Essais Chapitre 11

(Livre III, p. 453v-459).Michel de MontaigneVLivre III11. Des boyteuxMontaigne - Essais, Éd de Bordeaux, 3.djvuMontaigne - Essais, Éd de Bordeaux, 3.djvu/1453v-459

Des boyteux. Chap. XI.

IL y a deux ou trois ans qu’on acoursit l’an de dix jours en France. Combien de changemens devoient suyvre cette reformation’ce fut proprement remuer le ciel et la terre à la fois. Ce neantmoins, il n’est rien qui bouge de sa place : mes voisins trouvent l’heure de leurs semences, de leur recolte, l’opportunité de leurs negoces, les jours nuisibles et propices, au mesme point justement où ils les avoyent assignez de tout temps. Ny l’erreur ne se sentoit en nostre usage, ny l’amendement ne s’y sent. Tant il y a d’incertitude par tout, tant nostre apercevance est grossiere, obscure et obtuse. On dict que ce reiglement se pouvoit conduire d’une façon moins incommode : soustraiant, à l’exemple d’Auguste, pour quelques années le jour du bissexte, qui ainsi comme ainsin est un jour d’empeschement et de trouble, jusques à ce qu’on fut arrivé à satisfaire exactement ce debte (ce que mesme on n’a pas faict par cette correction, et demeurons encores en arrerages de quelques jours). Et si par mesme moyen on pouvoit prouvoir à l’advenir, ordonnant qu’apres la revolution de tel ou tel nombre d’années ce jour extraordinaire seroit tousjours eclipsé, si que nostre mesconte ne pourroit dores en avant exceder vingt et quatre heures. Nous n’avons autre compte du temps que les ans. Il y a tant de siecles que le monde s’en sert ; et si, c’est une mesure que nous n’avons encore achevé d’arrester, et telle, que nous doubtons tous les jours quelle forme les autres nations luy ont diversement donné, et quel en estoit l’usage. Quoy, ce que disent aucuns, que les cieux se compriment vers nous en vieillissant, et nous jettent en incertitude des heures mesme et des jours ? et des moys, ce que dict Plutarque, qu’encore de son temps l’astrologie n’avoit sçeu borner le mouvement de la lune ? Nous voylà bien accommodez pour tenir registre des choses passées. Je ravassois presentement, comme je faicts souvant, sur ce, combien l’humaine raison est un instrument libre et vague. Je vois ordinairement que les hommes, aux faicts qu’on leur propose, s’amusent plus volontiers à en cercher la raison qu’à en cercher la verité : ils laissent là les choses, et s’amusent à traiter les causes. Plaisants causeurs. La cognoissance des causes appartient seulement à celuy qui a la conduite des choses, non à nous qui n’en avons que la souffrance, et qui en avons l’usage parfaictement plein, selon nostre nature, sans en penetrer l’origine et l’essence. Ny le vin n’en est plus plaisant à celuy qui en sçait les facultez premieres. Au contraire : et le corps et l’ame interrompent et alterent le droit qu’ils ont de l’usage du monde, y meslant l’opinion de science. Le determiner et le sçavoir, comme le donner, appartient à la regence et à la maistrise ; à l’inferiorité, subjection et apprentissage appartient le jouyr, l’accepter. Revenons à nostre costume. Ils passent par dessus les effects, mais ils en examinent curieusement les consequences. Ils commencent ordinairement ainsi : Comment est-ce que cela se faict ? --Mais se fait il ? faudroit il dire. Nostre discours est capable d’estoffer cent autres mondes et d’en trouver les principes et la contexture. Il ne luy faut ny matiere ny baze ; laissez le courre : il bastit aussi bien sur le vuide que sur le plain, et de l’inanité que de matiere,

dare pondus idonea fumo.

