dunghill cock, who being but one had been yet everything, a philosopher,
a man, a woman, a king, a private man, a fish, a horse, a frog, and, I
believe too, a sponge; and at last concluded that no creature was more
miserable than man, for that all other creatures are content with those
bounds that nature set them, only man endeavors to exceed them. And
again, among men he gives the precedency not to the learned or the great,
but the fool. Nor had that Gryllus less wit than Ulysses with his many
counsels, who chose rather to lie grunting in a hog sty than be exposed
with the other to so many hazards. Nor does Homer, that father of
trifles, dissent from me; who not only called all men "wretched and full
of calamity," but often his great pattern of wisdom, Ulysses,
"miserable;" Paris, Ajax, and Achilles nowhere. And why, I pray but that,
like a cunning fellow and one that was his craft's master, he did nothing
without the advice of Pallas? In a word he was too wise, and by that
means ran wide of nature. As therefore among men they are least happy
that study wisdom, as being in this twice fools, that when they are born
men, they should yet so far forget their condition as to affect the life
of gods; and after the example of the giants, with their philosophical
gimcracks make a war upon nature: so they on the other side seem as
little miserable as is possible who come nearest to beasts and never
attempt anything beyond man. Go to then, let's try how demonstrable this
is; not by enthymemes or the imperfect syllogisms of the Stoics, but by
plain, downright, and ordinary examples.
And now, by the immortal gods! I think nothing more happy than that
generation of men we commonly call fools, idiots, lack-wits, and dolts;
splendid titles too, as I conceive them. I'll tell you a thing, which at
first perhaps may seem foolish and absurd, yet nothing more true. And
first they are not afraid of death--no small evil, by Jupiter! They are
not tormented with the conscience of evil acts, not terrified with the
fables of ghosts, nor frightened with spirits and goblins. They are not
distracted with the fear of evils to come nor the hopes of future good.
In short, they are not disturbed with those thousand of cares to which
this life is subject. They are neither modest, nor fearful, nor
ambitious, nor envious, nor love they any man. And lastly, if they should
come nearer even to the very ignorance of brutes, they could not sin, for
so hold the divines. And now tell me, you wise fool, with how many
troublesome cares your mind is continually perplexed; heap together all
the discommodities of your life, and then you'll be sensible from how
many evils I have delivered my fools. Add to this that they are not only
merry, play, sing, and laugh themselves, but make mirth wherever they
come, a special privilege it seems the gods have given them to refresh
the pensiveness of life. Whence it is that whereas the world is so
differently affected one towards another, that all men indifferently
admit them as their companions, desire, feed, cherish, embrace them, take
their parts upon all occasions, and permit them without offense to do or
say what they like. And so little does everything desire to hurt them,
that even the very beasts, by a kind of natural instinct of their
innocence no doubt, pass by their injuries. For of them it may be truly
said that they are consecrate to the gods, and therefore and not without
cause do men have them in such esteem. Whence is it else that they are in
so great request with princes that they can neither eat nor drink, go
anywhere, or be an hour without them? Nay, and in some degree they prefer
these fools before their crabbish wise men, whom yet they keep about them
for state's sake. Nor do I conceive the reason so difficult, or that it
should seem strange why they are preferred before the others, for that
these wise men speak to princes about nothing but grave, serious matters,
and trusting to their own parts and learning do not fear sometimes "to
grate their tender ears with smart truths;" but fools fit them with that
they most delight in, as jests, laughter, abuses of other men, wanton
pastimes, and the like.
Again, take notice of this no contemptible blessing which Nature has
given fools, that they are the only plain, honest men and such as speak
truth. And what is more commendable than truth? For though that proverb
of Alcibiades in Plato attributes truth to drunkards and children, yet
the praise of it is particularly mine, even from the testimony of
Euripides, among whose other things there is extant that his honorable
saying concerning us, "A fool speaks foolish things." For whatever a fool
has in his heart, he both shows it in his looks and expresses it in his
discourse; while the wise men's are those two tongues which the same
Euripides mentions, whereof the one speaks truth, the other what they
judge most seasonable for the occasion. These are they "that turn black
into white," blow hot and cold with the same breath, and carry a far
different meaning in their breast from what they feign with their tongue.
