This would have been a good way of putting Montaigne off literary endeavors for life; perhaps that was what Pierre was trying to do. As good luck would have it, however, the book was more than just long and boring. It also promoted a brand of theology that Montaigne found abhorrent. This woke him out of his slumbers. More than the work on La Boetie"s ma.n.u.scripts, and perhaps more even than the crafting of the letter describing his friend"s dying moments, his father"s translation task lit the spark that one day blazed up into the Essays Essays.
The book was called Theologia naturalis, sive liber creaturarum Theologia naturalis, sive liber creaturarum (Natural Theology, or Book of Creatures). Its author, Raymond Sebond, had written it in 1436, though it was not published until 1484: still well before Montaigne"s time, and Pierre"s. It had been given to Pierre by one of the bookish friends he liked to cultivate, but the Latin was too difficult for him, so he put it away in a pile of papers. Years later, he looked through the pile. Something about the book, perhaps its dense, stubborn inscrutability, put him in mind of his errant son. (Natural Theology, or Book of Creatures). Its author, Raymond Sebond, had written it in 1436, though it was not published until 1484: still well before Montaigne"s time, and Pierre"s. It had been given to Pierre by one of the bookish friends he liked to cultivate, but the Latin was too difficult for him, so he put it away in a pile of papers. Years later, he looked through the pile. Something about the book, perhaps its dense, stubborn inscrutability, put him in mind of his errant son.
Pierre"s decision to put it away when he did, and retrieve it when he did, may have been connected to the fact that it went first out of favor with the Church, then back in again. Theologia naturalis Theologia naturalis was placed on the was placed on the Index of Prohibited Books Index of Prohibited Books in 1558, but taken off in 1564, because it promoted a distinctive style of "rational" theology about which the Church kept changing its mind. The debate centered on the claim that truths of religion could be proved through rational arguments, or by examination of evidence found in nature. Sebond thought they could be so proved: this put him at the opposite extreme both from Montaigne and, for a while, from the Church. Montaigne inclined more towards a position known as Fideism, which placed no reliance at all on human reason or endeavor, and denied that humans could attain knowledge of religious truths except through faith. Montaigne may not have felt a great desire for faith, but he did feel a strong aversion to all human pretension-and the result was the same. in 1558, but taken off in 1564, because it promoted a distinctive style of "rational" theology about which the Church kept changing its mind. The debate centered on the claim that truths of religion could be proved through rational arguments, or by examination of evidence found in nature. Sebond thought they could be so proved: this put him at the opposite extreme both from Montaigne and, for a while, from the Church. Montaigne inclined more towards a position known as Fideism, which placed no reliance at all on human reason or endeavor, and denied that humans could attain knowledge of religious truths except through faith. Montaigne may not have felt a great desire for faith, but he did feel a strong aversion to all human pretension-and the result was the same.
Thus Montaigne found himself with the job of translating 500 pages of theological argumentation designed to prove an a.s.sertion he deplored. "It was a very strange and a new occupation for me," he wrote. In the Essays Essays, he tried to make it sound as though he had approached it in a casual way. "Being by chance at leisure at the time," he said, "and being unable to disobey any command of the best father there ever was, I got through it as best I could." But it must have been a major project, taking a year or more to complete. He probably surprised himself by how much he got out of it. It stimulated him as grit stimulates an oyster. The whole time he was writing, he must have been thinking, "But...but...," and even "No! No!" It forced him to a.n.a.lyze his own ideas. Even if he didn"t question the text deeply at the time, he certainly did when he was commissioned a few years later (probably by Marguerite de Valois, the king"s sister and wife of the Protestant Henri de Navarre) to write an essay defending the book; that is, to defend a work he considered indefensible.
That would become his "Apology for Raymond Sebond," the twelfth chapter of Book II of the Essays Essays. It is far and away the longest piece in the book, almost absurdly out of proportion to the rest. In the 1580 edition, the other ninety-three chapters average nine and a half pages each, while the "Apology" occupies 248 pages. Stylistically, though, it fits perfectly. It charms the reader and weaves complex patterns of digression just like the others, and it gives the Essays Essays its weight in more than one sense. Without it, the book would have had less influence in centuries to come. It would have been less hated, by some, but also less read. its weight in more than one sense. Without it, the book would have had less influence in centuries to come. It would have been less hated, by some, but also less read.
"Apology" means "defense"; and indeed the essay does begin as a defense of Sebond. It stays that way for about half a page. Then it swerves off into something very different: something much more like an attack. As the critic Louis Cons once put it, it supports Sebond "as the rope supports the hanged man."
