The Complete Essays

by Michel de Montaigne

  [Even the daylight only pleases us because the hours run by on changing steeds.]10

  I have my share of that.

  Those who go to the other extreme, who are happy with themselves, who esteem above all else whatever they possess and who recognize no form more beautiful than the one they behold, may not be wise as we are but they are truly happier. I do not envy them their wisdom but I do envy them their good fortune.

  My avid humour for things new and unknown helps to foster in me my yearning to travel, though plenty of other circumstances contribute to it as well. I am most willing to turn aside from ruling my house. There is some pleasure in being in charge, if only of a barn, and in being obeyed in one’s household, but it is too uniform and listless a pleasure; it also necessarily involves you in many troublesome thoughts. You are distressed when your tenants suffer from famine, when your neighbours quarrel among themselves or encroach on you.

  Aut verberatæ grandine vineæ,

  Fundusque mendax, arbore nunc aquas

  Culpante, nunc torrentia agros

  Sidera, nunc hyemes iniquas.

  [Either the hail has ravaged your vineyards, or the soil deceives your hopes, or your fruit trees are lashed by the rain, or the sun scorches your fields. And there are the rigours of winter.]11

  Then there is the fact that barely once in six months will God send you weather which totally satisfies your steward: if it is good for the vines it is bad for the pastures:

  Aut nimiis torret fervoribus ætherius sol,

  Aut subiti perimunt imbres, gelidæque pruinæ,

  Flabraque ventorum violento turbine vexant.

  [Either the blazing sun shrivels your harvests or else they are ruined by sudden rainstorms or frosts, or ravaged by violent whirlwinds.]

  Then there is that shoe of the man of yore: new and shapely but pinching the foot;12 no outsider ever understands how much it costs you, and how much it takes out of you, to keep up that appearance of order to be seen in your household and which perhaps is bought too dearly.

  I came late to managing my estates. Those whom Nature had given birth to before me long relieved me of that burden. I had already acquired a different bent, one more in keeping with my complexion. Nevertheless, from what I have seen of it, it is an occupation more time-consuming than difficult: if a man has the ability to do other things, then he can do it easily. If I were to seeking to get rich, that way would have seemed too long; I would have served kings – a business which produces better crops than any other. Since I [C] aim only to acquire the reputation for having acquired nothing, and squandered nothing either (in conformity with the rest of my life, which is as ill-suited to doing evil as good) and [B] seek only to get by, I can do it without paying much attention.

  ‘If the worst comes to worst, forestall poverty by cutting down expenses.’ That is what I try to do, changing my ways before poverty compels me to. Meanwhile I have established enough gradations in my soul to allow me to do with less than I have – and I mean contentedly. [C] ‘Non æstimatione census, verum victu atque cultu, terminator pecuniæ modus.’ [Your degree of wealth is not measured against your income but against your expenditure on food and luxuries.]13 [B] My real need does not so exactly take up all my income as to leave nothing for Fortune to get her teeth into without biting me to the quick. My presence, ignorant and disdainful though it be, does give a strong shove to the business of my home-estates. I do work at it, albeit grudgingly. And you can say this for me at home: while I do burn my end of the candle on my own, the other end does not have to cut down on anything.

  [C] My travels only hurt me by their expense, which is considerable and exceeds my resources. Used as I am to travel not merely with an adequate retinue but an honourable one, I have to make my journeys shorter and less frequent, spending only the froth of my savings, putting things off and spinning them out as the money comes in. I have no wish that the pleasure of roaming should mar the pleasure of repose; on the contrary, I intend that each should nourish and encourage the other. Fortune has helped me in that; my chief aim in life being to live it lazily and leisurely rather than busily, she has taken from me the need to proliferate in wealth to provide for a proliferation of heirs. For a single heir, if what has been plenty enough for me is not enough for him, that is just too bad. His foolishness would not justify my wishing him more.14 Following the example of Phocion, every man provides enough for his children insofar as he provides for characters not dissimilar to his.15 I would in no wise favour what Crates did: he left his money with a banker to give to his children if they turned out to be fools, but to share between the simpletons among the people if they turned out to be clever. As if fools are better able to use money because they are less able to do without it!