Je trouve quasi par tout qu’il faudroit dire : Il n’en est rien ; et employerois souvant cette responce ; mais je n’ose, car ils crient que c’est une deffaicte produicte de foiblesse d’esprit et d’ignorance. Et me faut ordinairement bateler par compaignie à traicter des subjects et comptes frivoles, que je mescrois entierement. Joinct qu’à la verité il est un peu rude et quereleux de nier tout sec une proposition de faict. Et peu de gens faillent, notamment aux choses mal-aysées à persuader, d’affermer qu’ils l’ont veu, ou d’alleguer des tesmoins desquels l’authorité arreste nostre contradiction. Suyvant cet usage, nous sçavons les fondemens et les causes de mille choses qui ne furent onques ; et s’escarmouche le monde en mille questions, desquelles et le pour et le contre est faux. Ita finitima sunt falsa veris, ut in praecipitem locum non debeat se sapiens committere. La verité et le mensonge ont leur visages conformes, le port, le goust et les alleures pareilles : nous les regardons de mesme œil. Je trouve que nous ne sommes pas seulement laches à nous defendre de la piperie, mais que nous cerchons et convions à nous y enferrer. Nous aymons à nous embrouiller en la vanité, comme conforme à nostre estre. J’ay veu la naissance de plusieurs miracles de mon temps. Encore qu’ils s’estoufent en naissant, nous ne laissons pas de prevoir le train qu’ils eussent pris s’ils eussent vescu leur aage. Car il n’est que de trouver le bout du fil, on en desvide tant qu’on veut. Et y a plus loing de rien à la plus petite chose du monde, qu’il n’y a de celle là jusques à la plus grande. Or les premiers qui sont abbreuvez de ce commencement d’estrangeté, venant à semer leur histoire, sentent par les oppositions qu’on leur fait où loge la difficulté de la persuasion, et vont calfeutrant cet endroict de quelque piece fauce. Outre ce, que, insita hominibus libidine alendi de industria rumores, nous faisons naturellement conscience de rendre ce qu’on nous a presté sans quelque usure et accession de nostre creu. L’erreur particuliere faict premierement l’erreur publique, et à son tour apres, l’erreur publique faict l’erreur particuliere. Ainsi va tout ce bastiment, s’estoffant et formant de main en main : de maniere que le plus esloigné tesmoin en est mieux instruict que le plus voisin, et le dernier informé mieux persuadé que le premier. C’est un progrez naturel. Car quiconque croit quelque chose, estime que c’est ouvrage de charité de la persuader à un autre ; et pour ce faire, ne craint poinct d’adjouster de son invention, autant qu’il voit estre necessaire en son compte, pour suppleer à la resistance et au deffaut qu’il pense estre en la conception d’autruy. Moy-mesme, qui faicts singuliere conscience de mentir et qui ne me soucie guiere de donner creance et authorité à ce que je dis, m’apperçoy toutesfois, aux propos que j’ay en main, qu’estant eschauffé ou par la resistance d’un autre ou par la propre chaleur de la narration, je grossis et enfle mon subject par vois, mouvemens, vigueur et force de parolles, et encore par extention et amplification, non sans interest de la verité nayfve. Mais je le fais en condition pourtant, qu’au premier qui me rameine et qui me demande la verité nue et crue, je quitte soudain mon effort et la luy donne, sans exaggeration, sans emphase et remplissage. La parole vive et bruyante, comme est la mienne ordinaire, s’emporte volontiers à l’hyperbole. Il n’est rien à quoi communement les hommes soient plus tendus qu’à donner voye à leurs opinions : où le moyen ordinaire nous faut, nous y adjoustons le commandement, la force, le fer, et le feu. Il y a du mal’heur d’en estre là que la meilleure touche de la verité ce soit la multitude des croians, en une presse où les fols surpassent de tant les sages en nombre. Quasi vero quidquam sit tam valde quam nil sapere vulgare. Sanitatis patrocinium est, insanientium turba. C’est chose difficile de resoudre son jugement contre les opinions communes. La premiere persuasion, prinse du subject mesme, saisit les simples ; de là elle s’espend aux habiles, soubs l’authorité du nombre et ancienneté des tesmoignages. Pour moy, de ce que je n’en croirois pas un, je n’en croirois pas cent uns. Et ne juge pas les opinions par les ans. Il y a peu de temps que l’un de nos princes, en qui la goute avoit perdu un beau naturel et une allegre composition, se laissa si fort persuader, au raport qu’on faisoit des merveilleuses operations d’un prestre, qui par la voie des parolles et des gestes guerissoit toutes maladies, qu’il fit un long voiage pour l’aller trouver, et par la force de son apprehension persuada et endormit ses jambes pour quelques heures, si qu’il en tira du service qu’elles avoient desapris luy faire il y avoit long temps. Si la fortune eust laissé emmonceler cinq ou six telles advantures, elles estoient capables de mettre ce miracle en nature. On trouva depuis tant de simplesse et si peu d’art en l’architecte de tels ouvrages, qu’on le jugea indigne d’aucun chastiement. Comme si feroit on de la plus part de telles choses, qui les reconnoistroit en leur giste. Miramur ex intervallo fallentia. Nostre veue represente ainsi souvent de loing des images estranges, qui s’esvanouissent en s’approchant. Nunquam ad liquidum fama perducitur. C’est merveille, de combien vains commencemens et frivoles causes naissent ordinairement si fameuses impressions. Cela mesmes en empesche l’information. Car, pendant qu’on cherche des causes et des fins fortes et poisantes et dignes d’un si grand nom, on pert les vrayes : elles eschapent de nostre veue par leur petitesse. Et à la verité, il est requis un bien prudent, attentif et subtil inquisiteur en telles recherches, indifferent, et non preoccupé. Jusques à cette heure, tous ces miracles et evenemens estranges se cachent devant moy. Je n’ay veu monstre et miracle au monde plus expres que moy-mesme. On s’apprivoise à toute estrangeté par l’usage et le temps ; mais plus je me hante et me connois, plus ma difformité m’estonne, moins je m’entens en moy. Le principal droict d’avancer et produire tels accidens est reservé à la fortune. Passant avant hier dans un vilage, à deux lieues de ma maison, je trouvay la place encore toute chaude d’un miracle que venoit d’y faillir, par lequel le voisinage avoit esté amusé plusieurs mois, et commençoient les provinces voisines de s’en esmouvoir et y accourir à grosses troupes, de toutes qualitez. Un jeune homme du lieu s’estoit joué à contrefaire une nuict en sa maison la voix d’un esprit, sans penser à autre finesse qu’à jouyr d’un badinage present. Cela luy ayant un peu mieux succedé qu’il n’esperoit, pour estendre sa farce à plus de ressorts, il