Yet in the midst of all their prosperity, princes in this respect seem to
me most unfortunate, because, having no one to tell them truth, they are
forced to receive flatterers for friends.
But, someone may say, the ears of princes are strangers to truth, and for
this reason they avoid those wise men, because they fear lest someone
more frank than the rest should dare to speak to them things rather true
than pleasant; for so the matter is, that they don't much care for truth.
And yet this is found by experience among my fools, that not only truths
but even open reproaches are heard with pleasure; so that the same thing
which, if it came from a wise man's mouth might prove a capital crime,
spoken by a fool is received with delight. For truth carries with it a
certain peculiar power of pleasing, if no accident fall in to give
occasion of offense; which faculty the gods have given only to fools. And
for the same reasons is it that women are so earnestly delighted with
this kind of men, as being more propense by nature to pleasure and toys.
And whatsoever they may happen to do with them, although sometimes it be
of the most serious, yet they turn it to jest and laughter, as that sex
was ever quick-witted, especially to color their own faults.
But to return to the happiness of fools, who when they have passed over
this life with a great deal of pleasantness and without so much as the
least fear or sense of death, they go straight forth into the Elysian
field, to recreate their pious and careless souls with such sports as
they used here. Let's proceed then, and compare the condition of any of
your wise men with that of this fool. Fancy to me now some example of
wisdom you'd set up against him; one that had spent his childhood and
youth in learning the sciences and lost the sweetest part of his life in
watchings, cares, studies, and for the remaining part of it never so much
as tasted the least of pleasure; ever sparing, poor, sad, sour, unjust,
and rigorous to himself, and troublesome and hateful to others; broken
with paleness, leanness, crassness, sore eyes, and an old age and death
contracted before their time (though yet, what matter is it, when he die
that never lived?); and such is the picture of this great wise man.
And here again do those frogs of the Stoics croak at me and say that
nothing is more miserable than madness. But folly is the next degree, if
not the very thing. For what else is madness than for a man to be out of
his wits? But to let them see how they are clean out of the way, with the
Muses' good favor we'll take this syllogism in pieces. Subtly argued, I
must confess, but as Socrates in Plato teaches us how by splitting one
Venus and one Cupid to make two of either, in like manner should those
logicians have done and distinguished madness from madness, if at least
they would be thought to be well in their wits themselves. For all
madness is not miserable, or Horace had never called his poetical fury a
beloved madness; nor Plato placed the raptures of poets, prophets, and
lovers among the chiefest blessings of this life; nor that sibyl in
Virgil called Aeneas' travels mad labors. But there are two sorts of
madness, the one that which the revengeful Furies send privily from hell,
as often as they let loose their snakes and put into men's breasts either
the desire of war, or an insatiate thirst after gold, or some dishonest
love, or parricide, or incest, or sacrilege, or the like plagues, or when
they terrify some guilty soul with the conscience of his crimes; the
other, but nothing like this, that which comes from me and is of all
other things the most desirable; which happens as often as some pleasing
dotage not only clears the mind of its troublesome cares but renders it
more jocund. And this was that which, as a special blessing of the gods,
Cicero, writing to his friend Atticus, wished to himself, that he might
be the less sensible of those miseries that then hung over the
commonwealth.
Nor was that Grecian in Horace much wide of it, who was so far made that
he would sit by himself whole days in the theatre laughing and clapping
his hands, as if he had seen some tragedy acting, whereas in truth there
was nothing presented; yet in other things a man well enough, pleasant
among his friends, kind to his wife, and so good a master to his servants
that if they had broken the seal of his bottle, he would not have run mad
for it. But at last, when by the care of his friends and physic he was
freed from his distemper and become his own man again, he thus
expostulates with them, "Now, by Pollux, my friends, you have rather
killed than preserved me in thus forcing me from my pleasure." By which
you see he liked it so well that he lost it against his will. And trust
me, I think they were the madder of the two, and had the greater need of
hellebore, that should offer to look upon so pleasant a madness as an
evil to be removed by physic; though yet I have not determined whether
every distemper of the sense or understanding be to be called madness.
