“On Friendship”
-Michel de Montaigne
Having considered
the proceedings of a painter that serves me, I had a mind to imitate his way.
He chooses the fairest place and middle of any wall, or panel, wherein to draw
a picture, which he finishes with his utmost care and art, and the vacuity
about it he fills with grotesques, which are odd fantastic figures without any
grace but what they derive from their variety, and the extravagance of their
shapes. And in truth, what are these things I scribble, other than grotesques
and monstrous bodies, made of various parts, without any certain figure, or any
other than accidental order, coherence, or proportion?
Desinit
in piscem mulier formosa superne.
A fair woman in her upper
form terminates in a fish. ❦
In
this second part I go hand in hand with my painter; but fall very short of him
in the first and the better, my power of handling not being such, that I dare
to offer at a rich piece, finely polished, and set off according to art. I have
therefore thought fit to borrow one of Estienne de la Boétie, and such a one as shall honor and adorn
all the rest of my work — namely,
a discourse that he called Voluntary Servitude; but, since, those who did not know him have
properly enough called it Le contr’un.He wrote in his youth, by way
of essay, in honor of liberty against tyrants; and it has since run through the
hands of men of great learning and judgment, not without singular and merited
commendation; for it is finely written, and as full as anything can possibly
be. And yet one may confidently say it is far short of what he was able to do;
and if in that more mature age, wherein I had the happiness to know him, he had
taken a design like this of mine, to commit his thoughts to writing, we should
have seen a great many rare things, and such as would have gone very near to
have rivalled the best writings of antiquity: for in natural parts especially,
I know no man comparable to him. But he has left nothing behind him, save this
treatise only (and that too by chance, for I believe he never saw it after it
first went out of his hands), and some observations upon that edict of January
made famous by our civil-wars, which also shall elsewhere, peradventure, find a
place. These were all I could recover of his remains, I to whom with so
affectionate a remembrance, upon his death-bed, he by his last will bequeathed
his library and papers, the little book of his works only excepted, which I
committed to the press. And this particular obligation I have to this treatise
of his, that it was the occasion of my first coming acquainted with him; for it
was showed to me long before I had the good fortune to know him; and the first
knowledge of his name, proving the first cause and foundation of a friendship,
which we afterwards improved and maintained, so long as God was pleased to
continue us together, so perfect, inviolate, and entire, that certainly the
like is hardly to be found in story, and among the men of this age, there is no
sign nor trace of any such thing in use; so much concurrence is required to the
building of such a one, that ’tis much, if fortune bring it but once to pass in
three ages.
There
is nothing to which nature seems so much to have inclined us, as to society;
and Aristotle, says that the good legislators had more
respect to friendship than to justice. Now the most supreme point of its
perfection is this: for, generally, all those that pleasure, profit, public or
private interest create and nourish, are so much the less beautiful and
generous, and so much the less friendships, by how much they mix another cause,
and design, and fruit in friendship, than itself. Neither do the four ancient
kinds, natural, social, hospitable, venereal, either separately or jointly,
make up a true and perfect friendship.
That
of children to parents is rather respect: friendship is nourished by
communication, which cannot by reason of the great disparity, be betwixt these,
but would rather perhaps offend the duties of nature; for neither are all the
secret thoughts of fathers fit to be communicated to children, lest it beget an
indecent familiarity betwixt them; nor can the advices and reproofs, which is
one of the principal offices of friendship, be properly performed by the son to
the father. There are some countries where ’twas the custom for children to
kill their fathers; and others, where the fathers killed their children, to
avoid their being an impediment one to another in life; and naturally the expectations
of the one depend upon the ruin of the other. There have been great
philosophers who have made nothing of this tie of nature, as Aristippus for
one, who being pressed home about the affection he owed to his children, as
being come out of him, presently fell to spit, saying, that this also came out
of him, and that we also breed worms and lice; and that other, that Plutarch endeavored to reconcile to his
brother: “I make never the more account of him,” said he, “for coming out of
the same hole.” This name of brother does indeed carry with it a fine and
delectable sound, and for that reason, he and I called one another brothers but
the complication of interests, the division of estates, and that the wealth of
the one should be the property of the other, strangely relax and weaken the
fraternal tie: brothers pursuing their fortune and advancement by the same path,
’tis hardly possible but they must of necessity often jostle and hinder one
another. Besides, why is it necessary that the correspondence of manners,
parts, and inclinations, which begets the true and perfect friendships, should
always meet in these relations? The father and the son may be of quite contrary
humors, and so of brothers: he is my son, he is my brother; but he is
passionate, ill-natured, or a fool. And moreover, by how much these are
friendships that the law and natural obligation impose upon us, so much less is
there of our own choice and voluntary freedom; whereas that voluntary liberty
of ours has no production more promptly and; properly its own than affection
and friendship. Not that I have not in my own person experimented all that can
possibly be expected of that kind, having had the best and most indulgent
father, even to his extreme old age, that ever was, and who was himself
descended from a family for many generations famous and exemplary for brotherly
concord:
Et
ipse
Notus in fratres animi paterni.
