The Complete Essays (101 page)

In the most famous of the Greek Schools of Philosophy the Universe is considered to be a god made by a greater one; it is composed of a body, with a soul situated in the centre but extending to the circumference by means of musical Numbers; it is divine, most blessed, most great, most wise and eternal. Within this ‘god’ there are other gods (the earth, the sea, the heavenly bodies) all maintained by the harmonious and perpetual movement of a sacred dance as they draw together then draw apart, hide then reveal themselves, or move to and fro and change their rows.
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Heraclitus laid down that the Universe was composed of fire and was destined one day to burst into flames and burn itself out: it would be born again some other time. Apuleius said that Men were
‘sigillatim mortales, cunctim perpetui’
[individually mortal, collectively eternal]. Alexander gave his mother the written record which one of the Egyptian priests had taken from their monuments; it bore witness to the boundless antiquity of that people and included a true account of the birth and growth of other countries. Cicero and Diodorus say that, in their own days, the Chaldaeans kept records going back some four hundred thousand years; Aristotle, Pliny and others date Zoroaster six thousand years before the time of Plato.

Plato says that the citizens of Sais possess written records covering eight thousand years, adding that the city of Athens was built a thousand years before the foundation of that city.
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[B] Epicurus taught that there exist in several other worlds objects very like the ones we can see here, fashioned the same way.
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He would have said that with even greater assurance if he could have seen those strange examples of past and present similarities and resemblances to be found between our world and that New World of the West Indies.

[C] In truth, when I consider what we know about the course of social life on this earth, I have often been struck with wonder at the resemblances there are – separated by immense spaces of place and time – between many savage beliefs or fantastic popular opinions which, whatever way you look at them, do not seem to arise from our natural reasoning. The human mind is a great forger of miracles, we know that: but this relationship has something abnormal about it which I cannot define; you can even see it in names, events and thousands of other ways. [B] For we have newly discovered peoples who, as far as we know, have never heard of us, yet where they believe in circumcision; where countries or great states are entirely governed by women, without men; where you can find something like our Lenten fasts, with the addition of sexual abstinence. We have found peoples where our crosses are honoured in various ways (in one place they even displayed them prominently on their graves); in another crosses were used (especially the cross of St Andrew) to ward off nocturnal visions; they also put them on their children’s beds against enchantments. Elsewhere was discovered a wooden cross, immensely tall, which was worshipped as the god of rain – and that was very far from the coast. Also found there were the express image of our penitents, the use of mitres, the practice of priestly celibacy, the art of divination from the entrails of sacrificed animals, [C] a total abstention from all kinds of fish and flesh, [B] the custom for priests to make liturgical use of a special tongue not the common one; the idea that the first god was driven away by a second, his younger brother; the belief that they were created with all kinds of advantages which were subsequently cut off because of their sin; their land changed and their natural condition made harsher; they were submerged by a heaven-sent flood, only a few families being saved who had taken refuge in high mountain caves, which they blocked up to stop
the waters getting in; various species of animals were shut in there too; when they thought the rain had ceased, dogs were sent out: they came back dripping wet and clean, so it was judged that the waters had only begun to subside; later other dogs were sent out. When they returned all covered in mud the humans emerged to re-people the world, which they found to be full of nothing but snakes.

In one case the inhabitants were convinced of a Day of Judgement. When the Spaniards scattered the bones of their dead about as they plundered their graves in search of treasure, they were beside themselves with anger, declaring that such scattered bones could not easily be put together again. They have trade by barter (but no other) with fairs and markets for this purpose; they have dwarves and deformed people to enliven the banquets of their princes; falconry they have, but with their own native birds; they have tyrannous taxation, elegant gardens, acrobats, dancing, musical instruments, coats-of-arms, tennis-courts, games of dice and chance – at which they get so carried away that they stake themselves and their freedom; they have medicine based entirely on magic charms, pictorial writing, a belief in one first man who was father of all peoples; they have the worship of a god who once lived as a Man in perfect celibacy, abstinence and penitence, preaching the law of Nature and liturgical ceremonies and who disappeared from the world without a natural death; a belief in giants, the custom of getting drunk on their local drink and seeing who can down the most, religious ornaments painted with bones and death’s heads, surplices, holy water and aspergilla, women and servants who gaily volunteer to be burnt or buried alive with their husband or masters, laws of inheritance which leave everything to the eldest son and set nothing but obedience aside for the younger one, the custom that a man promoted to high rank adopts a new name and abandons his old one, the custom of sprinkling chalk on the knee of a newborn babe, saying to him: ‘Dust thou art, and to dust thou shalt return’; and they have the art of augury.

Such vain shadows of our religion as may be seen in some of these examples witness to its dignity and holiness: it has penetrated into infidel nations on our side of the world by a kind of imitation, but to those natives of far-off lands it came by a shared supernatural inspiration. For we found a belief in Purgatory but of a difference style: they attribute to cold what we attribute to heat, thinking that the souls of the dead are punished and purged by the rigours of extreme cold.

That reminds me of another pleasing example of diversity: some peoples like to uncover the end of the penis, circumcizing the foreskin like Jews or
Moslems, whereas others have such conscientious objections to ever uncovering it that, lest the top of it should ever see the light of day, they scrupulously stretch the foreskin right over it and tie it together with little cords.

