"Vah! quemquamne hominem in animum instituere, aut
Parare, quod sit carius, quam ipse est sibi?"
["Ah! can any man conceive in his mind or realise what is dearer
than he is to himself?"—Terence, Adelph., i. I, 13.]
Solitude seems to me to wear the best favour in such as have already employed their most active and flourishing age in the world's service, after the example of Thales. We have lived enough for others; let us at least live out the small remnant of life for ourselves; let us now call in our thoughts and intentions to ourselves, and to our own ease and repose. 'Tis no light thing to make a sure retreat; it will be enough for us to do without mixing other enterprises. Since God gives us leisure to order our removal, let us make ready, truss our baggage, take leave betimes of the company, and disentangle ourselves from those violent importunities that engage us elsewhere and separate us from ourselves.
We must break the knot of our obligations, how strong soever, and hereafter love this or that, but espouse nothing but ourselves: that is to say, let the remainder be our own, but not so joined and so close as not to be forced away without flaying us or tearing out part of our whole. The greatest thing in the world is for a man to know that he is his own. 'Tis time to wean ourselves from society when we can no longer add anything to it; he who is not in a condition to lend must forbid himself to borrow. Our forces begin to fail us; let us call them in and concentrate them in and for ourselves. He that can cast off within himself and resolve the offices of friendship and company, let him do it. In this decay of nature which renders him useless, burdensome, and importunate to others, let him take care not to be useless, burdensome, and importunate to himself. Let him soothe and caress himself, and above all things be sure to govern himself with reverence to his reason and conscience to that degree as to be ashamed to make a false step in their presence:
"Rarum est enim, ut satis se quisque vereatur."
["For 'tis rarely seen that men have respect and reverence enough for themselves."—Quintilian, x. 7.]
Socrates says that boys are to cause themselves to be instructed, men to exercise themselves in well-doing, and old men to retire from all civil and military employments, living at their own discretion, without the obligation to any office. There are some complexions more proper for these precepts of retirement than others. Such as are of a soft and dull apprehension, and of a tender will and affection, not readily to be subdued or employed, whereof I am one, both by natural condition and by reflection, will sooner incline to this advice than active and busy souls, which embrace: all, engage in all, are hot upon everything, which offer, present, and give themselves up to every occasion. We are to use these accidental and extraneous commodities, so far as they are pleasant to us, but by no means to lay our principal foundation there; 'tis no true one; neither nature nor reason allows it so to be. Why therefore should we, contrary to their laws, enslave our own contentment to the power of another? To anticipate also the accidents of fortune, to deprive ourselves of the conveniences we have in our own power, as several have done upon the account of devotion, and some philosophers by reasoning; to be one's own servant, to lie hard, to put out our own eyes, to throw our wealth into the river, to go in search of grief; these, by the misery of this life, aiming at bliss in another; those by laying themselves low to avoid the danger of falling: all such are acts of an excessive virtue. The stoutest and most resolute natures render even their seclusion glorious and exemplary:
"Tuta et parvula laudo,
Quum res deficiunt, satis inter vilia fortis
Verum, ubi quid melius contingit et unctius, idem
Hos sapere et solos aio bene vivere, quorum
Conspicitur nitidis fundata pecunia villis."
["When means are deficient, I laud a safe and humble condition,
content with little: but when things grow better and more easy, I
all the same say that you alone are wise and live well, whose
invested money is visible in beautiful villas."
—Horace, Ep., i. 15, 42.]
A great deal less would serve my turn well enough. 'Tis enough for me, under fortune's favour, to prepare myself for her disgrace, and, being at my ease, to represent to myself, as far as my imagination can stretch, the ill to come; as we do at jousts and tiltings, where we counterfeit war in the greatest calm of peace. I do not think Arcesilaus the philosopher the less temperate and virtuous for knowing that he made use of gold and silver vessels, when the condition of his fortune allowed him so to do; I have indeed a better opinion of him than if he had denied himself what he used with liberality and moderation. I see the utmost limits of natural necessity: and considering a poor man begging at my door, ofttimes more jocund and more healthy than I myself am, I put myself into his place, and attempt to dress my mind after his mode; and running, in like manner, over other examples, though I fancy death, poverty, contempt, and sickness treading on my heels, I easily resolve not to be affrighted, forasmuch as a less than I takes them with so much patience; and am not willing to believe that a less understanding can do more than a greater, or that the effects of precept cannot arrive to as great a height as those of custom. And knowing of how uncertain duration these accidental conveniences are, I never forget, in the height of all my enjoyments, to make it my chiefest prayer to Almighty God, that He will please to render me content with myself and the condition wherein I am. I see young men very gay and frolic, who nevertheless keep a mass of pills in their trunk at home, to take when they've got a cold, which they fear so much the less, because they think they have remedy at hand. Every one should do in like manner, and, moreover, if they find themselves subject to some more violent disease, should furnish themselves with such medicines as may numb and stupefy the part.