y associa une fille de village, du tout stupide et niaise ; et furent trois en fin, de mesme aage et pareille suffisance ; et de presches domestiques en firent des presches publics, se cachans soubs l’autel de l’Église, ne parlans que de nuict, et deffendans d’y apporter aucune lumiere. De paroles qui tendoient à la conversion du monde et menace du jour du jugement (car ce sont subjects soubs l’authorité et reverence desquels l’imposture se tapit plus aiséement), ils vindrent à quelques visions et mouvements si niais et si ridicules qu’à peine y a-il rien si grossier au jeu des petits enfans. Si toutesfois la fortune y eust voulu prester un peu de faveur, qui sçait jusques où se fut accreu ce battelage ? Ces pauvres diables sont à cette heure en prison, et porteront volontiers la peine de la sottise commune ; et ne sçay si quelque juge se vengera sur eux de la sienne. On voit cler en cette-cy, qui est descouverte ; mais en plusieurs choses de pareille qualité, surpassant nostre connoissance, je suis d’avis que nous soustenons nostre jugement aussi bien à rejetter qu’à recevoir. Il s’engendre beaucoup d’abus au monde ou, pour le dire plus hardiment, tous les abus du monde s’engendrent de ce qu’on nous apprend à craindre de faire profession de nostre ignorance, et que nous sommes tenus d’accepter tout ce que nous ne pouvons refuter. Nous parlons de toutes choses par precepte et resolution. Le stile à Romme portoit que cela mesme qu’un tesmoin deposoit pour l’avoir veu de ses yeux, et ce qu’un juge ordonnoit de sa plus certaine science, estoit conceu en cette forme de parler : Il me semble. On me faict hayr les choses vray-semblables quand on me les plante pour infallibles. J’ayme ces mots, qui amollissent et moderent la temerité de nos propositions : A l’avanture, Aucunement, Quelque, On dict, Je pense, et semblables. Et si j’eusse eu à dresser des enfans, je leur eusse tant mis en la bouche cette façon de respondre, enquesteuse, non resolutive : Qu’est-ce à dire ? Je ne l’entends pas, Il pourroit estre, Est-il vray ? qu’ils eussent plustost gardé la forme d’apprentis à soixante ans que de representer les docteurs à dix ans, comme ils font. Qui veut guerir de l’ignorance, il faut la confesser. Iris est fille de Thaumantis. L’admiration est fondement de toute philosophie, l’inquisition le progrez, l’ignorance le bout. Voire dea, il y a quelque ignorance forte et genereuse qui ne doit rien en honneur et en courage à la science, ignorance pour laquelle concevoir il n’y a pas moins de science que pour concevoir la science. Je vy en mon enfance un procés, que Corras, conseiller de Toulouse, fist imprimer, d’un accident estrange : de deux hommes qui se presentoient l’un pour l’autre. Il me souvient (et ne me souvient aussi d’autre chose) qu’il me sembla avoir rendu l’imposture de celuy qu’il jugea coulpable si merveilleuse et excedant de si loing nostre connoissance, et la sienne qui estoit juge, que je trouvay beaucoup de hardiesse en l’arrest qui l’avoit condamné à estre pendu. Recevons quelque forme d’arrest qui die : La court n’y entend rien, plus librement et ingenuement que ne firent les Areopagites, lesquels, se trouvans pressez d’une cause qu’ils ne pouvoient desveloper, ordonnerent que les parties en viendroient à cent ans. Les sorcieres de mon voisinage courent hazard de leur vie, sur l’advis de chaque nouvel autheur qui vient donner corps à leurs songes. Pour accommoder les exemples que la divine parolle nous offre de telles choses, tres-certains et irrefragables exemples, et les attacher à nos evenemens modernes, puisque nous n’en voyons ny les causes ny les moyens, il y faut autre engin que le nostre. Il appartient à l’avanture à ce seul tres-puissant tesmoignage de nous dire : Cettuy-cy en est, et celle-là, et non cet autre. Dieu en doit estre creu, c’est vrayement bien raison ; mais non pourtant un d’entre nous, qui s’estonne de sa propre narration (et necessairement il s’en estonne s’il n’est hors de sens), soit qu’il l’employe au faict d’autruy, soit qu’il l’employe contre soy-mesme. Je suis lourd, et me tiens un peu au massif et au vray-semblable, evitant les reproches anciens : Majorem fidem homines adhibent iis quae non intelligunt. Cupidine humani ingenii libentius obscura creduntur. Je vois bien qu’on se courrouce, et me deffend on d’en doubter, sur peine d’injures execrables. Nouvelle façon de persuader. Pour Dieu mercy, ma creance ne se manie pas à coups de poing. Qu’ils gourmandent ceux qui accusent de fauceté leur opinion ; je ne l’accuse que de difficulté et de hardiesse, et condamne l’affirmation opposite, egalement avec eux sinon si imperieusement. Videantur sanè, ne affirmentur modo. Qui establit son discours par braverie et commandement montre que la raison y est foible. Pour une altercation verbale et scolastique, qu’ils ayent autant d’apparence que leurs contradicteurs ; mais en la consequence effectuelle qu’ils en tirent, ceux-cy ont bien de l’avantage. A tuer les gens, il faut une clarté lumineuse et nette ; et est nostre vie trop réele et essentielle pour garantir ces accidens supernaturels et fantastiques. Quant aux drogues et poisons, je les mets hors de mon compte : ce sont homicides, et de la pire espece. Toutesfois, en cela mesme on dict qu’il ne faut pas tousjours s’arrester à la propre confession de ces gens icy, car on leur a veu par fois s’accuser d’avoir tué des personnes qu’on trouvoit saines et vivantes. En ces autres accusations extravagantes, je dirois volontiers que c’est bien assez qu’un homme, quelque recommendation qu’il aye, soit creu de ce qui est humain ; de ce qui est hors de sa conception et d’un effect supernaturel, il en doit estre creu lors seulement qu’une approbation supernaturelle l’a authorisé. Ce privilege qu’il a pleu à Dieu donner à aucuns de nos tesmoignages ne doibt pas estre avily et communiqué legerement. J’ay les oreilles battues de mille tels comptes : Trois le virent un tel jour en levant ; trois le virent lendemain en occident, à telle heure, tel lieu, ainsi vestu. Certes je ne m’en croirois pas moy mesme. Combien trouvé-je plus naturel et plus vraysemblable que deux hommes mentent, que je ne fay qu’un homme en douze heures passe, quand et les vents, d’orient en occident ? Combien plus naturel que nostre entendement soit emporté de sa place par la volubilité de nostre esprit detraqué, que cela, qu’un de nous soit envolé sur un balay, au long du tuiau de sa cheminée, en chair et en os, par un esprit estrangier ? Ne cherchons pas des illusions du dehors et inconneues, nous qui sommes perpetuellement agitez d’illusions domestiques et nostres. Il me semble qu’on est pardonnable de mescroire une