And here is another one: just as we honour kings and festive days by putting on our best clothes, there are regions where they emphasize the disparity between themselves and their king and mark their total submission to him by appearing in their shabbiest clothing; as they go into the palace they put a tattered robe over their good one, so that all pomp and glory should belong to the king alone.
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But to get on.

[AI] If Nature includes among her normal activities – along with everything else – the beliefs, judgements and opinions of men; and if such things have their cycles, seasons, births and deaths, every bit as much as cabbages do, the heavens changing them and influencing them at will: what permanent, magisterial authority should we go on attributing to them?
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[B] Now if experience makes it clear that the very form of our being – not only our colour, build, complexion and behaviour but our mental faculties as well – depends upon our native air, climate and soil ([C] as Vegetius said:
‘et plaga coeli non solum ad robur corporum, sed etiam animorum facit’
[the heavenly regions contribute not only to the strength of men’s bodies but of their souls as well]);
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and if the goddess who founded Athens chose for her city a country of temperate climate which made men wise – that is what the priests of Egypt told Solon:
‘Athenis tenue coelum, ex quo etiam acutiores putantur Attici; crassum Thebis, itaque pingues Thebani et valentes’
[the air of Athens is not oppressive, which is why the Athenians are considered most intelligent; that of Thebes is oppressive, therefore the Thebans are considered heavy and tough]
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– [B] then men must vary as flora and fauna do: whether they are more warlike, just, equable, clever or dull, depends on where they were born. Here they are addicted to wine: there, to robbery and lechery; here they are inclined towards superstition: there to disbelief; [C] here, to freedom: there, to slavery; [B] they may be more suited to learn one particular art of science than another; they may be slow or intelligent, obedient or rebellious, good or bad, all depending
on inclinations arising from their physical environment. Change their location, and, like trees, they take on a new character. That was why Cyrus refused to allow the Persians to give up their squat and rugged land and emigrate to softer plains; [C] he said that rich soft lands make for soft men, that fertile lands make for barren minds.
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[B] Now, if we can see that the influence of the stars makes an art or an opinion to flourish; and if a particular age produces a particular kind of nature and inclines the human race towards some particular trait of character (their spirits producing good crops then lean crops, as fields do): what happens to all those special privileges which we pride ourselves upon? A wise man can be mistaken; a hundred men can; indeed, according to us, the whole human race has gone wrong for centuries at a time over this or that: so how can we be sure that human nature ever stops getting things wrong, [C] and that she is not wrong now, in our own period?

[A] Among other considerations witnessing to Man’s weakness, it seems to me that we should not overlook that even his desires cannot lead him to discover what he needs; I am not talking about fruition, but about thinking and wishing: we cannot even agree on what we need to make us contented. Even if we let our thoughts tailor everything to their wishes, they cannot even desire what is proper to them [C] and so be satisfied:

[B]
quid enim ratione timemus
Aut cupimus? quid tam dextro pede concipis, ut te
Conatus non poeniteat votique peracti?

[Is it reason that governs our fears and our desires? What have you ever conceived, even auspiciously, without being sorry about the outcome – even of its success?]
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[A] That is why [C] Socrates prayed the gods to give him only what they knew to be good for him. The Spartans, in public as in private, simply prayed that good and beauteous gifts be vouchsafed to them; they left the choice and selection to the gods:
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[B]
Conjugium petimus partumque uxoris; at illi
Notum qui pueri qualisque futura sit uxor
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[We pray to have a wife and children, yet only Jupiter knows what the children and that wife will be like.]
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[A] In his supplications the Christian says, ‘Thy will be done’, in order not to suffer that unseemly state which poets feign for King Midas: he prayed to God that all he touched should turn to gold. His prayer was granted: his wine was gold, his bread was gold, so were the very feathers in his bed, his undershirt and all his garments. In this way he found that the enjoyment of his desires crushed him and that he had been granted a boon no man could bear. He had to unpray his prayers:

Attonitus novitate mali, divesque miserque,
Effugere optat opes, et quae modo voverat, odit
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[Thunderstruck by so new an evil, rich and wretched both at once, he hates what once he prayed for.]
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[B] I can cite my own case. When I was young I begged Fortune, as much as anything, for the Order of St Michael: it was then the highest mark of honour for the French nobility, and very rare. Fortune granted it to me, but with a smirk instead of elevating me, instead of lifting me up so that I could reach it, she used greater condescension: she debased the Order, and brought it right down to my neck – lower still in fact.

[C] Cleobis and Bito asked their god, Trophonius and Agamedes their goddess, for rewards worthy of their piety; the gift they were given was death: so different from ours, where our needs are concerned, are the opinions of heaven.
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[A] It is sometimes to our detriment that God vouchsafes us riches, honour, life and health itself: the things which please us are not always good for us. If, instead of a cure, he sends us death or a worsening of our ills –
‘Virga tua et baculus tuus ipsa me consolata sunt’
[Even thy rod and thy staff do comfort me] – God acts thus by reason of his Providence, which knows our deserts far more accurately than we can ever do; whatever comes from a hand most loving and omniscient we must accept as good:

si
consilium vis
Permittes ipsis expendere numinibus, quid
Conveniat nobis, rebusque sit utile nostris:
Charior est illis homo quam sibi
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[If you want my advice, allow the gods to judge what is best for us and most advantageous for our affairs; a man is dearer to them than he is to himself.]
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For to ask the gods for honour and high office is like begging them to send you into battle, into a game of dice or into some other situation where the outcome is unknown and the gain dubious.
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