The employment a man should choose for such a life ought neither to be a laborious nor an unpleasing one; otherwise 'tis to no purpose at all to be retired. And this depends upon every one's liking and humour. Mine has no manner of complacency for husbandry, and such as love it ought to apply themselves to it with moderation:
["Endeavour to make circumstances subject to me, and not me subject to circumstances." —Horace, Ep., i. i, 19.]
Husbandry is otherwise a very servile employment, as Sallust calls it; though some parts of it are more excusable than the rest, as the care of gardens, which Xenophon attributes to Cyrus; and a mean may be found out betwixt the sordid and low application, so full of perpetual solicitude, which is seen in men who make it their entire business and study, and the stupid and extreme negligence, letting all things go at random which we see in others
"Democriti pecus edit agellos
Cultaque, dum peregre est animus sine corpore velox."
["Democritus' cattle eat his corn and spoil his fields, whilst his
soaring mind ranges abroad without the body."
—Horace, Ep., i, 12, 12.]
But let us hear what advice the younger Pliny gives his friend Caninius Rufus upon the subject of solitude: "I advise thee, in the full and plentiful retirement wherein thou art, to leave to thy hinds the care of thy husbandry, and to addict thyself to the study of letters, to extract from thence something that may be entirely and absolutely thine own." By which he means reputation; like Cicero, who says that he would employ his solitude and retirement from public affairs to acquire by his writings an immortal life.
"Usque adeone
Scire tuum, nihil est, nisi to scire hoc, sciat alter?"
["Is all that thy learning nothing, unless another knows
that thou knowest?"—Persius, Sat., i. 23.]
It appears to be reason, when a man talks of retiring from the world, that he should look quite out of [for] himself. These do it but by halves: they design well enough for themselves when they shall be no more in it; but still they pretend to extract the fruits of that design from the world, when absent from it, by a ridiculous contradiction.
The imagination of those who seek solitude upon the account of devotion, filling their hopes and courage with certainty of divine promises in the other life, is much more rationally founded. They propose to themselves God, an infinite object in goodness and power; the soul has there wherewithal, at full liberty, to satiate her desires: afflictions and sufferings turn to their advantage, being undergone for the acquisition of eternal health and joy; death is to be wished and longed for, where it is the passage to so perfect a condition; the asperity of the rules they impose upon themselves is immediately softened by custom, and all their carnal appetites baffled and subdued, by refusing to humour and feed them, these being only supported by use and exercise. This sole end of another happily immortal life is that which really merits that we should abandon the pleasures and conveniences of this; and he who can really and constantly inflame his soul with the ardour of this vivid faith and hope, erects for himself in solitude a more voluptuous and delicious life than any other sort of existence.
Neither the end, then, nor the means of this advice pleases me, for we often fall out of the frying-pan into the fire.—[or: we always relapse ill from fever into fever.]—This book-employment is as painful as any other, and as great an enemy to health, which ought to be the first thing considered; neither ought a man to be allured with the pleasure of it, which is the same that destroys the frugal, the avaricious, the voluptuous, and the ambitious man.
["This plodding occupation of bookes is as painfull as any other, and as great an enemie vnto health, which ought principally to be considered. And a man should not suffer him selfe to be inveagled by the pleasure he takes in them."—Florio, edit. 1613, p. 122.]