merveille, autant au moins qu’on peut en destourner et elider la verification par voie non merveilleuse. Et suis l’advis de sainct Augustin, qu’il vaut mieux pancher vers le doute que vers l’asseurance és choses de difficile preuve et dangereuse creance. Il y a quelques années, que je passay par les terres d’un prince souverain, lequel, en ma faveur et pour rabatre mon incredulité, me fit cette grace de me faire voir en sa presence, en lieu particulier, dix ou douze prisonniers de cette nature, et une vieille entre autres, vrayment bien sorciere en laideur et deformité, tres-fameuse de longue main en cette profession. Je vis et preuves et libres confessions et je ne sçay quelle marque insensible sur cette miserable vieille, et m’enquis et parlay tout mon saoul, y apportant la plus saine attention que je peusse ; et ne suis pas homme qui me laisse guiere garroter le jugement par preoccupation. En fin et en conscience, je leur eusse plustost ordonné de l’ellebore, que de la cicue. Captisque res magis mentibus, quam consceleratis similis visa. La justice a ses propres corrections pour telles maladies. Quant aux oppositions et arguments que des honnestes hommes m’ont faict, et là et souvent ailleurs, je n’en ay point senty qui m’attachent et qui ne souffrent solution tousjours plus vraysemblable que leurs conclusions. Bien est vray que les preuves et raisons qui se fondent sur l’experience et sur le faict, celles là je ne les desnoue point ; aussi n’ont elles point de bout : je les tranche souvent, comme Alexandre son neud. Apres tout, c’est mettre ses conjectures à bien haut pris que d’en faire cuire un homme tout vif. On recite par divers exemples, et Prestantius de son pere, que, assoupy et endormy bien plus lourdement que d’un parfaict sommeil, il fantasia estre jument et servir de sommier à des soldats. Et ce qu’il fantasioit, il l’estoit. Si les sorciers songent ainsi materiellement, si les songes se peuvent ainsi par fois incorporer en effects, encore ne croy-je pas que nostre volonté en fust tenue à la justice. Ce que je dis, comme celuy qui n’est ny juge ny conseiller des Roys ny s’en estime de bien loing digne, ains homme du commun, nay et voué à l’obeissance de la raison publique et en ses faicts et en ses dicts. Qui mettroit mes resveries en compte au prejudice de la plus chetive loy de son village, ou opinion, ou coustume, il se feroit grand tort, et encores autant à moy. Car en ce que je dy, je ne pleuvis autre certitude, sinon que c’est ce que lors j’en avoy en ma pensée, pensée tumultuaire et vacillante. C’est par maniere de devis que je parle de tout, et de rien par maniere d’advis. Nec me pudet, ut istos, fateri nescire quod nesciam. Je ne serois pas si hardy à parler s’il m’appartenoit d’en estre creu ; et fut ce que je respondis à un grand, qui se plaingnoit de l’aspreté et contention de mes enhortemens. Vous sentant bandé et préparé d’une part, je vous propose l’autre de tout le soing que je puis, pour esclarcir vostre jugement, non pour l’obliger ; Dieu tient vos courages et vous fournira de chois. Je ne suis pas si presomptueux de desirer seulement que mes opinions donnassent pante à chose de telle importance : ma fortune ne les a pas dressées à si puissantes et eslevées conclusions. Certes, j’ay non seulement des complexions en grand nombre, mais aussi des opinions assez, desquelles je desgouterois volontiers mon fils, si j’en avois. Quoy, si les plus vrayes ne sont pas tousjours les plus commodes à l’homme, tant il est de sauvage composition’A propos ou hors de propos, il n’importe, on dict en Italie, en commun proverbe, que celuy-là ne cognoit pas Venus en sa parfaicte douceur qui n’a couché avec la boiteuse. La fortune, ou quelque particulier accident, ont mis il y a long temps ce mot en la bouche du peuple ; et se dict des masles comme des femelles. Car la Royne des Amazonnes respondit au Scyte qui la convioit à l’amour : ἄριστα χωλὸς οιφεἶ, le boiteux le faict le mieux. En cette republique feminine, pour fuir la domination des masles, elles les stropioient des l’enfance, bras, jambes et autres membres qui leur donnoient avantage sur elles, et se servoient d’eux à ce seulement à quoy nous nous servons d’elles par deçà. J’eusse dict que le mouvement detraqué de la boiteuse apportast quelque nouveau plaisir à la besongne et quelque pointe de douceur à ceux qui l’essayent, mais je viens d’apprendre que mesme la philosophie ancienne en a decidé : elle dict que, les jambes et cuisses des boiteuses ne recevant, à
cause de leur imperfection, l’aliment qui leur est deu, il en advient que les parties genitales, qui sont au dessus, sont plus plaines, plus nourries et vigoureuses. Ou bien que, ce defaut empeschant l’exercice, ceux qui en sont entachez dissipent moins leurs forces et en viennent plus entiers aux jeux de Venus. Qui est aussi la raison pourquoy les Grecs descrioient les tisserandes d’estre plus chaudes que les autres femmes : à cause du mestier sedentaire qu’elles font, sans grand exercice du corps. De-quoy ne pouvons nous raisonner à ce pris là ? De celles icy je pourrois aussi dire que ce tremoussement que leur ouvrage leur donne ainsin assises les esveille et sollicite, comme faict les dames le crolement et tremblement de leurs coches. Ces exemples servent-ils pas à ce que je disois au commencement : que nos raisons anticipent souvent l’effect, et ont l’estendue de leur jurisdiction si infinie, qu’elles jugent et s’exercent en l’inanité mesme et au non estre ? Outre la flexibilité de nostre invention à forger des raisons à toute sorte de songes, nostre imagination se trouve pareillement facile à recevoir des impressions de la fauceté par bien frivoles apparences. Car, par la seule authorité de l’usage ancien et publique de ce mot, je me suis autresfois faict à croire avoir reçeu plus de plaisir d’une femme de ce qu’elle n’estoit pas droicte, et mis cela en recepte de ses graces. Torquato Tasso, en la comparaison qu’il faict de la France à l’Italie, dict avoir remarqué cela, que nous avons les jambes plus greles que les gentils-hommes Italiens, et en attribue la cause à ce que nous sommes continuellement à cheval ; qui est celle-mesmes de laquelle Suetone tire une toute contraire conclusion ; car il dict au rebours que Germanicus avoit grossi les siennes par continuation de ce mesme exercice. Il n’est rien si soupple et erratique que nostre entendement : c’est le soulier de Theramenez, bon à tous pieds. Et il est double et divers, et les matieres doubles et diverses. Donne moy une dragme d’argent, disoit un philosophe Cynique à Antigonus.--Ce n’est pas present de Roy, respondit-il.--Donne moy donc un talent.--Ce n’est pas present pour Cynique.