And I myself, known for
paternal love toward my brothers. ❦
We
are not here to bring the love we bear to women, though it be an act of our own
choice, into comparison, nor rank it with the others. The fire of this, I
confess,
neque
enim est dea nescia nostri
Quæ dulcem curis miscet amaritiem,
Nor is the goddess
unknown to me who mixes a sweet bitterness with my love. ❦
is
more active, more eager, and more sharp: but withal, ’tis more precipitant,
fickle, moving, and inconstant; a fever subject to intermissions and paroxysms,
that has seized but on one part of us. Whereas in friendship, ’tis a general
and universal fire, but temperate and equal, a constant established heat, all
gentle and smooth, without poignancy or roughness. Moreover, in love, ’tis no
other than frantic desire for that which flies from us:
Come
segue la lepre il cacciatore
Al freddo, al caldo, alla montagna, al lito;
Ne piu l’estima poi che presa vede;
E sol dietro a chi fugge affretta il piede
As the hunter pursues the
hare, in cold and heat, to the mountain, to the shore, nor cares for it farther
when he sees it taken, and only delights in chasing that which flees from
him. ❦
so
soon as it enters unto the terms of friendship, that is to say, into a
concurrence of desires, it vanishes and is gone, fruition destroys it, as
having only a fleshly end, and such a one as is subject to satiety. Friendship,
on the contrary, is enjoyed proportionably as it is desired; and only grows up,
is nourished and improved by enjoyment, as being of itself spiritual, and the
soul growing still more refined by practice. Under this perfect friendship, the
other fleeting affections have in my younger years found some place in me, to
say nothing of him, who himself so confesses but too much in his verses; so
that I had both these passions, but always so, that I could myself well enough
distinguish them, and never in any degree of comparison with one another; the
first maintaining its flight in so lofty and so brave a place, as with disdain
to look down, and see the other flying at a far humbler pitch below.
As
concerning marriage, besides that it is a covenant, the entrance into which
only is free, but the continuance in it forced and compulsory, having another
dependence than that of our own free will, and a bargain commonly contracted to
other ends, there almost always happens a thousand intricacies in it to
unravel, enough to break the thread and to divert the current of a lively
affection: whereas friendship has no manner of business or traffic with aught
but itself. Moreover, to say truth, the ordinary talent of women is not such as
is sufficient to maintain the conference and communication required to the
support of this sacred tie; nor do they appear to be endued with constancy of
mind, to sustain the pinch of so hard and durable a knot. And doubtless, if
without this, there could be such a free and voluntary familiarity contracted,
where not only the souls might have this entire fruition, but the bodies also
might share in the alliance, and a man be engaged throughout, the friendship
would certainly be more full and perfect; but it is without example that this
sex has ever yet arrived at such perfection; and, by the common consent of the
ancient schools, it is wholly rejected from it.1
That
other Grecian licence is justly abhorred by our manners, which also, from
having, according to their practice, a so necessary disparity of age and
difference of offices betwixt the lovers, answered no more to the perfect union
and harmony that we here require than the other:
Quis
est enim iste amor amicitiae? cur neque deformem adolescentem quisquam amat,
neque formosum senem?