How, then, can he call it an "apology"? Montaigne"s trick is simple. He purports to defend Sebond against those who have tried to bring him down using rational arguments. He does this by showing that rational arguments, in general in general, are fallible, because human reason itself cannot be relied on. Thus he defends a rationalist against other rationalists by arguing that anything based on reason is valueless. Montaigne"s defense undermines Sebond"s enemies, all right, but it undermines Sebond himself even more fatally. Of this, he was obviously well aware.
Despite its length and complexity, the essay is never less than entertaining. This is because Montaigne borrows a technique from Plutarch: he constructs his argument by heaping up case studies. Stories and facts spill out in every paragraph like flowers from a cornucopia. Almost every story provides an example of how useless human reason is, how feeble human powers are, and how silly and deluded almost everyone is-not excepting Montaigne himself, as he happily admits.
Many of the examples themselves come from Plutarch as well. But the driving force behind this unapologetic "Apology" is not Plutarch"s-or not his alone. It comes from the third of the great h.e.l.lenistic philosophies, the strangest of them all: Pyrrhonian Skepticism.
7. Q. How to live? A. Question everything
ALL I KNOW IS THAT I KNOW NOTHING, AND I"M NOT EVEN SURE ABOUT THAT
SET ALONGSIDE S STOICISM and Epicureanism, Skepticism looks like the odd one out. The other two seem obvious paths to tranquillity and "human flourishing": they teach you to prepare for life"s difficulties, to pay attention, to develop good habits of thought, and to practice therapeutic tricks on yourself. Skepticism seems a more limited matter. A skeptic is taken to be someone who always wants to see proof, and who doubts things that other people take at face value. It sounds as if it concerns only questions of knowledge, not the question of how to live. In the Renaissance, however, and in the cla.s.sical world where Skepticism was born alongside the other pragmatic philosophies, it was seen differently. and Epicureanism, Skepticism looks like the odd one out. The other two seem obvious paths to tranquillity and "human flourishing": they teach you to prepare for life"s difficulties, to pay attention, to develop good habits of thought, and to practice therapeutic tricks on yourself. Skepticism seems a more limited matter. A skeptic is taken to be someone who always wants to see proof, and who doubts things that other people take at face value. It sounds as if it concerns only questions of knowledge, not the question of how to live. In the Renaissance, however, and in the cla.s.sical world where Skepticism was born alongside the other pragmatic philosophies, it was seen differently.
Like the others, Skepticism amounted to a form of therapy. This, at least, was true of Pyrrhonian Skepticism, the type originated by the Greek philosopher Pyrrho, who died about 275 BC BC, and later developed more rigorously by s.e.xtus Empiricus in the second century AD AD. ("Dogmatic" or "Academic" Skepticism, the other kind, was less far-reaching.) Some idea of the bizarre effect Pyrrhonism had on people is apparent from the story of how Henri Estienne, Montaigne"s near-contemporary and first French translator of s.e.xtus Empiricus, reacted to his encounter with s.e.xtus"s Hypotyposes Hypotyposes. Working in his library one day, but feeling too ill and tired to do his usual work, he found a copy while browsing through an old box of ma.n.u.scripts. As soon as he started reading, he found himself laughing so heartily that his weariness left him and his intellectual energy returned. Another scholar of the period, Gentian Hervet, had a similar experience. He too came across s.e.xtus by chance in his employer"s library, and felt that a world of lightness and pleasure had opened up before him. The work did not so much instruct or convince its readers as give them the giggles.
A modern reader perusing the Hypotyposes Hypotyposes might wonder what was so funny. It does contain some sprightly examples, as philosophy books often do, but it does not seem wildly comic. It is not obvious why it cured both Estienne and Hervet of their ennui-or why it had such an impact on Montaigne, who would find in it the perfect antidote to Raymond Sebond and his solemn, inflated ideas of human importance. might wonder what was so funny. It does contain some sprightly examples, as philosophy books often do, but it does not seem wildly comic. It is not obvious why it cured both Estienne and Hervet of their ennui-or why it had such an impact on Montaigne, who would find in it the perfect antidote to Raymond Sebond and his solemn, inflated ideas of human importance.
The key to the trick is the revelation that nothing in life need be taken seriously. Pyrrhonism does not even take itself seriously. Ordinary dogmatic Skepticism a.s.serts the impossibility of knowledge: it is summed up in Socrates"s remark: "All I know is that I know nothing." Pyrrhonian Skepticism starts from this point, but then adds, in effect, "and I"m not even sure about that." Having stated its one philosophical principle, it turns in a circle and gobbles itself up, leaving only a puff of absurdity.