For neither he that having weak eyes should take a mule for an ass, nor
he that should admire an insipid poem as excellent would be presently
thought mad; but he that not only errs in his senses but is deceived also
in his judgment, and that too more than ordinary and upon all
occasions--he, I must confess, would be thought to come very near to it.
As if anyone hearing an ass bray should take it for excellent music, or a
beggar conceive himself a king. And yet this kind of madness, if, as it
commonly happens, it turn to pleasure, it brings a great delight not only
to them that are possessed with it but to those also that behold it,
though perhaps they may not be altogether so mad as the other, for the
species of this madness is much larger than the people take it to be. For
one mad man laughs at another, and beget themselves a mutual pleasure.
Nor does it seldom happen that he that is the more mad, laughs at him
that is less mad. And in this every man is the more happy in how many
respects the more he is mad; and if I were judge in the case, he should
be ranged in that class of folly that is peculiarly mine, which in truth
is so large and universal that I scarce know anyone in all mankind that
is wise at all hours, or has not some tang or other of madness.
And to this class do they appertain that slight everything in comparison
of hunting and protest they take an unimaginable pleasure to hear the
yell of the horns and the yelps of the hounds, and I believe could pick
somewhat extraordinary out of their very excrement. And then what
pleasure they take to see a buck or the like unlaced? Let ordinary
fellows cut up an ox or a wether, 'twere a crime to have this done by
anything less than a gentleman! who with his hat off, on his bare knees,
and a couteau for that purpose (for every sword or knife is not
allowable), with a curious superstition and certain postures, lays open
the several parts in their respective order; while they that hem him in
admire it with silence, as some new religious ceremony, though perhaps
they have seen it a hundred times before. And if any of them chance to
get the least piece of it, he presently thinks himself no small
gentleman. In all which they drive at nothing more than to become beasts
themselves, while yet they imagine they live the life of princes.
And next these may be reckoned those that have such an itch of building;
one while changing rounds into squares, and presently again squares into
rounds, never knowing either measure or end, till at last, reduced to the
utmost poverty, there remains not to them so much as a place where they
may lay their head, or wherewith to fill their bellies. And why all this?
but that they may pass over a few years in feeding their foolish fancies.
And, in my opinion, next these may be reckoned such as with their new
inventions and occult arts undertake to change the forms of things and
hunt all about after a certain fifth essence; men so bewitched with this
present hope that it never repents them of their pains or expense, but
are ever contriving how they may cheat themselves, till, having spent
all, there is not enough left them to provide another furnace. And yet
they have not done dreaming these their pleasant dreams but encourage
others, as much as in them lies, to the same happiness. And at last, when
they are quite lost in all their expectations, they cheer up themselves
with this sentence, "In great things the very attempt is enough," and
then complain of the shortness of man's life that is not sufficient for
so great an understanding.
And then for gamesters, I am a little doubtful whether they are to be
admitted into our college; and yet 'tis a foolish and ridiculous sight to
see some addicted so to it that they can no sooner hear the rattling of
the dice but their heart leaps and dances again. And then when time after
time they are so far drawn on with the hopes of winning that they have
made shipwreck of all, and having split their ship on that rock of dice,
no less terrible than the bishop and his clerks, scarce got alive to
shore, they choose rather to cheat any man of their just debts than not
pay the money they lost, lest otherwise, forsooth, they be thought no men
of their words. Again what is it, I pray, to see old fellows and half
blind to play with spectacles? Nay, and when a justly deserved gout has
knotted their knuckles, to hire a caster, or one that may put the dice in
the box for them? A pleasant thing, I must confess, did it not for the
most part end in quarrels, and therefore belongs rather to the Furies
than me.