For what is that friendly
love? why does no one love a deformed youth or a comely old man? ❦
Neither
will that very picture that the Academy presents of it, as I conceive,
contradict me, when I say, that this first fury inspired by the son of Venus
into the heart of the lover, upon sight of the flower and prime of a springing
and blossoming youth, to which they allow all the insolent and passionate
efforts that an immoderate ardor can produce, was simply founded upon external
beauty, the false image of corporal generation; for it could not ground this
love upon the soul, the sight of which as yet lay concealed, was but now
springing, and not of maturity to blossom; that this fury, if it seized upon a
low spirit, the means by which it preferred its suit were rich presents, favor
in advancement to dignities, and such trumpery, which they by no means approve;
if on a more generous soul, the pursuit was suitably generous, by philosophical
instructions, precepts to revere religion, to obey the laws, to die for the good
of one’s country; by examples of valor, prudence, and justice, the lover
studying to render himself acceptable by the grace and beauty of the soul, that
of his body being long since faded and decayed, hoping by this mental society
to establish a more firm and lasting contract. When this courtship came to
effect in due season (for that which they do not require in the lover, namely,
leisure and discretion in his pursuit, they strictly require in the person
loved, forasmuch as he is to judge of an internal beauty, of difficult
knowledge and abstruse discovery), then there sprung in the person loved the
desire of a spiritual conception; by the mediation of a spiritual beauty. This
was the principal; the corporeal, an accidental and secondary matter; quite the
contrary as to the lover. For this reason they prefer the person beloved,
maintaining that the gods in like manner preferred him too, and very much blame
the poet Aeschylus for having, in the loves of Achilles and Patroclus, given
the lover’s part to Achilles, who was in the first and beardless flower of his
adolescence, and the handsomest of all the Greeks. After this general
community, the sovereign, and most worthy part presiding and governing, and
performing its proper offices, they say, that thence great utility was derived,
both by private and public concerns; that it constituted the force and power of
the countries where it prevailed, and the chiefest security of liberty and
justice. Of which the healthy loves of Harmodius and Aristogiton are instances.
And therefore it is that they called it sacred and divine, and conceive that
nothing but the violence of tyrants and the baseness of the common people are
inimical to it. Finally, all that can be said in favor of the Academy is, that
it was a love which ended in friendship, which well enough agrees with the
Stoical definition of love:
Amorem
conatum esse amicitiae faciendae ex pulchritudinis specie.
Love is a desire of
contracting friendship arising from the beauty of the object. ❦
I
return to my own more just and true description:
Omnino
amicitiae, corroboratis jam confirmatisque, et ingeniis, et aetatibus,
judicandae sunt.
Those are only to be
reputed friendships that are fortified and confirmed by judgement and the
length of time. ❦
For
the rest, what we commonly call friends and friendships, are nothing but
acquaintance and familiarities, either occasionally contracted, or upon some
design, by means of which there happens some little intercourse betwixt our
souls. But in the friendship I speak of, they mix and work themselves into one
piece, with so universal a mixture, that there is no more sign of the seam by
which they were first conjoined. If a man should importune me to give a reason
why I loved him, I find it could no otherwise be expressed, than by making
answer: because it was he, because it was I. There is, beyond all
that I am able to say, I know not what inexplicable and fated power that
brought on this union. We sought one another long before we met, and by the
characters we heard of one another, which wrought upon our affections more
than, in reason, mere reports should do; I think ’twas by some secret
appointment of heaven. We embraced in our names; and at our first meeting,
which was accidentally at a great city entertainment, we found ourselves so
mutually taken with one another, so acquainted, and so endeared betwixt
ourselves, that from thenceforward nothing was so near to us as one another. He
wrote an excellent Latin satire, since printed, wherein he excuses the
precipitation of our intelligence, so suddenly come to perfection, saying, that
destined to have so short a continuance, as begun so late (for we were both
full-grown men, and he some years the older), there was no time to lose, nor
were we tied to conform to the example of those slow and regular friendships,
that require so many precautions of long preliminary conversation: This has no
other idea than that of itself, and can only refer to itself: this is no one
special consideration, nor two, nor three, nor four, nor a thousand; ’tis I
know not what quintessence of all this mixture, which, seizing my whole will,
carried it to plunge and lose itself in his, and that having seized his whole
will, brought it back with equal concurrence and appetite to plunge and lose
itself in mine. I may truly say lose, reserving nothing to ourselves that was
either his or mine.