Pyrrhonians accordingly deal with all the problems life can throw at them by means of a single word which acts as shorthand for this maneuver: in Greek, epokhe epokhe. It means "I suspend judgment." Or, in a different rendition given in French by Montaigne himself, je soutiens: je soutiens: "I hold back." This phrase conquers all enemies; it undoes them, so that they disintegrate into atoms before your eyes. "I hold back." This phrase conquers all enemies; it undoes them, so that they disintegrate into atoms before your eyes.
This sounds about as uplifting as the Stoic or Epicurean notion of "indifference." But, like the other h.e.l.lenistic ideas, it works, and that is all that matters. Epokhe Epokhe functions almost like one of those puzzling koans in Zen Buddhism: brief, enigmatic notions or unanswerable questions such as "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" At first, these utterances cause nothing but perplexity. Later, they open a path to all-encompa.s.sing wisdom. This family resemblance between Pyrrhonism and Zen may be no accident: Pyrrho traveled to Persia and India with Alexander the Great, and dabbled in Eastern philosophy-not Zen Buddhism, which did not yet exist, but some of its precursors. functions almost like one of those puzzling koans in Zen Buddhism: brief, enigmatic notions or unanswerable questions such as "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" At first, these utterances cause nothing but perplexity. Later, they open a path to all-encompa.s.sing wisdom. This family resemblance between Pyrrhonism and Zen may be no accident: Pyrrho traveled to Persia and India with Alexander the Great, and dabbled in Eastern philosophy-not Zen Buddhism, which did not yet exist, but some of its precursors.
The epokhe epokhe trick makes you laugh and feel better because it frees you from the need to find a definite answer to anything. To borrow an example from Alan Bailey, a historian of Skepticism, if someone declares that the number of grains of sand in the Sahara is an even number and demands to know your opinion, your natural response might be, "I don"t have one," or "How should I know?" Or, if you want to sound more philosophical, "I suspend judgment"- trick makes you laugh and feel better because it frees you from the need to find a definite answer to anything. To borrow an example from Alan Bailey, a historian of Skepticism, if someone declares that the number of grains of sand in the Sahara is an even number and demands to know your opinion, your natural response might be, "I don"t have one," or "How should I know?" Or, if you want to sound more philosophical, "I suspend judgment"-epokhe. If a second person says, "What rubbish! There is obviously an odd odd number of grains of sand in the Sahara," you would still say number of grains of sand in the Sahara," you would still say epokhe epokhe, in the same unflappable tone. In effect, you respond with the deadpan statement s.e.xtus himself cited as a definition of epokhe: epokhe: I cannot say which of the things proposed I should find convincing and which I should not find convincing.
Or: I now feel in such a way as neither to posit dogmatically nor to reject any of the things falling under this investigation.
Or: To every account I have scrutinized which purports to establish something in dogmatic fashion, there appears to me to be opposed another account, purporting to establish something in dogmatic fashion, equal to it in convincingness or lack of convincingness.
This last formulation in particular might be memorized as a useful way of shutting up anyone making outlandish claims about the Sahara or anything else. In reciting it, one feels a kind of mental calm descending. One cannot know the answer and feels it doesn"t matter, so one"s nonengagement causes no distress.
For a Pyrrhonian, this remains true even when the questions get more difficult. Is it all right to lie to someone to make them feel better? Epokhe Epokhe. Is my cat better-looking than your cat? Am I kinder than you? Does love make one happy? Is there such a thing as a just war? Epokhe Epokhe. And it goes further. A real Pyrrhonian will suspend judgment even in response to questions that ordinary folk might think had an obvious answer. Do hens lay eggs? Do other people really exist? Am I looking at a cup of coffee at this moment? It is epokhe epokhe all the way. all the way.
The Pyrrhonians did this, not to unsettle themselves profoundly and throw themselves into a paranoid vortex of doubt, but to attain a condition of relaxation about everything. It was their path to ataraxia ataraxia-a goal they shared with the Stoics and Epicureans-and thus to joy and human flourishing. The most obvious advantage is that Pyrrhonians need never worry about getting anything wrong. If they win their arguments, they show that they are right. If they lose, that just proves that they were right to doubt their own knowledge. This makes them simultaneously very peaceful and very contrary. They are fond of arguing for unpopular points of view, for the fun of it. As Montaigne wrote: If you postulate that snow is black, they argue on the contrary that it is white. If you say that it is neither one nor the other, it is up to them to maintain that it is both. If you maintain with certain judgment that you know nothing about it, they will maintain that you do. Yes, and if by an affirmative axiom you a.s.sure them that you are in doubt about it, they will go and argue that you are not, or that you cannot judge and prove that you are in doubt.
