But we through extreme sloth and ignorance, being stupidly careless of
our own affairs, must be idly spending our time and talk either about
our neighbor’s pedigree, how that such a one had a tapster for his
grandfather, and that his grandmother was a laundress; or that another
owes three or four talents, and is not able to pay the interest. Nay,
and such trivial stuff as this we busy ourselves about,—where such a
man’s wife has been all this while; and what it was, that this and the
other fellow have been talking of in a corner. But the wise Socrates
employed his curiosity to better purpose, when he went about enquiring
by what excellent precepts Pythagoras obtained so great authority among
his followers; and Aristippus, meeting Ischomachus at the Olympic
games, asked him what those notions were with which Socrates had so
powerfully charmed the minds of his young scholars; upon the slight
information whereof, he was so passionately inflamed with a desire of
going to Athens, that he grew pale and lean, and almost languished till
he came to drink of the fountain itself, and had been acquainted with
the person of Socrates, and more fully learned that philosophy of his,
the design of which was to teach men how to discover their own ills and
apply proper remedies to them.
3. But to some sort of men their own life and actions would appear
the most unpleasant spectacle in the world, and therefore they fly
from the light of their conscience, and cannot bear the torture of
one reflecting thought upon themselves; for when the soul, being once
defiled with all manner of wickedness, is scared at its own hideous
deformity, it endeavors to run from itself, and ranging here and there,
it pampers its own malignity with malicious speculations on the ills of
others.
It is observed of the hen that, loathing the plenty of meat that is
cast before her on a clean floor, she will be scratching in a hole or
spurning the dunghill, in search of one single musty grain. So these
over-busy people, neglecting such obvious and common things into which
any man may enquire and talk of without offence, cannot be satisfied
unless they rake into the private and concealed evils of every family
in the neighborhood. It was smartly said by the Egyptian, who, being
asked what it was he carried so closely, replied, it was therefore
covered that it might be secret. Which answer will serve to check
the curiosity of those impertinent men who will be always peeping
into the privacies of others; for assuredly there is nothing usually
more concealed than what is too foul to be seen; nor would it be kept
so close, were it either fit or safe it should be known. Without
knocking at the door, it is great rudeness to enter another’s house,
and therefore in former times were rappers fitted to the gates, that
by the noise thereof notice might be given to the family; for the
same purpose are porters appointed now, lest, a stranger coming in
unawares, the mistress or daughter of the family might be surprised
busy or undressed, or a servant be seen under correction, or the maids
be overheard in the heat of their scolding. But a person of this
prying busy temper, who would disdain the being invited to a sober
and well-governed house, will yet even forcibly intrude himself as a
spy into the indecencies of private families; and he pries into those
very things which locks, bolts, and doors were intended to secure from
common view, for no other end but to discover them to all the world.
Aristo said that those winds were the most troublesome which blew up
one’s garments and exposed one’s nakedness; but these inquisitive
people deprive us of all the shelter or security of walls and doors,
and like the wanton air, which pervades the veil and steals through
the closest guards of virgin modesty, they insinuate into those
divertisements which are hidden in the retirements of the night, and
strip men even to their very skin.
4. So that—as it is merrily said by the comedian concerning Cleon,
that “his hands were in Aetolia, and his soul in Thieftown”[210]—the
hands and feet, eyes and thoughts of inquisitive persons are straggling
about in many places at once. Neither the mansions of the great, nor
the cottages of the poor, nor the privy chambers of princes, nor
the recesses of the nuptial alcove, can escape the search of their
curiosity; they are familiar to the affairs of strangers, and will
be prying into the darkest mysteries of state, although it be to the
manifest peril of their being ruined by it. For as to him that will be
curiously examining the virtues of medicinal herbs, the unwary taste
of a venomous plant conveys a deleterious impression upon the brain,
before its noxious quality can be discerned by the palate; so they
that boldly pry into the ills of great persons usually meet with their
own destruction, sooner than they can discover the dangerous secret
they enquire after. And so it happens that, when the rashly curious
eye, not contented to expatiate in the free and boundless region of
reflected light, will be gazing at the imperial seat of brightness, it
becomes a sacrifice to the burning rays, and straight sinks down in
penal darkness.