When
Laelius, in the presence of the Roman consuls, who after thay had sentenced
Tiberius Gracchus, prosecuted all those who had had any familiarity with him
also; came to ask Caius Blosius, who was his chiefest friend, how much he would
have done for him, and that he made answer: “All things.” — “How! All things!” said Laelius. “And what if he had commanded you to fire our temples?” — “He would never have commanded me that,” replied Blosius. — “But what if he had?” said Laelius. — “I would have obeyed him,” said the other. If he was so perfect a friend to
Gracchus as the histories report him to have been, there was yet no necessity
of offending the consuls by such a bold confession, though he might still have
retained the assurance he had of Gracchus’s disposition. However, those who
accuse this answer as seditious, do not well understand the mystery; nor
presuppose, as it was true, that he had Gracchus’s will in his sleeve, both by
the power of a friend, and the perfect knowledge he had of the man: they were
more friends than citizens, more friends to one another than either enemies or
friends to their country, or than friends to ambition and innovation; having
absolutely given up themselves to one another, either held absolutely the reins
of the other’s inclination; and suppose all this guided by virtue, and all this
by the conduct of reason, which also without these it had not been possible to
do, Blosius’s answer was such as it ought to be. If any of their actions flew
out of the handle, they were neither (according to my measure of friendship)
friends to one another, nor to themselves. As to the rest, this answer carries
no worse sound, than mine would do to one that should ask me: “If your will
should command you to kill your daughter, would you do it?” and that I should
make answer, that I would; for this expresses no consent to such an act,
forasmuch as I do not in the least suspect my own will, and as little that of
such a friend. ’Tis not in the power of all the eloquence in the world, to
dispossess me of the certainty I have of the intentions and resolutions of my
friend; nay, no one action of his, what face soever it might bear, could be
presented to me, of which I could not presently, and at first sight, find out
the moving cause. Our souls had drawn so unanimously together, they had
considered each other with so ardent an affection, and with the like affection
laid open the very bottom of our hearts to one another’s view, that I not only
knew his as well as my own; but should certainly in any concern of mine have
trusted my interest much more willingly with him, than with myself.
Let
no one, therefore, rank other common friendships with such a one as this. I
have had as much experience of these as another, and of the most perfect of
their kind: but I do not advise that any should confound the rules of the one
and the other, for they would find themselves much deceived. In those other
ordinary friendships, you are to walk with bridle in your hand, with prudence
and circumspection, for in them the knot is not so sure that a man may not half
suspect it will slip. “Love him,” said Chilo, “so as if you were one day to
hate him; and hate him so as you were one day to love him.” This precept,
though abominable in the sovereign and perfect friendship I speak of, is
nevertheless very sound as to the practice of the ordinary and customary ones,
and to which the saying that Aristotle had
so frequent in his mouth, “O my friends, there is no friend,” may very fitly be
applied. In this noble commerce, good offices, presents, and benefits, by which
other friendships are supported and maintained, do not deserve so much as to be
mentioned; and the reason is the concurrence of our wills; for, as the kindness
I have for myself receives no increase, for anything I relieve myself withal in
time of need (whatever the Stoics say), and as I do not find myself obliged to
myself for any service I do myself: so the union of such friends, being truly
perfect, deprives them of all idea of such duties, and makes them loathe and
banish from their conversation these words of division and distinction,
benefits, obligation, acknowledgment, entreaty, thanks, and the like. All
things, wills, thoughts, opinions, goods, wives, children, honors, and lives,
being in effect common betwixt them, and that absolute concurrence of
affections being no other than one soul in two bodies (according to that very
proper definition of Aristotle),
they can neither lend nor give anything to one another. This is the reason why
the lawgivers, to honor marriage with some resemblance of this divine alliance,
interdict all gifts betwixt man and wife; inferring by that, that all should
belong to each of them, and that they have nothing to divide or to give to each
other.
If,
in the friendship of which I speak, one could give to the other, the receiver
of the benefit would be the man that obliged his friend; for each of them
contending and above all things studying how to be useful to the other, he that
administers the occasion is the liberal man, in giving his friend the
satisfaction of doing that toward him which above all things he most desires.
When the philosopher Diogenes wanted money, he used to say, that he redemanded
it of his friends, not that he demanded it. And to let you see the practical
working of this, I will here produce an ancient and singular example.
Eudamidas, a Corinthian, had two friends, Charixenus a Sicyonian and Areteus a
Corinthian; this man coming to die, being poor, and his two friends rich, he
made his will after this manner. “I bequeath to Areteus the maintenance of my
mother, to support and provide for her in her old age; and to Charixenus I
bequeath the care of marrying my daughter, and to give her as good a portion as
he is able; and in case one of these chance to die, I hereby substitute the
survivor in his place.” They who first saw this will made themselves very merry
at the contents: but the legatees, being made acquainted with it, accepted it
with very great content; and one of them, Charixenus, dying within five days
after, and by that means the charge of both duties devolving solely on him,
Areteus nurtured the old woman with very great care and tenderness, and of five
talents he had in estate, he gave two and a half in marriage with an only
daughter he had of his own, and two and a half in marriage with the daughter of
Eudamidas, and on one and the same day solemnized both their nuptials.