By this time they will probably have been silenced by a punch on the nose, but even that does not bother them, since they are undisturbed by the idea of someone being angry with them, and they are not unduly bothered by physical pain. Who is to say that pain is worse than pleasure? And if a shard of bone penetrates their brain and kills them, so what? Is it better to live than to die?
"Hail, skeptic ease!" wrote the Irish poet Thomas Moore, long after Montaigne: When error"s waves are past How sweet to reach thy tranquil port at last, And gently rocked in undulating doubt, Smile at the st.u.r.dy winds which war without!
So immense was this ease that it could separate Skeptics entirely from ordinary people-even though, unlike the Epicureans in their Garden, they preferred to remain immersed in the real world. Some extraordinary stories were told about Pyrrho himself. He was supposed to be so aloof and so tranquil that he would not react to things at all. When walking somewhere, he would not change his course even for precipices or oncoming carts, so his friends had to keep intervening to save him. And, as Montaigne recorded, "If he had begun to say something, he never failed to finish it, even though the man he was speaking to had gone away"-because he did not want to be diverted from his inner reality by external changes.
Meanwhile, other stories suggested that even Pyrrho could not maintain perfect indifference all the time. A friend caught him "quarreling very sharply" with his sister, and accused him of betraying his principles. "What, must this silly woman also serve as testimony to my rules?" replied Pyrrho. Another time, having been caught defending himself against a frenzied dog, he admitted, "It is very difficult entirely to strip off the man."
Montaigne loved both kinds of story: the ones that showed Pyrrho departing radically from normal behavior, as well as the ones that showed him to be merely human. And, like a true Skeptic, he tried to suspend judgment about them all. He felt it more likely, however, that Pyrrho was an ordinary man like himself, striving only to be clear-sighted and to take nothing for granted.
He did not want to make himself a stump or a stone; he wanted to make himself a living, thinking, reasoning man, enjoying all natural pleasures and comforts, employing and using all his bodily and spiritual faculties.
All Pyrrho renounced, according to Montaigne, was the pretension most people fall prey to: that of "regimenting, arranging, and fixing truth." This was what really interested Montaigne in the Skeptical tradition: not so much the Skeptics" extreme approach to warding off pains and sorrows (for that, he preferred the Stoics and Epicureans, who seemed more closely attuned to real life), but their desire to take everything provisionally and questioningly. This was just what he always tried to do himself. To keep this goal in the forefront of his mind, he had a series of medals struck in 1576, featuring s.e.xtus"s magic word epokhe epokhe (here appearing as (here appearing as epekho) epekho), together with his own arms and an emblem of weighing scales. The scales are another Pyrrhonian symbol, designed to remind himself both to maintain balance, and to weigh things up rather than merely accepting them.
The imagery he used was unusual, but the idea of inscribing such personal statements on medals or jetons jetons was not: it was a fashion of the time, and functioned both as an was not: it was a fashion of the time, and functioned both as an aide-memoire aide-memoire and as a token of belonging or ident.i.ty. Had Montaigne been a young man of the early twenty-first century instead of the sixteenth, he would probably have had it done as a tattoo. and as a token of belonging or ident.i.ty. Had Montaigne been a young man of the early twenty-first century instead of the sixteenth, he would probably have had it done as a tattoo.
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(ill.u.s.tration credit i7.1)
If the medal was indeed designed to remind him of his principles, it worked: Skepticism guided him at work, in his home life, and in his writing. The Essays Essays are suffused with it: he filled his pages with words such as "perhaps," "to some extent," "I think," "It seems to me," and so on-words which, as Montaigne said himself, "soften and moderate the rashness of our propositions," and which embody what the critic Hugo Friedrich has called his philosophy of "una.s.sumingness." They are not extra flourishes; they are suffused with it: he filled his pages with words such as "perhaps," "to some extent," "I think," "It seems to me," and so on-words which, as Montaigne said himself, "soften and moderate the rashness of our propositions," and which embody what the critic Hugo Friedrich has called his philosophy of "una.s.sumingness." They are not extra flourishes; they are are Montaigne"s thought, at its purest. He never tired of such thinking, or of boggling his own mind by contemplating the millions of lives that had been lived through history and the impossibility of knowing the truth about them. "Even if all that has come down to us by report from the past should be true and known by someone, it would be less than nothing compared with what is unknown." How puny is the knowledge of even the most curious person, he reflected, and how astounding the world by comparison. To quote Hugo Friedrich again, Montaigne had a "deep need to be surprised by what is unique, what cannot be categorized, what is mysterious." Montaigne"s thought, at its purest. He never tired of such thinking, or of boggling his own mind by contemplating the millions of lives that had been lived through history and the impossibility of knowing the truth about them. "Even if all that has come down to us by report from the past should be true and known by someone, it would be less than nothing compared with what is unknown." How puny is the knowledge of even the most curious person, he reflected, and how astounding the world by comparison. To quote Hugo Friedrich again, Montaigne had a "deep need to be surprised by what is unique, what cannot be categorized, what is mysterious."