  [B] Anyhow such harm as may be done by my absence does not seem to me to merit my refusing to accept, while I can afford it, such occasions as come along to withdraw my irksome presence. Something is always going awry there. You are always tugged at by business concerning this house or that. You survey everything at too close quarters: there your sharp-sightedness is harmful to you, as often enough elsewhere. I shun all occasions for annoyance and keep myself from learning about things going wrong, yet not so successfully as to avoid stumbling at home upon things which displease me. [C] And the mean tricks they hide from me are the ones I know best: you have to help to conceal some of them yourself so that they hurt you the less! [B] Vain little jabs – [C] well, vain sometimes – [B] but jabs all the same.16 It is the smallest, finest cuts which are the most piercing; just as the smallest print tires and hurts your eyes so do the smallest concerns stab you most. [C] A multitude of petty ills beset you more than the violence of a single one, no matter how big. [B] The finer and more frequent those domestic thorns the more sharply and unexpectedly they bite into us, easily taking us by surprise.17

  [C] I am no philosopher: ills crush me in proportion to their weight, and they weigh as much by their manner as their matter, often more I know them better than ordinary people do and so bear them better; but in the end, though they do not wound me they do strike me. Life is a delicate thing, easy to disturb. ‘Nemo enim resistit sibi cum coeperit impelli’ [No one can stop himself once he yields to the first impulse]:18 [B] once my face is turned towards chagrin, no matter how silly the cause which brought me to be so, I goad my humour in that direction. Thereafter it nourishes itself, provoking itself under its own impetus, drawing to itself and piling up matter upon matter on which to feed:

  Stillicidi casus lapidem cavat.

  [Water dripping drop by drop makes fissures in a stone.]

  Those everyday fissures eat into me. [C] Everyday irritations are never slight. They are constant and irremediable, particularly when they arise from the cares of your estates, which are constant and unavoidable.

  [B] When I consider my affairs overall and from a distance I find (perhaps because my memory of them is hardly a detailed one) that they have, up to the present, gone on prospering beyond my projections or calculations; I seem to be getting more out than is there: their happy state misleads me. But once I am involved in the job and watching the progress of all the details–

  Turn vero in curas animum diducimur omnes

  [Our souls torn asunder by all our cares]

  – thousands of things cause me to hope or to fear. It is exceptionally easy for me to abandon them completely: dealing with them without anguish is exceptionally hard. It is wretched to be in a place where everything you see makes work for you and concerns you. I believe I am more happy when enjoying the pleasures of someone’s else’s house, and that I bring a more innocent taste to them. [C] When asked what kind of wine he thought best, Diogenes replied, ‘Someone else’s’.19 I agree with that.

  [B] My father loved building at Montaigne, where he was born. In all my government of my domestic affairs I like to follow his precept and example, and as far as I can I will impose that duty on my successors. If I could do better for him I would. I glory in the fact that h
is wishes are still effective and implemented by me. God forbid that I should allow to fail in my hands any ghost of life which I could give to so good a father. The fact that I have bothered to complete some old section of wall and repair some botched bit of building has certainly been more out of regard for his intention than my contentment. [C] And I reproach my own laziness for not having gone on to complete the fine things he started in this house of his, the more so since I am most likely to be the last of my stock to own it and to give it a final touch. [B] As for my own inclinations, neither the pleasures of building (which are supposed to be so attractive) nor of hunting nor of laying out gardens, nor the other pleasure of life in the country, can keep me much occupied. I think ill of myself for this, as I do for all opinions which are disadvantageous to me. I do not so much care about having vigorous and informed opinions as having easy ones, convenient to live with; [C] they are true and sound enough if they are useful and pleasant.