This
example is very full, if one thing were not to be objected, namely the
multitude of friends for the perfect friendship I speak of is indivisible; each
one gives himself so entirely to his friend, that he has nothing left to
distribute to others: on the contrary, is sorry that he is not double, treble,
or quadruple, and that he has not many souls and many wills, to confer them all
upon this one object. Common friendships will admit of division; one may love
the beauty of this person, the good-humor of that, the liberality of a third,
the paternal affection of a fourth, the fraternal love of a fifth, and so of
the rest: but this friendship that possesses the whole soul, and there rules
and sways with an absolute sovereignty, cannot possibly admit of a rival. If
two at the same time should call to you for succor, to which of them would you
run? Should they require of you contrary offices, how could you serve them
both? Should one commit a thing to your silence that it were of importance to
the other to know, how would you disengage yourself? A unique and particular
friendship dissolves all other obligations whatsoever: the secret I have sworn
not to reveal to any other, I may without perjury communicate to him who is not
another, but myself. ’Tis miracle enough certainly, for a man to double
himself, and those that talk of tripling, talk they know not of what. Nothing
is extreme, that has its like; and he who shall suppose, that of two, I love
one as much as the other, that they mutually love one another too, and love me
as much as I love them, multiplies into a confraternity the most single of
units, and whereof, moreover, one alone is the hardest thing in the world to
find. The rest of this story suits very well with what I was saying; for
Eudamidas, as a bounty and favor, bequeaths to his friends a legacy of
employing themselves in his necessity; he leaves them heirs to this liberality
of his, which consists in giving them the opportunity of conferring a benefit
upon him; and doubtless, the force of friendship is more eminently apparent in
this act of his, than in that of Areteus. In short, these are effects not to be
imagined nor comprehended by such as have not experience of them, and which
make me infinitely honor and admire the answer of that young soldier to Cyrus,
by whom being asked how much he would take for a horse, with which he had won
the prize of a race, and whether he would exchange him for a kingdom? — “No, truly, sir,” said he, “but I would give him with all my heart, to get thereby a
true friend, could I find out any man worthy of that alliance.” He did not say
ill in saying, “could I find”: for though one may almost everywhere meet with
men sufficiently qualified for a superficial acquaintance, yet in this, where a
man is to deal from the very bottom of his heart, without any manner of
reservation, it will be requisite that all the wards and springs be truly
wrought and perfectly sure.
In
confederations that hold but by one end, we are only to provide against the
imperfections that particularly concern that end. It can be of no importance to
me of what religion my physician or my lawyer is; this consideration has
nothing in common with the offices of friendship which they owe me; and I am of
the same indifference in the domestic acquaintance my servants must necessarily
contract with me. I never inquire, when I am to take a footman, if he be
chaste, but if he be diligent; and am not solicitous if my muleteer be given to
gaming, as if he be strong and able; or if my cook be a swearer, if he be a good
cook. I do not take upon me to direct what other men should do in the
government of their families, there are plenty that meddle enough with that,
but only give an account of my method in my own:
Mihi
sic usus est: tibi, ut opus est facto, face.
This has been my way; as
for you, do as you find needful. ❦
For
table-talk, I prefer the pleasant and witty before the learned and the grave;
in bed, beauty before goodness; in common discourse the ablest speaker, whether
or no there be sincerity in the case. And, as he that was found astride upon a
hobby-horse, playing with his children, entreated the person who had surprised
him in that posture to say nothing of it till himself came to be a father,
supposing that the fondness that would then possess his own soul, would render
him a fairer judge of such an action; so I, also, could wish to speak to such
as have had experience of what I say: though, knowing how remote a thing such a
friendship is from the common practice, and how rarely it is to be found, I
despair of meeting with any such judge. For even these discourses left us by
antiquity upon this subject, seem to me flat and poor, in comparison of the
sense I have of it, and in this particular, the effects surpass even the
precepts of philosophy.
Nil
ego contulerim jucundo sanus amico.