It was therefore well said by Philippides the comedian, who, being
asked by King Lysimachus what he desired might be imparted to him,
replied, Any thing but a secret. And indeed, those things in the courts
of princes that are most pleasant in themselves and most delightful to
be known,—such as balls, magnificent entertainments, and all the shows
of pomp and greatness,—are exposed to common view, nor do they ever
hide those divertisements and enjoyments which are the attendants of
a prosperous estate; but in what cases soever they seem reserved,—as
when they are conceiving some high displeasure, or contriving the
methods of a revenge, or raging under a fit of jealousy, or suspicious
of the disloyal practices of their children, or dubious concerning
the treachery of a favorite,—come not near nor intermeddle, for every
thing is of a dreadful aspect and of very dangerous access that is thus
concealed. Fly from so black a cloud, whose darkness condenses into a
tempest; and it will be time enough, when its fury breaks forth with
flash and thunder, for thee to observe upon whose head the mischief
falls.
5. But to avoid the danger of this curiosity, divert thy thoughts to
more safe and delightful enquiries; survey the wonders of nature in
the heavens, earth, the sea, and air; in which thou hast a copious
choice of materials for the more sublime, as well as the more easy and
obvious contemplations. If thy more piercing wit aspires to the noblest
enquiries, consider the greater luminary in its diurnal motion, in
what part of heaven its morning beams are kindled, and where those
chambers of the night are placed which entertain its declining lustre.
View the moon in all her changes, the just representation of human
vicissitudes, and learn the causes that destroy and then restore her
brightness:—
How from an infant-spark sprung out of night,
She swells into a perfect globe of light;
And soon her beauties thus repaired die,
Wasting into their first obscurity.[211]
These are indeed the great secrets of Nature, whose depth may perhaps
amaze and discourage thy enquiries. Search therefore into things
more obvious,—why the fruits of plants are shaped into such variety
of figures; why some are clothed with the verdure of a perennial
spring, and others, which sometime were no less fresh and fair, like
hasty spendthrifts, lavish away the bounty of Heaven in one summer’s
gayety, and stand naked to the succeeding frosts. But such harmless
speculations will perchance affect thee little, and it may be thou
hast that malignity in thy temper which, like venomous beasts that
cannot live out of stink and putrefaction, must be ever preying upon
the follies and miseries of mankind. Peruse therefore the histories
of the world, wherein thou shalt find such vast heaps of wickedness
and mischiefs, made up of the downfalls and sudden deaths of great
men,[212] the rapes and defilements of women, the treacheries of
servants, the falseness of friends, the arts of poisoning, the fatal
effects of envy and jealousy, the ruin of families, dethroning of
princes, with many other such direful occurrences as may not only
delight and satisfy, but even cloy and nauseate thy ill-natured
curiosity.
6. But neither (as it appears) are such antiquated evils any agreeable
entertainment to people of this perverse disposition; they hearken
most to modern tragedies, and such doleful accidents as may be grateful
as well for the novelty as the horror of the relation. All pleasant
and cheerful converse is irksome to them; so that if they happen into
a company that are talking of weddings, the solemnities of sacred
rites, or pompous processions, they make as though they heard not, or,
to divert and shorten the discourse, will pretend they knew as much
before. Yet, if any one should relate how such a wench had a child
before the time, or that a fellow was caught with another man’s wife,
or that certain people were at law with each other, or that there
was an unhappy difference between near relations, he no longer sits
unconcerned or minds other things, but
With ears pricked up, he listens. What, and when,
And how, he asks; pray say, let’s hear’t again!
And indeed, that proverbial saying, “Ill news goes quick and far,” was
occasioned chiefly by these busy ill-natured men, who very unwillingly
hear or talk of any thing else. For their ears, like cupping-glasses
that attract the most noxious humors in the body, are ever sucking in
the most spiteful and malicious reports; and, as in some cities there
are certain ominous gates through which nothing passes but scavenger’s
carts or the sledges of malefactors, so nothing goes in at their ears
or out of their mouths but obscene, tragical, and horrid relations.