Seu plures calor ille vias et caeca relaxat

Spiramenta, novas veniat qua succus in herbas ;

Seu durat magis et venas astringit hiantes,

Ne tenues pluviae, rapidive potentia solis

Acrior, aut Boreae penetrabile frigus adurat.

Ogni medaglia ha il suo riverso. Voilà pourquoy Clitomachus disoit anciennement que Carneades avoit surmonté les labeurs de Hercules, pour avoir arraché des hommes le consentement, c’est à dire l’opinion et la temerité de juger. Cette fantasie de Carneades, si vigoureuse, nasquit à mon advis anciennement de l’impudence de ceux qui font profession de sçavoir, et de leur outre-cuidance desmesurée. On mit Aesope en vente avec deux autres esclaves. L’acheteur s’enquit du premier ce qu’il sçavoit faire ; celuy là, pour se faire valoir, respondit monts et merveilles, qu’il sçavoit et cecy et cela ; le deuxiesme en respondit de soy autant ou plus ; quand ce fut à Aesope, et qu’on luy eust aussi demandé ce qu’il sçavoit faire : Rien, dict-il, car ceux cy ont tout preoccupé : ils sçavent tout. Ainsin est-il advenu en l’escole de la philosophie : la fierté de ceux qui attribuoyent à l’esprit humain la capacité de toutes choses causa en d’autres, par despit et par emulation, cette opinion qu’il n’est capable d’aucune chose. Les uns tiennent en l’ignorance cette mesme extremité que les autres tiennent en la science. Afin qu’on ne puisse nier que l’homme ne soit immoderé par tout, et qu’il n’a point d’arrest que celuy de la necessité, et impuissance d’aller outre.

Chapter XI. Of Cripples.

'Tis now two or three years ago that they made the year ten days shorter

in France. How many

changes may we expect should follow this reformation! it was really

moving heaven and earth at once. Yet nothing for all that stirs from its

place my neighbours still find their seasons of sowing and reaping, the

opportunities of doing their business, the hurtful and propitious days,

dust at the same time where they had, time out of mind, assigned them;

there was no more error perceived in our old use, than there is amendment

found in the alteration; so great an uncertainty there is throughout; so

gross, obscure, and obtuse is our perception. 'Tis said that this

regulation might have been carried on with less inconvenience, by

subtracting for some years, according to the example of Augustus, the

Bissextile, which is in some sort a day of impediment and trouble, till

we had exactly satisfied this debt, the which itself is not done by this

correction, and we yet remain some days in arrear: and yet, by this

means, such order might be taken for the future, arranging that after the

revolution of such or such a number of years, the supernumerary day might

be always thrown out, so that we could not, henceforward, err above

four-and-twenty hours in our computation. We have no other account of

time but years; the world has for many ages made use of that only; and

yet it is a measure that to this day we are not agreed upon, and one that

we still doubt what form other nations have variously given to it, and

what was the true use of it. What does this saying of some mean, that

the heavens in growing old bow themselves down nearer towards us, and put

us into an uncertainty even of hours and days? and that which Plutarch

says of the months, that astrology had not in his time determined as to

the motion of the moon; what a fine condition are we in to keep records

of things past.

I was just now ruminating, as I often do, what a free and roving thing

human reason is. I ordinarily see that men, in things propounded to

them, more willingly study to find out reasons than to ascertain truth:

they slip over presuppositions, but are curious in examination of

consequences; they leave the things, and fly to the causes. Pleasant

talkers! The knowledge of causes only concerns him who has the conduct

of things; not us, who are merely to undergo them, and who have perfectly

full and accomplished use of them, according to our need, without

penetrating into the original and essence; wine is none the more pleasant

to him who knows its first faculties. On the contrary, both the body and

the soul interrupt and weaken the right they have of the use of the world

and of themselves, by mixing with it the opinion of learning; effects

concern us, but the means not at all. To determine and to distribute

appertain to superiority and command; as it does to subjection to accept.

Let me reprehend our custom. They commonly begin thus: "How is such a

thing done?" Whereas they should say, "Is such a thing done?" Our

reason is able to create a hundred other worlds, and to find out the

beginnings and contexture; it needs neither matter nor foundation: let it

but run on, it builds as well in the air as on the earth, and with

inanity as well as with matter:

"Dare pondus idonea fumo."

I find that almost throughout we should say, "there is no such thing,"

and should myself often make use of this answer, but I dare not: for they

cry that it is an evasion produced from ignorance and weakness of

understanding; and I am fain, for the most part, to juggle for company,

and prate of frivolous subjects and tales that I believe not a word of;

besides that, in truth, 'tis a little rude and quarrelsome flatly to deny

a stated fact; and few people but will affirm, especially in things hard

to be believed, that they have seen them, or at least will name witnesses

whose authority will stop our mouths from contradiction. In this way, we

know the foundations and means of things that never were; and the world

scuffles about a thousand questions, of which both the Pro and the Con

are false.