But there is no doubt but that that kind of men are wholly ours who love
to hear or tell feigned miracles and strange lies and are never weary of
any tale, though never so long, so it be of ghosts, spirits, goblins,
devils, or the like; which the further they are from truth, the more
readily they are believed and the more do they tickle their itching ears.
And these serve not only to pass away time but bring profit, especially
to mass priests and pardoners. And next to these are they that have
gotten a foolish but pleasant persuasion that if they can but see a
wooden or painted Polypheme Christopher, they shall not die that day; or
do but salute a carved Barbara, in the usual set form, that he shall
return safe from battle; or make his application to Erasmus on certain
days with some small wax candles and proper prayers, that he shall
quickly be rich. Nay, they have gotten a Hercules, another Hippolytus,
and a St. George, whose horse most religiously set out with trappings and
bosses there wants little but they worship; however, they endeavor to
make him their friend by some present or other, and to swear by his
master's brazen helmet is an oath for a prince. Or what should I say of
them that hug themselves with their counterfeit pardons; that have
measured purgatory by an hourglass, and can without the least mistake
demonstrate its ages, years, months, days, hours, minutes, and seconds,
as it were in a mathematical table? Or what of those who, having
confidence in certain magical charms and short prayers invented by some
pious imposter, either for his soul's health or profit's sake, promise to
themselves everything: wealth, honor, pleasure, plenty, good health, long
life, lively old age, and the next place to Christ in the other world,
which yet they desire may not happen too soon, that is to say before the
pleasures of this life have left them?
And now suppose some merchant, soldier, or judge, out of so many rapines,
parts with some small piece of money. He straight conceives all that sink
of his whole life quite cleansed; so many perjuries, so many lusts, so
many debaucheries, so many contentions, so many murders, so many deceits,
so many breaches of trusts, so many treacheries bought off, as it were by
compact; and so bought off that they may begin upon a new score. But what
is more foolish than those, or rather more happy, who daily reciting
those seven verses of the Psalms promise to themselves more than the top
of felicity? Which magical verses some devil or other, a merry one
without doubt but more a blab of his tongue than crafty, is believed to
have discovered to St. Bernard, but not without a trick. And these are so
foolish that I am half ashamed of them myself, and yet they are approved,
and that not only by the common people but even the professors of
religion. And what, are not they also almost the same where several
countries avouch to themselves their peculiar saint, and as everyone of
them has his particular gift, so also his particular form of worship? As,
one is good for the toothache; another for groaning women; a third, for
stolen goods; a fourth, for making a voyage prosperous; and a fifth, to
cure sheep of the rot; and so of the rest, for it would be too tedious to
run over all. And some there are that are good for more things than one;
but chiefly, the Virgin Mother, to whom the common people do in a manner
attribute more than to the Son.
Yet what do they beg of these saints but what belongs to folly? To
examine it a little. Among all those offerings which are so frequently
hung up in churches, nay up to the very roof of some of them, did you
ever see the least acknowledgment from anyone that had left his folly, or
grown a hair's breadth the wiser? One escapes a shipwreck, and he gets
safe to shore. Another, run through in a duel, recovers. Another, while
the rest were fighting, ran out of the field, no less luckily than
valiantly. Another, condemned to be hanged, by the favor of some saint or
other, a friend to thieves, got off himself by impeaching his fellows.
Another escaped by breaking prison. Another recovered from his fever in
spite of his physician. Another's poison turning to a looseness proved
his remedy rather than death; and that to his wife's no small sorrow, in
that she lost both her labor and her charge. Another's cart broke, and he
saved his horses. Another preserved from the fall of a house. All these
hang up their tablets, but no one gives thanks for his recovery from
folly; so sweet a thing it is not to be wise, that on the contrary men
rather pray against anything than folly.
But why do I launch out into this ocean of superstitions? Had I a hundred
tongues, as many mouths, and a voice never so strong, yet were I not able
to run over the several sorts of fools or all the names of folly, so
thick do they swarm everywhere. And yet your priests make no scruple to
receive and cherish them as proper instruments of profit; whereas if some
scurvy wise fellow should step up and speak things as they are, as, to
live well is the way to die well; the best way to get quit of sin is to
add to the money you give the hatred of sin, tears, watchings, prayers,
fastings, and amendment of life; such or such a saint will favor you, if
you imitate his life--these, I say, and the like--should this wise man
chat to the people, from what happiness into how great troubles would he
draw them?