Howling and woe, as in a jail or hell,
Always infest the places where they dwell.
This noise is to them like the Sirens’ song and the sweetest melody,
the most pleasant hearing in the world.
Now this curiosity, being an affectation of knowledge in things
concealed, must needs proceed from a great degree of spite and envy.
For men do not usually hide, but ambitiously proclaim whatever is
for their honor or interest to be known; and therefore to pry into
what is industriously covered can be for no other purpose than
that secret delight curious persons enjoy in the discovery of other
men’s ills,—which is spite,—and the relief they gather thence, to
ease themselves under their tormenting resentment at another’s
prosperity,—which is envy;—both which spring from that savage and
brutal disposition which we call ill-nature.
7. But how ungrateful it is to mankind to have their evils enquired
into appears from hence; that some have chosen rather to die than
disclose a secret disease to their physician. Suppose then that
Herophilus or Erasistratus, or Aesculapius himself when he was upon
earth, should have gone about from house to house, enquiring whether
any there had a fistula in ano or cancer in utero to be cured. Although
such a curiosity as this might in them seem much more tolerable, from
the charity of their design and the benefit intended by their art; yet
who would not rebuke the saucy officiousness of that quack who should,
unsent for, thus impudently pry into those privy distempers which the
modesty or perhaps the guilt of the patient would blush or abhor to
discover, though it were for the sake of a cure? But those that are of
this curious and busy humor cannot forbear searching into these, and
other ills too that are of a more secret nature; and—what makes the
practice the more exceedingly odious and detestable—the intent is not
to remedy, but expose them to the world. It is not ill taken, if the
searchers and officers of the customs do inspect goods openly imported,
but only when, with a design of being vexatious and troublesome, they
rip up the unsuspected packets of private passengers; and yet even this
they are by law authorized to do, and it is sometimes to their loss, if
they do not. But curious and meddlesome people will be ever enquiring
into other men’s affairs, without leave or commission, though it be to
the great neglect and damage of their own.
It is farther observable concerning this sort of men, how averse they
are to living long in the country, as being not able to endure the
quiet and calm of a retired solitude. But if by chance they take a
short ramble to their country-house, the main of their business there
is more to enquire into their neighbors’ concerns than their own; that
they may know how other men’s fruit-trees are blasted, the number of
cattle they have lost, and what a scanty harvest they are like to have,
and how well their wine keeps; with which impertinent remarks having
filled their giddy brains, the worm wags, and away they must to the
town again. Now a true bred rustic, if he by chance meet with any news
from the city, presently turns his head another way, and in his blunt
language thus reflects upon the impertinence of it:
One can’t at quiet eat, nor plough one’s lond;
Zo much us country-voke they bear in hond
With tales, which idle rascals blow about,
How kings (and well, vhat then?) vall in and out.
8. But the busy cit hates the country, as a dull unfashionable thing,
and void of mischief; and therefore keeps himself to the town, that he
may be among the crowds that throng the courts, exchange, and wharfs,
and pick up all the idle stories. Here he goes about pumping, What news
d’ye hear? Were not you upon the exchange to-day, sir? The city’s in
a very ticklish posture, what d’ye think on’t? In two or three hours’
time we may be altogether by the ears. If he’s riding post, he will
light off his horse, and even hug and kiss a fellow that has a story
to tell him; and stay never so long, till he hears it out. But if any
one upon demand shall answer, No news! he replies, as in a passion,
What, have you been neither at the exchange or market to-day? Have
you not been towards the court lately? Have you not heard any thing
from those gentlemen that newly came out of Italy? It was (methinks)
a good piece of policy among the Locrians, that if any person coming
from abroad but once asked concerning news, he was presently confined
for his curiosity; for as cooks and fishmongers wish for plenty in the
commodities they trade with, so inquisitive people that deal much in
news are ever longing for innovations, alterations, variety of action,
or any thing that is mischievous and unlucky, that they may find store
of game for their restless ill-nature to hunt and prey upon. Charondas
also did well in prohibiting comedians by law from exposing any citizen
upon the stage, unless it were for adultery or this malignant sort of
curiosity. And indeed there is a near affinity between these two vices,
for adultery is nothing else but the curiosity of discovering another
man’s secret pleasures, and the itch of knowing what is hidden; and
curiosity is (as it were) a rape and violence committed upon other
people’s privacies.