"Ita finitima sunt falsa veris, ut in praecipitem

locum non debeat se sapiens committere."

Truth and lies are faced alike; their port, taste, and proceedings are

the same, and we look upon them with the same eye. I find that we are

not only remiss in defending ourselves from deceit, but that we seek and

offer ourselves to be gulled; we love to entangle ourselves in vanity, as

a thing conformable to our being.

I have seen the birth of many miracles in my time; which, although they

were abortive, yet have we not failed to foresee what they would have

come to, had they lived their full age. 'Tis but finding the end of the

clew, and a man may wind off as much as he will; and there is a greater

distance betwixt nothing and the least thing in the world than there is

betwixt this and the greatest. Now the first that are imbued with this

beginning of novelty, when they set out with their tale, find, by the

oppositions they meet with, where the difficulty of persuasion lies, and

so caulk up that place with some false piece;

besides that:

"Insita hominibus libido alendi de industria rumores,"

we naturally make a conscience of restoring what has been lent us,

without some usury and accession of our own. The particular error first

makes the public error, and afterwards, in turn, the public error makes

the particular one; and thus all this vast fabric goes forming and piling

itself up from hand to hand, so that the remotest witness knows more

about it than those who were nearest, and the last informed is better

persuaded than the first.

'Tis a natural progress; for whoever believes anything, thinks it a work

of charity to persuade another into the same opinion; which the better to

do, he will make no difficulty of adding as much of his own invention as

he conceives necessary to his tale to encounter the resistance or want of

conception he meets with in others. I myself, who make a great

conscience of lying, and am not very solicitous of giving credit and

authority to what I say, yet find that in the arguments I have in hand,

being heated with the opposition of another, or by the proper warmth of

my own narration, I swell and puff up my subject by voice, motion,

vigour, and force of words, and moreover, by extension and amplification,

not without some prejudice to the naked truth; but I do it conditionally

withal, that to the first who brings me to myself, and who asks me the

plain and bare truth, I presently surrender my passion, and deliver the

matter to him without exaggeration, without emphasis, or any painting of

my own. A quick and earnest way of speaking, as mine is, is apt to run

into hyperbole. There is nothing to which men commonly are more inclined

than to make way for their own opinions; where the ordinary means fail

us, we add command, force, fire, and sword. 'Tis a misfortune to be at

such a pass, that the best test of truth is the multitude of believers in

a crowd, where the number of fools so much exceeds the wise:

"Quasi vero quidquam sit tam valde, quam nil sapere, vulgare."

"Sanitatis patrocinium est, insanientium turba."

'Tis hard to resolve a man's judgment against the common opinions: the

first persuasion, taken from the very subject itself, possesses the

simple, and from them diffuses itself to the wise, under the authority of

the number and antiquity of the witnesses. For my part, what I should

not believe from one, I should not believe from a hundred and one: and I

do not judge opinions by years.

'Tis not long since one of our princes, in whom the gout had spoiled an

excellent nature and sprightly disposition, suffered himself to be so far

persuaded with the report made to him of the marvellous operations of a

certain priest who by words and gestures cured all sorts of diseases,

as to go a long journey to seek him out, and by the force of his mere

imagination, for some hours so persuaded and laid his legs asleep, as to

obtain that service from them they had long time forgotten. Had fortune

heaped up five or six such-like incidents, it had been enough to have

brought this miracle into nature. There was afterwards discovered so

much simplicity and so little art in the author of these performances,

that he was thought too contemptible to be punished, as would be thought

of most such things, were they well examined:

"Miramur ex intervallo fallentia."

So does our sight often represent to us strange images at a distance that

vanish on approaching near:

"Nunquam ad liquidum fama perducitur."

'Tis wonderful from how many idle beginnings and frivolous causes such

famous impressions commonly, proceed. This it is that obstructs

information; for whilst we seek out causes and solid and weighty ends,

worthy of so great a name, we lose the true ones; they escape our sight

by their littleness. And, in truth, a very prudent, diligent, and subtle

inquisition is required in such searches, indifferent, and not

prepossessed. To this very hour, all these miracles and strange events

have concealed themselves from me: I have never seen greater monster or

miracle in the world than myself: one grows familiar with all strange

things by time and custom, but the more I frequent and the better I know

myself, the more does my own deformity astonish me, the less I understand

myself.

The principal right of advancing and producing such accidents is reserved

to fortune. Passing the day before yesterday through a village two

leagues from my house, I found the place yet warm with a miracle that had

lately failed of success there, where with first the neighbourhood had

been several months amused; then the neighbouring provinces began to take

it up, and to run thither in great companies of all sorts of people.

A young fellow of the place had one night in sport counterfeited the

voice of a spirit in his own house, without any other design at present,

but only for sport; but this having succeeded with him better than he

expected, to extend his farce with more actors he associated with him a

stupid silly country girl, and at last there were three of them of the

same age and understanding, who from domestic, proceeded to public,

preachings, hiding themselves under the altar of the church, never

speaking but by night, and forbidding any light to be brought. From

words which tended to the conversion of the world, and threats of the day

of judgment (for these are subjects under the authority and reverence of

which imposture most securely lurks), they proceeded to visions and

gesticulations so simple and ridiculous that - nothing could hardly be so

gross in the sports of little children. Yet had fortune never so little

favoured the design, who knows to what height this juggling might have at

last arrived? These poor devils are at present in prison, and are like

shortly to pay for the common folly; and I know not whether some judge

will not also make them smart for his. We see clearly into this, which

is discovered; but in many things of the like nature that exceed our

knowledge, I am of opinion that we ought to suspend our judgment, whether

as to rejection or as to reception.