And of all that was mysterious, nothing amazed him more than himself, the most unfathomable phenomenon of all. Countless times, he noticed himself changing an opinion from one extreme to the other, or shifting from emotion to emotion within seconds.
My footing is so unsteady and so insecure, I find it so vacillating and ready to slip, and my sight is so unreliable, that on an empty stomach I feel myself another man than after a meal. If my health smiles upon me, and the brightness of a beautiful day, I am a fine fellow; if I have a corn bothering my toe, I am surly, unpleasant, and unapproachable.
Even his simplest perceptions cannot be relied upon. If he has a fever or has taken medicine, everything tastes different or appears with different colors. A mild cold befuddles the mind; dementia would knock it out entirely. Socrates himself could be rendered a vacant idiot by a stroke or brain damage, and if a rabid dog bit him, he would talk nonsense. The dog"s saliva could make "all philosophy, if it were incarnate, raving mad." And this is just the point: for Montaigne, philosophy is is incarnate. It lives in individual, fallible humans; therefore, it is riddled with uncertainty. "The philosophers, it seems to me, have hardly touched this chord." incarnate. It lives in individual, fallible humans; therefore, it is riddled with uncertainty. "The philosophers, it seems to me, have hardly touched this chord."
And what of the perceptions of different species? Montaigne correctly guesses (as s.e.xtus did before him) that other animals see colors differently from humans. Perhaps it is we, not they, who see them "wrongly." We have no way of knowing what the colors really are. Animals have faculties that are weak or lacking in us, and maybe some of these are essential to a full understanding of the world. "We have formed a truth by the consultation and concurrence of our five senses; but perhaps we needed the agreement of eight or ten senses, and their contribution, to perceive it certainly and in its essence."
This seemingly casual remark proposes a shocking idea: that we may be cut off by our very nature from seeing things as they are. A human being"s perspective may not merely be p.r.o.ne to occasional error, but limited by definition, in exactly the way we normally (and arrogantly) presume a dog"s intelligence to be. Only someone with an exceptional ability to escape his immediate point of view could entertain such an idea, and this was precisely Montaigne"s talent: being able to slip out from behind his eyes so as to gaze back upon himself with Pyrrhonian suspension of judgment. Even the original Skeptics never went so far. They doubted everything around them, but they did not usually consider how implicated their innermost souls were in the general uncertainty. Montaigne did, all the time: We, and our judgment, and all mortal things go on flowing and rolling unceasingly. Thus nothing certain can be established about one thing by another, both the judging and the judged being in continual change and motion.
This might seem a dead end, closing off all possibility of knowing anything, since nothing can be measured against anything else, but it can also open up a new way of living. It makes everything more complicated and more interesting: the world becomes a vast multidimensional landscape in which every point of view must be taken into account. All we need to do is to remember this fact, so as to "become wise at our own expense," as Montaigne put it.
Even for him, the discipline of attention required constant effort: "We must really strain our soul to be aware of our own fallibility." The Essays Essays helped. By writing them, he set himself up like a lab rat and stood over himself with notebook in hand. Each observed oddity made him rejoice. He even took pleasure in his memory lapses, for they reminded him of his failings and saved him from the error of insisting that he was always right. There was only one exception to his "question everything" rule: he was careful to state that he considered his religious faith beyond doubt. He adhered to the received dogma of the Catholic Church, and that was that. helped. By writing them, he set himself up like a lab rat and stood over himself with notebook in hand. Each observed oddity made him rejoice. He even took pleasure in his memory lapses, for they reminded him of his failings and saved him from the error of insisting that he was always right. There was only one exception to his "question everything" rule: he was careful to state that he considered his religious faith beyond doubt. He adhered to the received dogma of the Catholic Church, and that was that.