9. And now as the accumulation of notions in the head usually begets
multiplicity of words,—for which reason Pythagoras thought fit to
check the too early loquacity of his scholars, by imposing on them
five years’ silence from their first admission,—so the same curiosity
that is thus inquisitive to know is no less intemperate in talking
too, and must needs be as ill-spoken as it is ill-natured. And hence
it is that curiosity does not only become a restraint to the vices and
follies of others, but is a disappointment also to itself. For all
mankind are exceeding shy of inquisitive persons: no serious business
is consulted of where they are; and if they chance to surprise men in
the negotiation of any affair, it is presently laid aside as carefully
as the housewife locks up her fish from the cat; nor (if it be possible
to avoid it) is any thing of moment said or done in their company. But
whatever is freely permitted to any other people to see, hear, or talk
of, is kept as a great secret from persons of this busy impertinent
disposition; and there is no man but would commit his letters, papers,
and writings to the care of a servant or a stranger, rather than to an
acquaintance or relation of this busy and blabbing humor.
By the great command which Bellerophon had over his curiosity, he
resisted the solicitations of a lustful woman, and (though it were to
the hazard of his life) abstained from opening the letters wherein he
was designed to be the messenger of his own destruction. For curiosity
and adultery (as was intimated before) are both vices of incontinence;
only they are aggravated by a peculiar degree of madness and folly,
beyond what is found in most other vices of this nature. And can there
any thing be more sottish, than for a man to pass by the doors of so
many common prostitutes that are ready to seize him in the streets,
and to beleaguer the lodgings of some coy and recluse female that
is far more costly, and perhaps far less comely too, than a hackney
three-penny strumpet? But such is plainly the frensy of curious
persons, who, despising all those things that are of easy access and
unenvied enjoyment,—such as are the divertisements of the theatre, the
conversation of the ingenious, and the discourses of the learned,—must
be breaking open other men’s letters, listening at their neighbors’
doors, peeping in at their windows, or whispering with their servants;
a practice which (as it deserves) is commonly dangerous, but ever
extremely base and ignominious.
10. Now to dissuade inquisitive persons (as much as possible) from
this sneaking and most despicable humor, it would contribute much,
if they would but recollect and review all their past observations.
For as Simonides, using at certain times to open two chests he kept
by him, found that wherein he put rewards ever full, and the other
appointed for thanks always empty; so, if inquisitive people did but
now and then look into their bag of news, they would certainly be
ashamed of that vain and foolish curiosity which, with so much hazard
and trouble to themselves, had been gathering together such a confused
heap of worthless and loathsome trash. If a man, in reading over the
writings of the ancients, should rake together all the dross he could
meet with, and collect into one volume all the unfinished scraps of
verse in Homer, the incongruous expressions in the tragedians, or those
obscenities of smutty Archilochus for which he was scorned and pointed
at, would not such a filthy scavenger of books well deserve that curse
of the tragedian,
Pox on your taste! Must you, like lice and fleas,
Be always fed with scabs and nastiness?
But without this imprecation, the practice itself becomes its own
punishment, in the dishonest and unprofitable drudgery of amassing
together such a noisome heap of other men’s vices and follies; a
treasure much resembling the city Poneropolis (or _Rogue-town_),
so called by King Philip after he had peopled it with a crew of rogues
and vagabonds. For curious people do so load their dirty brains with
the ribaldry and solecisms of other men’s writings, as well as the
defects and blemishes of their lives, that there is not the least room
left in their heads for one witty, graceful, or ingenious thought.