Great abuses in the world are begotten, or, to speak more boldly, all the

abuses of the world are begotten, by our being taught to be afraid of

professing our ignorance, and that we are bound to accept all things we

are not able to refute: we speak of all things by precepts and decisions.

The style at Rome was that even that which a witness deposed to having

seen with his own eyes, and what a judge determined with his most certain

knowledge, was couched in this form of speaking: "it seems to me." They

make me hate things that are likely, when they would impose them upon me

as infallible. I love these words which mollify and moderate the

temerity of our propositions: "peradventure; in some sort; some; 'tis

said, I think," and the like: and had I been set to train up children I

had put this way of answering into their mouths, inquiring and not

resolving: "What does this mean? I understand it not; it may be: is it

true?" so that they should rather have retained the form of pupils at

threescore years old than to go out doctors, as they do, at ten. Whoever

will be cured of ignorance must confess it.

Iris is the daughter of Thaumas;

admiration is the foundation of all philosophy, inquisition the progress,

ignorance the end. But there is a sort of ignorance, strong and

generous, that yields nothing in honour and courage to knowledge; an

ignorance which to conceive requires no less knowledge than to conceive

knowledge itself. I read in my younger years a trial that Corras,

a councillor of Toulouse, printed, of a strange incident, of two men who

presented themselves the one for the other. I remember (and I hardly

remember anything else) that he seemed to have rendered the imposture of

him whom he judged to be guilty, so wonderful and so far exceeding both

our knowledge and his own, who was the judge, that I thought it a very

bold sentence that condemned him to be hanged. Let us have some form of

decree that says, "The court understands nothing of the matter" more

freely and ingenuously than the Areopagites did, who, finding themselves

perplexed with a cause they could not unravel, ordered the parties to

appear again after a hundred years.

The witches of my neighbourhood run the hazard of their lives upon the

report of every new author who seeks to give body to their dreams. To

accommodate the examples that Holy Writ gives us of such things, most

certain and irrefragable examples, and to tie them to our modern events,

seeing that we neither see the causes nor the means, will require another

sort-of wit than ours. It, peradventure, only appertains to that sole

all-potent testimony to tell us. "This is, and that is, and not that

other." God ought to be believed; and certainly with very good reason;

but not one amongst us for all that who is astonished at his own

narration (and he must of necessity be astonished if he be not out of his

wits), whether he employ it about other men's affairs or against himself.

I am plain and heavy, and stick to the solid and the probable, avoiding

those ancient reproaches:

"Majorem fidem homines adhibent iis, quae non intelligunt; - Cupidine humani ingenii libentius obscura creduntur."

I see very well that men get angry, and that I am forbidden to doubt upon

pain of execrable injuries; a new way of persuading! Thank God, I am not

to be cuffed into belief. Let them be angry with those who accuse their

opinion of falsity; I only accuse it of difficulty and boldness, and

condemn the opposite affirmation equally, if not so imperiously, with

them. He who will establish this proposition by authority and huffing

discovers his reason to be very weak. For a verbal and scholastic

altercation let them have as much appearance as their contradictors;

"Videantur sane, non affirmentur modo;"

but in the real consequence they draw from it these have much the

advantage. To kill men, a clear and strong light is required, and our

life is too real and essential to warrant these supernatural and

fantastic accidents.

As to drugs and poisons, I throw them out of my count, as being the worst

sort of homicides: yet even in this, 'tis said, that men are not always

to rely upon the personal confessions of these people; for they have

sometimes been known to accuse themselves of the murder of persons who

have afterwards been found living and well. In these other extravagant

accusations, I should be apt to say, that it is sufficient a man, what

recommendation soever he may have, be believed as to human things; but of

what is beyond his conception, and of supernatural effect, he ought then

only to be believed when authorised by a supernatural approbation. The

privilege it has pleased Almighty God to give to some of our witnesses,

ought not to be lightly communicated and made cheap. I have my ears

battered with a thousand such tales as these: "Three persons saw him such

a day in the east three, the next day in the west: at such an hour, in

such a place, and in such habit"; assuredly I should not believe it

myself. How much more natural and likely do I find it that two men

should lie than that one man in twelve hours' time should fly with the

wind from east to west? How much more natural that our understanding

should be carried from its place by the volubility of our disordered

minds, than that one of us should be carried by a strange spirit upon a

broomstaff, flesh and bones as we are, up the shaft of a chimney? Let

not us seek illusions from without and unknown, we who are perpetually

agitated with illusions domestic and our own. Methinks one is pardonable

in disbelieving a miracle, at least, at all events where one can elude

its verification as such, by means not miraculous; and I am of St.

Augustine's opinion, that, "'tis better to lean towards doubt than

assurance, in things hard to prove and dangerous to believe."

'Tis now some years ago that I travelled through the territories of a

sovereign prince, who, in my favour, and to abate my incredulity, did me

the honour to let me see, in his own presence, and in a private place,

ten or twelve prisoners of this kind, and amongst others, an old woman,

a real witch in foulness and deformity, who long had been famous in that

profession. I saw both proofs and free confessions, and I know not what

insensible mark upon the miserable creature: I examined and talked with

her and the rest as much and as long as I would, and gave the best and

soundest attention I could, and I am not a man to suffer my judgment to

be made captive by prepossession. In the end, and in all conscience, I

should rather have prescribed them hellebore than hemlock;

"Captisque res magis mentibus, quam consceleratis similis visa;"

justice has its corrections proper for such maladies. As to the

oppositions and arguments that worthy men have made to me, both there,

and often in other places, I have met with none that have convinced me,

and that have not admitted a more likely solution than their conclusions.

