INTRODUCTION.—The fable of the Sirens is, in a vulgar sense, justly
enough explained of the pernicious incentives to pleasure; but the
ancient mythology seems to us like a vintage ill-pressed and trod; for
though something has been drawn from it, yet all the more excellent
parts remain behind in the grapes that are untouched.
FABLE.—The Sirens are said to be the daughters of Achelous and
Terpsichore, one of the Muses. In their early days they had wings,
but lost them upon being conquered by the Muses, with whom they
rashly contended; and with the feathers of these wings the Muses made
themselves crowns, so that from this time the Muses wore wings on their
heads, except only the mother to the Sirens.
These Sirens resided in certain pleasant islands, and when, from their
watch-tower, they saw any ship approaching, they first detained the
sailors by their music, then, enticing them to shore, destroyed them.
Their singing was not of one and the same kind, but they adapted their
tunes exactly to the nature of each person, in order to captivate and
secure him. And so destructive had they been, that these islands of
the Sirens appeared, to a very great distance, white with the bones of
their unburied captives.
Two different remedies were invented to protect persons against them,
the one by Ulysses, the other by Orpheus. Ulysses commanded his
associates to stop their ears close with wax; and he, determining to
make the trial, and yet avoid the danger, ordered himself to be tied
fast to a mast of the ship, giving strict charge not to be unbound,
even though himself should entreat it; but Orpheus, without any binding
at all, escaped the danger, by loudly chanting to his harp the praises
of the gods, whereby he drowned the voices of the Sirens.
EXPLANATION.—This fable is of the moral kind, and appears no less
elegant than easy to interpret. For pleasures proceed from plenty and
affluence, attended with activity or exultation of the mind.[651]
Anciently their first incentives were quick, and seized upon men
as if they had been winged, but learning and philosophy afterwards
prevailing, had at least the power to lay the mind under some
restraint, and make it consider the issue of things, and thus deprived
pleasures of their wings.
This conquest redounded greatly to the honor and ornament of the
Muses; for after it appeared, by the example of a few, that philosophy
could introduce a contempt of pleasures, it immediately seemed to be a
sublime thing that could raise and elevate the soul, fixed in a manner
down to the earth, and thus render men’s thoughts, which reside in the
head, winged as it were, or sublime.
Only the mother of the Sirens was not thus plumed on the head, which
doubtless denotes superficial learning, invented and used for delight
and levity; an eminent example whereof we have in Petronius, who,
after receiving sentence of death, still continued his gay frothy
humor, and as Tacitus observes, used his learning to solace or divert
himself, and instead of such discourses as give firmness and constancy
of mind, read nothing but loose poems and verses.[652] Such learning as
this seems to pluck the crowns again from the Muses’ heads, and restore
them to the Sirens.
The Sirens are said to inhabit certain islands, because pleasures
generally seek retirement, and often shun society. And for their songs,
with the manifold artifice and destructiveness thereof, this is too
obvious and common to need explanation. But that particular of the
bones stretching like white cliffs along the shores, and appearing afar
off, contains a more subtile allegory, and denotes that the examples of
others’ calamity and misfortunes, though ever so manifest and apparent,
have yet but little force to deter the corrupt nature of man from
pleasures.
The allegory of the remedies against the Sirens is not difficult, but
very wise and noble; it proposes, in effect, three remedies, as well
against subtile as violent mischiefs, two drawn from philosophy and one
from religion.
The first means of escaping is to resist the earliest temptation in
the beginning, and diligently avoid and cut off all occasions that may
solicit or sway the mind; and this is well represented by shutting up
the ears, a kind of remedy to be necessarily used with mean and vulgar
minds, such as the retinue of Ulysses.
But nobler spirits may converse, even in the midst of pleasures, if
the mind be well guarded with constancy and resolution. And thus some
delight to make a severe trial of their own virtue, and thoroughly
acquaint themselves with the folly and madness of pleasures, without
complying or being wholly given up to them; which is what Solomon
professes of himself when he closes the account of all the numerous
pleasures he gave a loose to, with this expression: “But wisdom still
continued with me.” Such heroes in virtue may, therefore, remain
unmoved by the greatest incentives to pleasure, and stop themselves on
the very precipice of danger; if, according to the example of Ulysses,
they turn a deaf ear to pernicious counsel, and the flatteries of their
friends and companions, which have the greatest power to shake and
unsettle the mind.
But the most excellent remedy, in every temptation, is that of Orpheus,
who, by loudly chanting and resounding the praises of the gods,
confounded the voices, and kept himself from hearing the music of the
Sirens; for divine contemplations exceed the pleasures of sense, not
only in power but also in sweetness.