles than the face; and we never, or very rarely, fee people who, in growing old, do not grow four and mufty. The whole man moves, both towards his perfection and his decay. In confidering the wifdom of Socrates, and many circumftances of his condemnation, I dare believe that he indulged himself by prevarication, in fome measure, for the purpose, seeing that at 70 years of age he fuffered fuch a rich genius as his was to be almoft totally crampt, and his wonted brightnefs obfcured. What metamorphofes do I every day fee made by age in feveral of my acquaintance! It is a powerful malady, which creeps upon us naturally, and imperceptibly. Deep ftudy and great precaution are abfolutely neceffary to avoid the imperfections it loads us with, or at leaft to flacken their progrefs. I find that, notwithstanding all my intrenchments, it feals upon me one foot after another; I bear up againft it as well as I can, but I know not what it will bring me to at laft; but, happen what will, I am content to have it known what I was before I fell.

CHA P. III

Of three Commerces, i. e. Familiarities with Men, Women, and Books.

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The chief ability of the human

E muft not rivet ourselves fo faft to our humours and complexions. Our chief fufficiency is to know how to apply understanding. ourfelves to various cuftoms.

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If this be a conjecture only founded on Montaigne's fagacity, it does him very great honour, for Xenophon tells us exprefly, that in

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to keep himself tied and bound, by neceffity, to one only courfe, is but bare existence, not living. Thofe are the most amiable tempers, which are more variable and flexible. It was an honourable character of the elder Cato, Huic verfatile ingenium fic pariter ad omnia fuit, ut natum ad id unum diceres, quodcumque ageret §; "he had parts fo flexible to every thing, that whatsoever he "took in hand, a man would be apt to fay he was form ❝ed by nature for that very thing only." Were I to chufe for myself, there is no fashion fo good that I would care to be fo wedded to, as not to have it in my power to difengage myself from it. Life is a motion uneven, irregular, and various. A man is not his own friend, much less his own mafter, but rather a flave to himself, who is eternally pursuing his own humour, and such a bigot to his inclinations, that he is not able to turn afide from them. I fpeak it now at this time of life, when I find it hard to difengage myself from the uneafinefs of my mind, by reason that it cannot amuse itself generally, but in things wherein it is embarraffed, nor employ itself because it is fo cramped and inflexible. It is apt to mag, nify a flight fubject, and ftretches it to fuch a degree, as to require the application of all its ftrength. Its inactivity is therefore to me a painful labour, and prejudicial to my health. The minds of moft men require foreign matter to quicken and exercise them; mine has need of it rather to compofe and fettle it, Vitia otii negotio difcutienda funt; the vices owing to floth are to be fhaken "off by bufinefs;" for my moft painful, as well as principal ftudy, is to ftudy myself. Books are one fort of thofe employments that divert me from this ftudy. Upon the first thoughts, which come into thy mind, it bustles and makes trial of its vigour in every respect; exercises its feeling quality, fometimes towards force, at other times towards order and beauty, and then ranges,

truth Socrates defended himself with fo much haughtiness before his judges, only from a confideration that at his age death would be better for him than life. This is the fubject of the intire preface to that de fence made by Socrates before his judges. § Tit. Liv. lib. xxxix, cap. 40.

† Senec, Ep. 59.

moderation,

moderates, and fortifies itself. It has in itself wherewith to rouze its faculties. Nature has given to it, as to all other men's, matter enough of its own for its benefit, and fubjects proper enough both for its invention and judgment.

Meditation an important em`ployment.

Montaigne was inattentive to verfation.

frivolous con

Meditation, for a man who can infpect and exert himself with vigour, is a powerful and copious ftudy. I had rather frame my mind than furnifh it. There is no employment, either more weak or more ftrong, than that of entertaining a man's thoughts according to the ftate of his mind. The greateft men make it their profeffion, Quibus vivere eft cogitare; "to whom to live and to think, are one and the fame thing." Nature has also favoured man with this privilege, that there is nothing we can hold out in fo long. nor any action to which we more commonly, and more readily incline. It is the bufinefs of the gods, fays Ariftotle, and that from which proceeds both their blifs and ours. The principal ufe of reading to me is that, by the variety of fubjects, it keeps my reafon awake, and employs my judgment, not my memory. Few converfations therefore please me, if there be not life and in them. It is true, that the gracefulness and elegance of a speech captivate and ingrofs my attention as much, or more than the importance or weight of the fubject: and as I am apt to be fleepy in all other conversation, and give but little attention thereto, it often happens that in fuch poor, low discourse, and infipid chat, I either make drowsy, ftupid, and ridiculous anfwers, unbecoming even a child, or elfe more indifcretely and rudely maintain an obftinate filence. I am on the one hand of a penfive temper, which makes me abfent from all but myfelf; and on the other hand have a stupid and childish ignorance of many common things. By these two qualities I have obtained that five or fix as filly ftories may as truly be reported of me as of any other perfon whatsoever.

+ Cic. Tufc. Quest. lib. v. cap. 38.
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