It is true, indeed, that the proofs and reasons that are founded upon

experience and fact, I do not go about to untie, neither have they any

end; I often cut them, as Alexander did the Gordian knot. After all,

'tis setting a man's conjectures at a very high price upon them to cause

a man to be roasted alive.

We are told by several examples, as Praestantius of his father, that

being more profoundly, asleep than men usually are, he fancied himself

to be a mare, and that he served the soldiers for a sumpter; and what

he fancied himself to be, he really proved. If sorcerers dream so

materially; if dreams can sometimes so incorporate themselves with

effects, still I cannot believe that therefore our will should be

accountable to justice; which I say as one who am neither judge nor privy

councillor, and who think myself by many degrees unworthy so to be, but a

man of the common sort, born and avowed to the obedience of the public

reason, both in its words and acts. He who should record my idle talk as

being to the prejudice of the pettiest law, opinion, or custom of his

parish, would do himself a great deal of wrong, and me much more; for, in

what I say, I warrant no other certainty, but that 'tis what I had then

in my thought, a tumultuous and wavering thought. All I say is by way of

discourse, and nothing by way of advice:

"Nec me pudet, ut istos fateri nescire, quod nesciam;"

I should not speak so boldly, if it were my due to be believed; and so I

told a great man, who complained of the tartness and contentiousness of

my exhortations. Perceiving you to be ready and prepared on one part, I

propose to you the other, with all the diligence and care I can, to clear

your judgment, not to compel it. God has your hearts in His hands, and

will furnish you with the means of choice. I am not so presumptuous even

as to desire that my opinions should bias you - in a thing of so great

importance: my fortune has not trained them up to so potent and elevated

conclusions. Truly, I have not only a great many humours, but also a

great many opinions, that I would endeavour to make my son dislike, if I

had one. What, if the truest are not always the most commodious to man,

being of so wild a composition?

Whether it be to the purpose or not, tis no great matter: 'tis a common

proverb in Italy, that he knows not Venus in her perfect sweetness who

has never lain with a lame mistress. Fortune, or some particular

incident, long ago put this saying into the mouths of the people; and the

same is said of men as well as of women; for the queen of the Amazons

answered the Scythian who courted her to love, "Lame men perform best."

In this feminine republic, to evade the dominion of the males, they

lamed them in their infancy - arms, legs, and other members that gave them

advantage over them, and only made use of them in that wherein we, in

these parts of the world, make use of them. I should have been apt to

think; that the shuffling pace of the lame mistress added some new

pleasure to the work, and some extraordinary titillation to those who

were at the sport; but I have lately learnt that ancient philosophy has

itself determined it, which says that the legs and thighs of lame women,

not receiving, by reason of their imperfection, their due aliment, it

falls out that the genital parts above are fuller and better supplied and

much more vigorous; or else that this defect, hindering exercise, they

who are troubled with it less dissipate their strength, and come more

entire to the sports of Venus; which also is the reason why the Greeks

decried the women-weavers as being more hot than other women by reason of

their sedentary trade, which they carry on without any great exercise of

the body. What is it we may not reason of at this rate? I might also

say of these, that the jaggling about whilst so sitting at work, rouses

and provokes their desire, as the swinging and jolting of coaches does

that of our ladies.

Do not these examples serve to make good what I said at first: that our

reasons often anticipate the effect, and have so infinite an extent of

jurisdiction that they judge and exercise themselves even on inanity

itself and non-existency? Besides the flexibility of our invention to

forge reasons of all sorts of dreams, our imagination is equally facile

to receive impressions of falsity by very frivolous appearances; for, by

the sole authority of the ancient and common use of this proverb, I have

formerly made myself believe that I have had more pleasure in a woman by

reason she was not straight, and accordingly reckoned that deformity

amongst her graces.

Torquato Tasso, in the comparison he makes betwixt France and Italy,

says that he has observed that our legs are generally smaller than those

of the Italian gentlemen, and attributes the cause of it to our being

continually on horseback; which is the very same cause from which

Suetonius draws a quite opposite conclusion; for he says, on the

contrary, that Germanicus had made his legs bigger by the continuation of

the same exercise.

Nothing is so supple and erratic as our understanding; it is the shoe of

Theramenes, fit for all feet. It is double and diverse, and the matters

are double and diverse too. "Give me a drachm of silver," said a Cynic

philosopher to Antigonus. "That is not a present befitting a king,"

replied he. "Give me then a talent," said the other. "That is not a

present befitting a Cynic."

"Seu plures calor ille vias et caeca relaxat

Spiramenta, novas veniat qua succus in herbas

Seu durat magis, et venas astringit hiantes;

Ne tenues pluviae, rapidive potentia colic

Acrior, aut Boreae penetrabile frigus adurat."

"Ogni medaglia ha il suo rovescio."

This is the reason why Clitomachus said of old that Carneades had outdone

the labours of Hercules, in having eradicated consent from men, that is

to say, opinion and the courage of judging. This so vigorous fancy of

Carneades sprang, in my opinion, anciently from the impudence of those

who made profession of knowledge and their immeasurable self-conceit.

AEsop was set to sale with two other slaves; the buyer asked the first of

these what he could do; he, to enhance his own value, promised mountains

and marvels, saying he could do this and that, and I know not what; the

second said as much of himself or more: when it came to AEsop's turn, and

that he was also asked what he could do; "Nothing," said he, "for these

two have taken up all before me; they know everything." So has it

happened in the school of philosophy: the pride of those who attributed

the capacity of all things to the human mind created in others, out of

despite and emulation, this opinion, that it is capable of nothing: the

one maintain the same extreme in ignorance that the others do in

knowledge; to make it undeniably manifest that man is immoderate

throughout, and can never stop but of necessity and the want of ability

to proceed further.