Of this college also are they who in their lifetime appoint with what
solemnity they'll be buried, and particularly set down how many torches,
how many mourners, how many singers, how many almsmen they will have at
it; as if any sense of it could come to them, or that it were a shame to
them that their corpse were not honorably interred; so curious are they
herein, as if, like the aediles of old, these were to present some shows
or banquet to the people.
And though I am in haste, yet I cannot yet pass by them who, though they
differ nothing from the meanest cobbler, yet 'tis scarcely credible how
they flatter themselves with the empty title of nobility. One derives his
pedigree from Aeneas, another from Brutus, a third from the star by the
tail of Ursa Major. They show you on every side the statues and pictures
of their ancestors; run over their great-grandfathers and the
great-great-grandfathers of both lines, and the ancient matches of their
families, when themselves yet are but once removed from a statue, if not
worse than those trifles they boast of. And yet by means of this pleasant
self-love they live a happy life. Nor are they less fools who admire
these beasts as if they were gods.
But what do I speak of any one or the other particular kind of men, as if
this self-love had not the same effect everywhere and rendered most men
superabundantly happy? As when a fellow, more deformed than a baboon,
shall believe himself handsomer than Homer's Nereus. Another, as soon as
he can draw two or three lines with a compass, presently thinks himself a
Euclid. A third, that understands music no more than my horse, and for
his voice as hoarse as a dunghill cock, shall yet conceive himself
another Hermogenes. But of all madness that's the most pleasant when a
man, seeing another any way excellent in what he pretends to himself,
makes his boasts of it as confidently as if it were his own. And such was
that rich fellow in Seneca, who whenever he told a story had his servants
at his elbow to prompt him the names; and to that height had they
flattered him that he did not question but he might venture a rubber at
cuffs, a man otherwise so weak he could scarce stand, only presuming on
this, that he had a company of sturdy servants about him.
Or to what purpose is it I should mind you of our professors of arts?
Forasmuch as this self-love is so natural to them all that they had
rather part with their father's land than their foolish opinions; but
chiefly players, fiddlers, orators, and poets, of which the more ignorant
each of them is, the more insolently he pleases himself, that is to say
vaunts and spreads out his plumes. And like lips find like lettuce; nay,
the more foolish anything is, the more 'tis admired, the greater number
being ever tickled at the worst things, because, as I said before, most
men are so subject to folly. And therefore if the more foolish a man is,
the more he pleases himself and is admired by others, to what purpose
should he beat his brains about true knowledge, which first will cost him
dear, and next render him the more troublesome and less confident, and
lastly, please only a few?
And now I consider it, Nature has planted, not only in particular men but
even in every nation, and scarce any city is there without it, a kind of
common self-love. And hence is it that the English, besides other things,
particularly challenge to themselves beauty, music, and feasting. The
Scots are proud of their nobility, alliance to the crown, and logical
subtleties. The French think themselves the only well-bred men. The
Parisians, excluding all others, arrogate to themselves the only
knowledge of divinity. The Italians affirm they are the only masters of
good letters and eloquence, and flatter themselves on this account, that
of all others they only are not barbarous. In which kind of happiness
those of Rome claim the first place, still dreaming to themselves of
somewhat, I know not what, of old Rome. The Venetians fancy themselves
happy in the opinion of their nobility. The Greeks, as if they were the
only authors of sciences, swell themselves with the titles of the ancient
heroes. The Turk, and all that sink of the truly barbarous, challenge to
themselves the only glory of religion and laugh at Christians as
superstitious. And much more pleasantly the Jews expect to this day the
coming of the Messiah, and so obstinately contend for their Law of Moses.
The Spaniards give place to none in the reputation of soldiery. The
Germans pride themselves in their tallness of stature and skill in magic.