  [B] Those who, when they hear me tell of my inadequacies for the tasks of managing my estates, proceed to yell in my ears that it is due to disdain and that I cannot be bothered to learn the names of the tools used in husbandry, nor about its seasons and succession of tasks, nor how my wines are made, how grafting is done, the names of plants and fruits and the ways of preparing them for the table, [C] nor the names and quality of the cloth I wear, [B] because my mind is full of some higher knowledge, do me mortal wrong. That would be silly, more stupid than glorious. I would20 rather be a good equerry than a good logician:

  Quin tu aliquid saltern potius Quorum indiget usus,

  Viminibus mollique paras detexere junco?

  [Why do you not do something useful, like making baskets of wickerwork or pliant reeds?]21

  [C] We confuse our thoughts with generalities, universal causes and processes which proceed quite well without us, and leave behind our own concerns for Michel,22 which touch us even more intimately than Man.

  [B] Now usually I do remain at home; but I could wish that I were happier there than elsewhere.

  Sit meœ sedes utinam senectœ,

  Sit modus lasso maris, et viarum,

  Militiœque.

  [May it be my final haven when I am weary of the sea, of roaming and of war.]23

  I do not know whether I shall manage to struggle through. I wish that, in lieu of some other part of his inheritance, my father had bequeathed me that passionate love for the running of his estates which he had in his old age. He was most successful in limiting his desires to his means and in knowing how to be content with what he had. If only I can acquire the taste for it as he did, then political philosophy can, if it will, condemn me for the lowliness and barrenness of my occupation. I do believe that the most [C] honourable [B] vocation24 is to serve the commonwealth and to be useful to many. [C] ‘Fructus enim ingenii et virtutis omnisque prœstantiœ tum maximus accipitur, cum in proximum quemque confertur.’ [The fruits of intellect and virtue and of all outstanding talents are best employed when shared with one’s neighbour.]25 [B] But where I am concerned I renounce my share, partly from self-awareness (which enables me to see both the weight attached to such vocations and the scant means I have of providing for them) – [C] even that master-theoretician of all political government Plato did not fail to abstain from it himself– [B] partly from laziness. I am content to enjoy the world without being over-occupied with it and to lead a life which is no more than excusable, neither a burden to myself nor to others.

  No man ever entrusted his affairs more fully and passively into the care and control of another than I would do if only I had someone available. One of my wishes now would be to find me a son-in-law who would fill my beak, comfort my final years and lull them to sleep, into whose hands I could resign the control and use of my goods, with complete sovereignty to do with them as I do, getting out of them what I do now – provided that he brought to it a truly grateful and loving affection. Yes: but we live in a world where the loyalty of one’s own children is unheard of.

  When I am on my travels, whoever has my purse has full charge of it without supervision. He could cheat me just as well if I kept accounts, and, unless he is a devil, by such reckless trust I oblige him to be honest. [C] ‘Multi fallere docuerunt, dum tintent falli, et aliis jus pec-candi suspicando fecerunt.’ [Many by their fear of being cheated have taught others to cheat; others have found justification for wrong-doing in suspicion thrown upon them.]26 [B] The surety I most usually have for my servants is my own ignorance. (I never assume defects until I have seen them, and I trust the young more, reckoning that they are less corrupted by bad example.) I prefer hearing after two months that I have spent four hundred crowns than having my ears battered every morning with three, five or seven. Yet [C] by larcenies of that kind [B] I have been as little robbed as anyone. True, I lend my ignorance a helping hand. I consciously encourage my knowledge of my money to be somewhat vague and uncertain; Up to a point I am pleased to be unsure about it. You should leave a little room for the improvidence or dishonesty of your manservant. On condition that there should remain, by and large, enough for us to do what we want, let us allow the surplus of Fortune’s liberality to flow on a little farther at her behest – [C] the gleaner’s portion.27 After all I do not prize the faithfulness of my men more than I disprize their wronging me. [B] Oh, what a servile and silly care is care for your money, loving to handle it, weigh it, count it over. That is the way miserliness makes its advances.