This can come as a surprise to modern readers. Today, Skepticism and organized religion are usually thought to occupy opposite sides of a divide, with the latter representing faith and authority while the former allies itself with science and reason. In Montaigne"s day, the lines were drawn differently. Science in the modern sense did not yet exist, and human reason was only rarely considered something that could stand alone, unsupported by G.o.d. The idea that the human mind could find things out for itself was the very thing Skeptics were likely to be most skeptical about. And the Church currently favored faith over "rational theology," so it naturally saw Pyrrhonism as an ally. Attacking human arrogance as it did, Pyrrhonian Skepticism was especially useful against the "innovation" of Protestantism, which prioritized private reasoning and conscience rather than dogma.
Thus, for several decades, Catholicism embraced Pyrrhonism, and held up books such as Henri Estienne"s s.e.xtus translation and Montaigne"s Essays Essays as valuable antidotes to heresy. Montaigne helped them with his attack on rational hubris, as well as with the many overt statements of Fideism scattered through his work. Religion, he wrote, must come to us from G.o.d by means of "an extraordinary infusion," not by our own efforts. G.o.d provides the tea bag; we provide the water and cup. And if we do not receive the infusion directly, it is enough to trust in the Church, which is a sort of authorized ma.s.s samovar, filled with pre-brewed faith. Montaigne made it clear that he recognized the Church"s right to govern him in religious matters, even to the extent of policing his thoughts. At a time when people were rushing to novelty, he wrote, the principle of unquestioning obedience had saved him many a time: as valuable antidotes to heresy. Montaigne helped them with his attack on rational hubris, as well as with the many overt statements of Fideism scattered through his work. Religion, he wrote, must come to us from G.o.d by means of "an extraordinary infusion," not by our own efforts. G.o.d provides the tea bag; we provide the water and cup. And if we do not receive the infusion directly, it is enough to trust in the Church, which is a sort of authorized ma.s.s samovar, filled with pre-brewed faith. Montaigne made it clear that he recognized the Church"s right to govern him in religious matters, even to the extent of policing his thoughts. At a time when people were rushing to novelty, he wrote, the principle of unquestioning obedience had saved him many a time: Otherwise I could not keep myself from rolling about incessantly. Thus I have, by the grace of G.o.d, kept myself intact, without agitation or disturbance of conscience, in the ancient beliefs of our religion, in the midst of so many sects and divisions that our century has produced.
It is hard to tell whether the disturbance he had in mind was a spiritual one, or whether he was thinking more of the inconvenience of being called a heretic and having his books burned. Fideism could be a handy pretext for secret unbelievers. Having paid G.o.d His due and immunized oneself against accusations of irreligion, one could in theory go on to be as secular as one wished. What possible accusation could you bring against someone who advocated submission to G.o.d and to Church doctrine in every detail? Indeed, the Church eventually noticed this danger, and by the following century had cast Fideism into disrepute. For the moment, however, anyone who wanted to take this path could do so with impunity. Did Montaigne fall into this category?
It is true that he showed little sign of real interest in religion. The Essays Essays has nothing to say about most Christian ideas: he seems unmoved by themes of sacrifice, repentance, and salvation, and shows neither fear of h.e.l.l nor desire for Heaven. The idea that witches and demons are active in the world gets shorter shrift than does the idea of cats hypnotizing birds out of trees. When Montaigne broods on death, he apparently forgets that he is supposed to believe in an afterlife. He says things like, "I plunge head down, stupidly, into death...as into a silent and dark abyss which swallows me up at one leap and overwhelms me in an instant with a heavy sleep free from feeling and pain." Theologians of the following century were horrified by this G.o.dless description. Another topic Montaigne shows no interest in is Jesus Christ. He writes about the n.o.ble deaths of Socrates and Cato, but does not think to mention the crucifixion alongside them. The sacred mystery of redemption leaves him cold. He cares much more about secular morality-about questions of mercy and cruelty. As the modern critic David Quint has summed it up, Montaigne would probably interpret the message for humanity in Christ"s crucifixion as being "Don"t crucify people." has nothing to say about most Christian ideas: he seems unmoved by themes of sacrifice, repentance, and salvation, and shows neither fear of h.e.l.l nor desire for Heaven. The idea that witches and demons are active in the world gets shorter shrift than does the idea of cats hypnotizing birds out of trees. When Montaigne broods on death, he apparently forgets that he is supposed to believe in an afterlife. He says things like, "I plunge head down, stupidly, into death...as into a silent and dark abyss which swallows me up at one leap and overwhelms me in an instant with a heavy sleep free from feeling and pain." Theologians of the following century were horrified by this G.o.dless description. Another topic Montaigne shows no interest in is Jesus Christ. He writes about the n.o.ble deaths of Socrates and Cato, but does not think to mention the crucifixion alongside them. The sacred mystery of redemption leaves him cold. He cares much more about secular morality-about questions of mercy and cruelty. As the modern critic David Quint has summed it up, Montaigne would probably interpret the message for humanity in Christ"s crucifixion as being "Don"t crucify people."