There is a sort of people at Rome who, being unaffected with any thing
that is beautiful and pretty, either in the works of art or nature,
despise the most curious pieces in painting or sculpture, and the
fairest boys and girls that are there exposed to sale, as not worth
their money; therefore they much frequent the monster-market, looking
after people of distorted limbs and preternatural shapes, of three eyes
and pointed heads, and mongrels
Where kinds of unlike form oft blended be
Into one hideous deformity.[213]
All which are sights so loathsome, that they themselves would
abhor them were they compelled often to behold them. And if they
who curiously enquire into those vicious deformities and unlucky
accidents that may be observed in the lives of other men would only
bind themselves to a frequent recollection of what they had seen and
heard, there would be found very little delight or advantage in such
ungrateful and melancholy reflections.
11. Now since it is from the use and custom of intermeddling in the
affairs of other men that this perverse practice grows up into such a
vicious habit, therefore the best remedy thereof is, that beginning (as
it were) at a distance, and with such things as do less excite the itch
of our curiosity, we gradually bring ourselves to an utter desuetude of
enquiring into or being concerned at any of those things that do not
pertain unto us. Therefore let men first make trial of themselves in
smaller and less considerable matters. As for the purpose, why should
it be thought such a severe piece of self-denial for any man, as he
passes by, to forbear reading the inscriptions that are upon a monument
or gravestone, or the letters that are drawn on walls and sign-posts,
if it were but considered that there is nothing more, either for
delight or benefit, to be learned thereby, but that certain people
had a desire to preserve the memory of their friends and relations by
engraving their names on brass or marble, or that some impudent quack
or rooking tradesman wants money, and knows no other way to draw men to
their shop or lodgings, but by decoying billets and the invitation of
a show-board? The taking notice of which and such like things may seem
for the present harmless; yet there is really a secret mischief wrought
by it, while men, suffering their minds to rove so inconsiderately at
every thing they see, are inured to a foolish curiosity in busying
themselves about things impertinent. For as skilful huntsmen do not
permit their beagles to fling or change, but lead them forth in
couples, that their noses may be kept sharp for their proper game,
With scent most quick of nostrils after kind,
The tracks of beast so wild in chase to find;
so ought persons of an inquisitive temper to restrain the wanton
excursions of their curiosity, and confine it to observations of
prudence and sobriety. Thus the lion and eagle, which walk with their
claws sheathed to keep them always pointed for their prey, are an
example of that discretion which curious persons should imitate, by
carefully preserving those noble faculties of wit and understanding,
which were made for useful and excellent enquiries, from being dulled
and debauched with low and sottish speculations.
12. The second remedy of this curiosity is that we accustom ourselves
in passing by not to peep in at other men’s doors or windows, for in
this case the hand and eye are much alike guilty; and Xenocrates said,
“One may as well go as look into another man’s house,” because the eye
may reach what the hand cannot, and wander where the foot does not
come. And besides, it is neither genteel nor civil thus to gaze about.
A well-bred person will commonly discover very little that is either
meet or delightful to look on; but foul dishes perhaps lying about the
floor, or wenches in lazy or immodest postures, and nothing that is
decent or in good order; but as one said upon this occasion,
For ought that’s here worth seeing, friend, you may
Ev’n turn your prying look another way.
And yet laying aside this consideration of uncomely sights, this very
staring and glancing of the eyes to and fro implies such a levity
of mind and so great a defect in good manners, as must needs render
the practice in itself very clownish and contemptible. When Diogenes
observed Dioxippus, a victor in the Olympic games, twisting his neck
as he sat in his chariot, that he might take the better view of a
fair damsel that came to see the sport, Look (says he) what a worthy
gamester goes there, that even a woman can turn him which way she
lists. But these busy-brained people do so twist and turn themselves
to every frivolous show, as if they had acquired a verticity in their
heads by their custom of gazing at all things round about them. Now
(methinks) it is by no means seemly, that the sense which ought
to behave itself as a handmaid to the soul (in doing its errands
faithfully, returning speedily, and keeping at home with submissive and
reserved modesty) should be suffered, like a wanton and ungovernable
servant, to be gadding abroad from her mistress, and straying about at
her pleasure. But this happens according to that of Sophocles,
And then the Aenianian’s colts disdain
Bridle and bit, nor will abide the rein.[214]
For so the senses, not exercised and well managed, will at every turn
break loose into wild excursions, and hurry reason along with them into
the same extravagance.