While I have sense left
to me, there will never be anything more acceptable to me than an agreeable
friend. ❦
The
ancient Menander declared him to be happy that had had the good fortune to meet
with but the shadow of a friend: and doubtless he had good reason to say so,
especially if he spoke by experience: for in good earnest, if I compare all the
rest of my life, though, thanks be to God, I have passed my time pleasantly
enough, and at my ease, and the loss of such a friend excepted, free from any
grievous affliction, and in great tranquillity of mind, having been contented
with my natural and original commodities, without being solicitous after
others; if I should compare it all, I say, with the four years I had the happiness
to enjoy the sweet society of this excellent man, ’tis nothing but smoke, an
obscure and tedious night. From the day that I lost him:
quem
semper acerbum,
Semper honoratum (sic, di, voluistis) habebo,
A day for me ever sad,
for ever sacred, so have you willed ye gods. ❦
I
have only led a languishing life; and the very pleasures that present
themselves to me, instead of administering anything of consolation, double my
affliction for his loss. We were halves throughout, and to that degree, that
methinks, by outliving him, I defraud him of his part.
Nec
fas esse ulla me voluptate hic frui
Decrevi, tantisper dum ille abest meus particeps.
I have determined that it
will never be right for me to enjoy any pleasure, so long as he, with whom I
shared all pleasures is away. ❦
I
was so grown and accustomed to be always his double in all places and in all
things, that methinks I am no more than half of myself:
Illam
meae si partem anima tulit
Maturior vis, quid moror altera,
Nec carus aeque, nec superstes
Integer? Ille dies utramqueDuxit ruinam.
If a superior force has
taken that part of my soul, why do I, the remaining one, linger behind? What is
left is not so dear, nor an entire thing: this day has wrought the destruction
of both. ❦
There
is no action or imagination of mine wherein I do not miss him; as I know that
he would have missed me: for as he surpassed me by infinite degrees in virtue
and all other accomplishments, so he also did in the duties of friendship:
Quis
desiderio sit pudor, aut modus
Tam chari capitis?
What shame can there, or
measure, in lamenting so dear a friend? ❦
O
misero frater adempte mihi!
Omnia tecum una perierunt gaudia nostra,
Quæ tuus in vita dulcis alebat amor.
Tu mea, tu moriens fregisti commoda, frater;
Tecum una tota est nostra sepulta anima
Cuius ego interitu tota de menthe fugaui
Hæc studia, atque omnes delicias animi.
Alloquar? audiero nunquam tua verba loquentem?
Nunquam ego te, vita frater amabilior
Aspiciam posthac; at certè semper amabo.
O brother, taken from me
miserable! with thee, all our joys have vanished, those joys which, in thy
life, thy dear love nourished. Dying, thou, my brother, hast destroyed all my
happiness. My whole soul is buried with thee. Through whose death I have
banished from my mind these studies, and all the delights of the mind. Shall I
address thee? I shall never hear thy voice. Never shall I behold thee
hereafter. O brother, dearer to me than life. Nought remains, but assuredly I
shall ever love thee. ❦
But
let us hear a boy of sixteen speak.
Because
I have found that that work has been since brought out, and with a mischievous
design, by those who aim at disturbing and changing the condition of our
government, without troubling themselves to think whether they are likely to
improve it: and because they have mixed up his work with some of their own
performance, I have refrained from inserting it here. But that the memory of
the author may not be injured, nor suffer with such as could not come near-hand
to be acquainted with his principles, I here give them to understand, that it
was written by him in his boyhood, and that by way of exercise only, as a
common theme that has been hackneyed by a thousand writers. I make no question
but that he himself believed what he wrote, being so conscientious that he
would not so much as lie in jest: and I moreover know, that could it have been
in his own choice, he had rather have been born at Venice, than at Sarlac; and with reason. But he
had another maxim sovereignty imprinted in his soul, very religiously to obey
and submit to the laws under which he was born. There never was a better
citizen, more affectionate to his country; nor a greater enemy to all the commotions
and innovations of his time: so that he would much rather have employed his
talent to the extinguishing of those civil flames, than have added any fuel to
them; he had a mind fashioned to the model of better ages. Now, in exchange of
this serious piece, I will present you with another of a more gay and frolic
air, from the same hand, and written at the same age.
Notes
- 1Schachter
(2001–2002, 7) argues that the paragraph break introduced here in modern
editions of the Essays, in the eighteenth century, “obfuscates
Montaigne’s immediate point” that a more full and perfect friendship,
in which the bodies might share in the alliance, may be
possible and desirable, albeit not between men and women, or between
unequal male partners. The break implies a separation between
heterosexuality and homosexuality when Montaigne may have been focusing
only on types of relations unsuitable to full friendships, without excluding
homosexuality.
BOOK 1 CHAPTER 27
On Friendship
Translated by Charles Cotton (1685)
Revised by W. Carew Hazlitt (1877)
© https://hyperessays.net/essays/on-friendship/
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