On the other hand, it is unlikely that Montaigne was an out-and-out atheist; in the sixteenth century almost no one was. And it would be no surprise to find him genuinely drawn to Fideism. It accorded well both with his Skeptical philosophy and his personal temperament-for, despite his love of independence, he often preferred giving up control, especially of things that did not interest him much. Besides, whatever he really thought about Fideism"s high-alt.i.tude G.o.d, the attraction of what remains down here here exerted a much stronger pull on him. exerted a much stronger pull on him.
The result, in any case, was that he lived his life without ever encountering serious problems with the Church: quite an achievement for a man who wrote so freely, who lived on a border between Catholic and Protestant lands, and who occupied public office in a time of religious war. When he was traveling in Italy in the 1580s, Inquisition officials did inspect the Essays Essays and produced a list of mild objections. One was that he used the word and produced a list of mild objections. One was that he used the word Fortune Fortune instead of the officially approved instead of the officially approved Providence Providence. (Providence comes from G.o.d and allows room for free will; Fortune is just the way the cookie crumbles.) Others were that he quoted heretical poets, that he made excuses for the apostate emperor Julian, that he thought anything beyond simple execution cruel, and that he recommended bringing children up naturally and freely. But the Inquisition did not mind his views on death, his reservations about witchcraft trials, or-least of all-his Skepticism.
It was, in fact, the Essays" Essays" Skepticism that made it such a success on first publication, alongside its Stoicism and Epicureanism. It managed to appeal to thoughtful, independent-minded readers, but also to the most orthodox of churchmen. It pleased people like Montaigne"s Bordeaux colleague Florimond de Raemond, a zealous Catholic whose favorite subject, in his own writings, was the imminent arrival of the Antichrist and the coming Apocalypse. Raemond advised people to read Montaigne to fortify themselves against heresy, and particularly praised the "beautiful Apology" because of its abundance of stories demonstrating how little we know about the world. He borrowed several such stories for a chapter of his own work Skepticism that made it such a success on first publication, alongside its Stoicism and Epicureanism. It managed to appeal to thoughtful, independent-minded readers, but also to the most orthodox of churchmen. It pleased people like Montaigne"s Bordeaux colleague Florimond de Raemond, a zealous Catholic whose favorite subject, in his own writings, was the imminent arrival of the Antichrist and the coming Apocalypse. Raemond advised people to read Montaigne to fortify themselves against heresy, and particularly praised the "beautiful Apology" because of its abundance of stories demonstrating how little we know about the world. He borrowed several such stories for a chapter of his own work L"Antichrist L"Antichrist, ent.i.tled "Strange things of which we do not know the reason." Why does an angry elephant become calm on seeing a sheep? he asked. Why does a wild bull become docile if he is tethered to a fig tree? And how exactly does the remora fish apply its little hooks to a ship"s hull to hold it back at sea? Raemond sounds so amiable and shows such a bright amazement about natural wonders that one has to pinch oneself to remember that he believed the end of the world was nigh. Fideism produced odd bedfellows indeed; extremists and secular moderates were brought together by a shared desire to marvel at their own ignorance.
Thus, the early Montaigne was embraced by the orthodox as a pious Skeptical sage, a new Pyrrho as well as a new Seneca: the author of a book at once consoling and morally improving. It comes as a surprise, therefore, to discover that by the end of the following century he was shunned with horror and that the Essays Essays was consigned to the was consigned to the Index of Prohibited Books Index of Prohibited Books, there to stay for almost a hundred and eighty years.
The problem began with discussion of a topic which one might think of little importance: animals.
ANIMALS AND DEMONS.
Montaigne"s favorite trick for undermining human vanity was the telling of animal stories like those that so intrigued Florimond de Raemond-many of them liberated from Plutarch. He liked them because they were entertaining, yet had a serious purpose. Tales of animal cleverness and sensitivity demonstrated that human abilities were far from exceptional, and indeed that animals do many things better than we do.
Animals can be good, for example, at working cooperatively. Oxen, hogs, and other creatures will gather in groups for self-defense. If a parrotfish is hooked by a fisherman, his fellow parrotfish rush to chew through the line and free him. Or, if one is netted, others thrust their tails through the net so he can grab one with his teeth, and be pulled out. Even different species can work together in this way, as with the pilot fish that guides the whale, or the bird that picks the crocodile"s teeth.