It is said of Democritus, that he voluntarily put out his eyes by the
reflection of a burning-glass, that (as by the darkening of windows,
sometimes done for the same purpose) he might not by the allurements
of sense be called off from attending to his purely intellectual
contemplations. Although the story be false, yet this at least is
true, that those men who are most addicted to profound speculations
do least of all converse with impressions of sense. And therefore,
to prevent that interruption and disturbance which either noise or
impertinent visits might be to their philosophical enquiries, they
placed their studies at some distance from cities, and called the night
_Euphrone_ (from εὔφρων, of _good understanding_), thinking
that its quiet and stillness from all disturbances made it the fittest
season for meditation.
13. Farther, to forbear mixing with a crowd of fellows that are
quarrelling in the market-place, or to sit still while the mad rabble
are rioting in the streets, or at least to get out of hearing of it,
will not be very difficult to any man that considers how little there
is to be gained by intermeddling with busy and unquiet people, and how
great the certain advantage is of bridling our curiosity, and bringing
it under subjection to the commands of reason. And thus, when by this
more easy discipline a man hath acquired some power over himself,
exercises of greater difficulty are to be attempted; as, for instance,
to forbear the theatre upon the tempting fame of some new and much
applauded play; to resist the importunity of a friend that invites thee
to a ball, an entertainment at the tavern, or a concert of music; and
not to be transported if thou chance at a distance to hear the din at a
race-course, or the noise at the circus. For as Socrates advises well,
that men should abstain from tasting those meats and drinks which, by
their exquisite pleasantness, tempt the palate to exceed the sober
measures of thirst and hunger, so are all those oblectations of the ear
and eye to be avoided which are apt to entice men into impertinence or
extravagance. When Araspes had commended the fair Panthea to Cyrus, as
a beauty worth his admiration, he replied: For that very reason I will
not see her, lest, if by thy persuasion I should see her but once, she
herself might persuade me to see her often, and spend more time with
her than would be for the advantage of my own affairs. So Alexander,
upon like consideration, would not trust his eyes in the presence of
the beautiful queen of Persia, but kept himself out of the reach of
her charms, and treated only with her aged mother. But we, alas! (that
no opportunity may be lost of doing ourselves all the mischief we
can by our curiosity) cannot forbear prying into sedans and coaches,
or gazing at the windows or peeping under the balconies, where women
are; nay, we must be staring about from the house-top, to spy out all
occasions of our ruin, and are all the while so sottishly inconsiderate
as to apprehend no danger from giving such a boundless license to our
wandering eyes.
14. Now as, in point of justice and honesty, it conduces much to
prevent our defrauding and overreaching other men if we now and then
in smaller matters voluntarily abate somewhat of our strict dues, and
as it is a means to keep men chaste and continent to all other women
if they sometimes forbear the lawful enjoyment of their own wives, so
will these excesses of curiosity be cured by the same restraints, if,
instead of enquiring into what concerns other men, we can prevail with
ourselves so far as not to hear or see all that is done in our own
houses, nor to listen to every thing that may be told us concerning
ourselves or our private affairs. Oedipus by his curiosity fell into
great mischief; for, being of a parentage to himself unknown and now
at Corinth where he was a stranger, he went about asking questions
concerning himself, and lighting on Laius he slew him; and then by
the marriage of the queen, who was his own mother, he obtained the
government. Not contented with the thoughts of being thus happy, he
must needs once more (against all the persuasions of his wife) be
enquiring concerning himself; when, meeting with an old man that was
privy to the whole contrivance, he pressed him earnestly to reveal the
secret. And when he now began to suspect the worst, the old man cried
out,
Alas! So sad a tale to tell I dread;
but he, burning with impatience of knowing all, replied,