  I have been in charge of property for the last eighteen years but have never yet got myself to look into my title-deeds nor into my principal affairs which must needs be transacted with my knowledge and attention. This is no philosophical contempt for the transitory things of this world: my taste has not been so purified as that. At the very least I value such things at their worth. It is a case, most certainly, of inexcusable and puerile28 [C] laziness and negligence. What would I not do to avoid reading through a contract and shaking the dust off piles of papers, a slave to my affairs and, worse still, a slave to other people’s, like so many folk who do it for the money! For me nothing is expensive save toil and worry: all I want is to be indifferent and bovine.

  [B] I was made, I think, more for living off somebody else, if that could be done without servitude and obligation. And when I look at things closely I am not sure whether, for a man of my temperament and station, what I have to put up with from business and agents and servants does not entail more degradation, bother and bitterness than there would be in following a man born greater than I who would give me a bit of guidance and comfort. [C] ‘Servitus obedientia est fracti animi et abjecti.’ [Slavery is the obedience of a weak and despondent mind lacking in will.]29

  [B] When Crates, to rid himself of the cares and indignities of his home, jumped into the freedom of poverty, he made things worse.30 That I would never do. I loathe poverty on a par with pain. But I would indeed exchange that first sort of existence for another less grand and less busy.

  Once I am away I slough off all such preoccupations: I would feel it less then if a tower collapsed than I feel the fall of a tile when I am there. Once I am away my soul can easily find detachment: when I am there she frets like a wine-grower’s. [C] A twisted rein on my horse or a stirrup-strap knocking against my leg can put me out of humour for an entire day. [B] In face of difficulties I can lift up my thoughts but not my eyes.

  Sensus, O superi, sensus.

  [Feelings, ye gods! Feelings!]31

  It is I who am responsible when anything goes wrong at home. There are few masters – I mean of my middle station (and if there are any at all the luckier they are) who are able to rely on anyone else without retaining most of the load. That [C] somewhat detracts from the way I treat visitors (though I may have made the odd one stay on, as bores do, more for my cuisine than for my charm); and it [B] considerably detracts from the pleasure I ought to take in visits and gatherings of friends in my house.

  A gentleman in his own home never looks so [C] silly [B] as when32 he
is seen to be preoccupied with the arrangements, having a word in a manservant’s ear or casting threatening glances at another: such arrangements should flow unnoticed and suggest a normal pattern. And I find it ugly to discuss with your guests the way you are treating them, either to apologize or to boast.

  Order and cleanliness I love –

  et cantharus et lanx

  Ostendunt mihi me

  [I can see my reflection in tankard and plate]33

  – on a par with abundance; in my own home I am punctilious about necessities but have little regard for ostentation. When you are in somebody else’s house and a servant brawls or a dish is spilled you simply laugh; and while My Lord settles tomorrow’s arrangements for you with his butler you can doze off.

  [C] I am speaking for myself: I do not fail to realize how great a pastime it generally is for certain natures to run their households quietly and prosperously, all done with regularity and order. I do not wish to attribute my own mistakes and shortcomings to the thing itself nor to contradict Plato’s contention that the happiest occupation for any man is to manage his private concerns without injustice.34

  [B] When on my travels I have to think only of me – and how to spend my money (one injunction can see to that). To amass a fortune you need too many talents: I know nothing about that. I know a bit about spending it and making a good show of my expenditure – which is indeed its principal use – but I strive a bit too ambitiously over it, which makes my spending uneven and misshapen, given to excess at both extremes. If it makes a parade, if it serves a purpose, I let myself be carried away injudiciously: and just as injudiciously I close up tight if it has no gleam and does not beam on me.