Essays of Montaigne

These so frequent and common examples passing every day before our eyes, how is it possible a man should disengage himself from the thought of death, or avoid fancying that it has us every moment by the throat? What matter is it, you will say, which way it comes to pass, provided a man does not terrify himself with the expectation? For my part, I am of this mind, and if a man could by any means avoid it, though by creeping under a calf's skin, I am one that should not be ashamed of the shift; all I aim at is, to pass my time at my ease, and the recreations that will most contribute to it, I take hold of, as little glorious and exemplary as you will:

"Praetulerim . . . delirus inersque videri,

Dum mea delectent mala me, vel denique fallant,

Quam sapere, et ringi."

["I had rather seem mad and a sluggard, so that my defects are

agreeable to myself, or that I am not painfully conscious of them,

than be wise, and chaptious."—Hor., Ep., ii. 2, 126.]

But 'tis folly to think of doing anything that way. They go, they come, they gallop and dance, and not a word of death. All this is very fine; but withal, when it comes either to themselves, their wives, their children, or friends, surprising them at unawares and unprepared, then, what torment, what outcries, what madness and despair! Did you ever see anything so subdued, so changed, and so confounded? A man must, therefore, make more early provision for it; and this brutish negligence, could it possibly lodge in the brain of any man of sense (which I think utterly impossible), sells us its merchandise too dear. Were it an enemy that could be avoided, I would then advise to borrow arms even of cowardice itself; but seeing it is not, and that it will catch you as well flying and playing the poltroon, as standing to't like an honest man:—

"Nempe et fugacem persequitur virum,

Nec parcit imbellis juventae

Poplitibus timidoque tergo."

["He pursues the flying poltroon, nor spares the hamstrings of the

unwarlike youth who turns his back"—Hor., Ep., iii. 2, 14.]

And seeing that no temper of arms is of proof to secure us:—

"Ille licet ferro cautus, se condat et aere,

Mors tamen inclusum protrahet inde caput"

["Let him hide beneath iron or brass in his fear, death will pull

his head out of his armour."—Propertious iii. 18]

—let us learn bravely to stand our ground, and fight him. And to begin to deprive him of the greatest advantage he has over us, let us take a way quite contrary to the common course. Let us disarm him of his novelty and strangeness, let us converse and be familiar with him, and have nothing so frequent in our thoughts as death. Upon all occasions represent him to our imagination in his every shape; at the stumbling of a horse, at the falling of a tile, at the least prick with a pin, let us presently consider, and say to ourselves, "Well, and what if it had been death itself?" and, thereupon, let us encourage and fortify ourselves. Let us evermore, amidst our jollity and feasting, set the remembrance of our frail condition before our eyes, never suffering ourselves to be so far transported with our delights, but that we have some intervals of reflecting upon, and considering how many several ways this jollity of ours tends to death, and with how many dangers it threatens it. The Egyptians were wont to do after this manner, who in the height of their feasting and mirth, caused a dried skeleton of a man to be brought into the room to serve for a memento to their guests:

"Omnem crede diem tibi diluxisse supremum

Grata superveniet, quae non sperabitur, hora."

["Think each day when past is thy last; the next day, as unexpected,

will be the more welcome."—Hor., Ep., i. 4, 13.]