Tuna fish demonstrate a sophisticated understanding of astronomy: when the winter solstice arrives, the whole school stops precisely where it is in the water, and stays there until the following spring equinox. They know geometry and arithmetic too, for they have been observed to form themselves into a perfect cube of which all six sides are equal.
Morally, animals prove themselves at least as n.o.ble as humans. For repentance, who can surpa.s.s the elephant who was so grief-stricken about having killed his keeper in a fit of temper that he deliberately starved himself to death? And what of the female halcyon, or kingfisher, who loyally carries a wounded mate around on her shoulders, for the rest of her life if need be? These loving kingfishers also show a flair for technology: they use fishbones to build a structure that acts as both nest and boat, cleverly testing it for leaks near a sh.o.r.e first before launching it into open sea.
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(ill.u.s.tration credit i7.2)
Animals surpa.s.s us in miscellaneous abilities of all kinds. Humans change color, but in an uncontrolled way: we blush when we are embarra.s.sed, and go pale when we are frightened. This places us on the same level as chameleons, who also change at the mercy of chance conditions, but far below the octopus, who can blend his colors however and whenever he pleases. We and the chameleons can only gaze up in admiration at the mighty octopus-a shock for human vanity.
Yet still we humans persist in thinking of ourselves as separate from all other creatures, closer to G.o.ds than to chameleons or parrotfish. It never occurs to us to rank ourselves among animals, or to put ourselves in their minds. We barely stop to wonder whether they have minds at all. Yet, for Montaigne, it is enough to watch a dog dreaming to see that it must have an inner world just like ours. A person who dreams about Rome or Paris conjures up an insubstantial Rome or Paris within. Likewise, a dog dreaming about a hare surely sees a disembodied hare running through his dream. We sense this from the twitching of his paws as he runs after it: a hare is there for him somewhere, albeit "a hare without fur or bones." Animals populate their internal world with ghosts of their own invention, just as we do.
Montaigne"s animal stories seemed both delightful and innocuous to his first readers. If anything, they were morally useful, pointing out that humans are modest beings who cannot expect to master or understand much on G.o.d"s earth. But as the sixteenth century receded into history and the seventeenth rolled on, people became increasingly disturbed by this picture of themselves as less refined or capable than an octopus. It seemed degrading rather than merely humbling. By the 1660s, the "Apology," where most of the animal stories are found, no longer looked like a treasure chest of uplifting wisdom. It looked like a case study in everything that had gone wrong with the morals of the previous century. Montaigne"s easy acceptance of human fallibility and of our animalistic side was now something to be fought against-almost a trick of the Devil himself.
Typical of the new att.i.tude was a denunciation from the pulpit by the bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet in 1668. Montaigne, he said, prefers animals to men, their instinct to our reason, their simple, innocent, and plain nature...to our refinements and malices. But tell me, subtle philosopher, who laughs so cleverly at man for imagining himself to be something [more than an animal], do you reckon it as nothing to know G.o.d?
The challenging tone was new, and so was the feeling that human dignity needed defending against a "subtle" enemy. The seventeenth century would cease to accept Montaigne as a sage; it would begin to see him as a trickster and a subversive. Montaigne"s animal stories and his debunking of human pretensions would prove particularly irksome to two of the greatest writers of the new era: Rene Descartes and Blaise Pascal. They had no sympathy for each other; this makes it all the more noteworthy that they came together in disapproval of Montaigne.
Rene Descartes, the greatest philosopher of the early modern era, was interested in animals mainly as a contrast to human beings. Humans have a conscious, immaterial mind; they can reflect on their own experience, and say "I think." Animals cannot. For Descartes, they therefore lack souls and are no more than machines. They are programmed to walk, run, sleep, yawn, sneeze, hunt, roar, scratch themselves, build nests, raise young, eat, and defecate, but they do this in the same way as a clockwork automaton might whirr its gears and trundle across the floor. A dog, for Descartes, has no perspective, no true experience. It does not create a hare in its inner world and chase it across the fields. It can snuffle and twitch its paws all it likes; Descartes will never see anything but contracting muscles and firing nerves, triggered by equally mechanical operations in the brain.
Descartes cannot truly exchange a glance with an animal. Montaigne can, and does. In one famous pa.s.sage, he mused: "When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not a pastime to her more than she is to me?" And he added in another version of the text: "We entertain each other with reciprocal monkey tricks. If I have my time to begin or to refuse, so has she hers." He borrows his cat"s point of view in relation to him just as readily as he occupies his own in relation to her.