The sages give us caution enough to beware the treachery of our desires, and to distinguish true and entire pleasures from such as are mixed and complicated with greater pain. For the most of our pleasures, say they, wheedle and caress only to strangle us, like those thieves the Egyptians called Philistae; if the headache should come before drunkenness, we should have a care of drinking too much; but pleasure, to deceive us, marches before and conceals her train. Books are pleasant, but if, by being over-studious, we impair our health and spoil our goodhumour, the best pieces we have, let us give it over; I, for my part, am one of those who think, that no fruit derived from them can recompense so great a loss. As men who have long felt themselves weakened by indisposition, give themselves up at last to the mercy of medicine and submit to certain rules of living, which they are for the future never to transgress; so he who retires, weary of and disgusted with the common way of living, ought to model this new one he enters into by the rules of reason, and to institute and establish it by premeditation and reflection. He ought to have taken leave of all sorts of labour, what advantage soever it may promise, and generally to have shaken off all those passions which disturb the tranquillity of body and soul, and then choose the way that best suits with his own humour:
"Unusquisque sua noverit ire via."
In husbandry, study, hunting, and all other exercises, men are to proceed to the utmost limits of pleasure, but must take heed of engaging further, where trouble begins to mix with it. We are to reserve so much employment only as is necessary to keep us in breath and to defend us from the inconveniences that the other extreme of a dull and stupid laziness brings along with it. There are sterile knotty sciences, chiefly hammered out for the crowd; let such be left to them who are engaged in the world's service. I for my part care for no other books, but either such as are pleasant and easy, to amuse me, or those that comfort and instruct me how to regulate my life and death:
"Tacitum sylvas inter reptare salubres,
Curantem, quidquid dignum sapienti bonoque est."
["Silently meditating in the healthy groves, whatever is worthy
of a wise and good man."—Horace, Ep., i. 4, 4.]
Wiser men, having great force and vigour of soul, may propose to themselves a rest wholly spiritual but for me, who have a very ordinary soul, it is very necessary to support myself with bodily conveniences; and age having of late deprived me of those pleasures that were more acceptable to me, I instruct and whet my appetite to those that remain, more suitable to this other reason. We ought to hold with all our force, both of hands and teeth, the use of the pleasures of life that our years, one after another, snatch away from us:
"Carpamus dulcia; nostrum est,
Quod vivis; cinis, et manes, et fabula fies."
["Let us pluck life's sweets, 'tis for them we live: by and by we
shall be ashes, a ghost, a mere subject of talk."
—Persius, Sat., v. 151.]
Now, as to the end that Pliny and Cicero propose to us of glory, 'tis infinitely wide of my account. Ambition is of all others the most contrary humour to solitude; glory and repose are things that cannot possibly inhabit in one and the same place. For so much as I understand, these have only their arms and legs disengaged from the crowd; their soul and intention remain confined behind more than ever:
"Tun', vetule, auriculis alienis colligis escas?"
["Dost thou, then, old man, collect food for others' ears?"
—Persius, Sat., i. 22.]
they have only retired to take a better leap, and by a stronger motion to give a brisker charge into the crowd. Will you see how they shoot short? Let us put into the counterpoise the advice of two philosophers, of two very different sects, writing, the one to Idomeneus, the other to Lucilius, their friends, to retire into solitude from worldly honours and affairs. "You have," say they, "hitherto lived swimming and floating; come now and die in the harbour: you have given the first part of your life to the light, give what remains to the shade. It is impossible to give over business, if you do not also quit the fruit; therefore disengage yourselves from all concern of name and glory; 'tis to be feared the lustre of your former actions will give you but too much light, and follow you into your most private retreat. Quit with other pleasures that which proceeds from the approbation of another man: and as to your knowledge and parts, never concern yourselves; they will not lose their effect if yourselves be the better for them. Remember him, who being asked why he took so much pains in an art that could come to the knowledge of but few persons? 'A few are enough for me,' replied he; 'I have enough with one; I have enough with never an one.'—[Seneca, Ep., 7.]—He said true; you and a companion are theatre enough to one another, or you to yourself. Let the people be to you one, and be you one to the whole people. 'Tis an unworthy ambition to think to derive glory from a man's sloth and privacy: you are to do like the beasts of chase, who efface the track at the entrance into their den. You are no more to concern yourself how the world talks of you, but how you are to talk to yourself. Retire yourself into yourself, but first prepare yourself there to receive yourself: it were a folly to trust yourself in your own hands, if you cannot govern yourself. A man may miscarry alone as well as in company. Till you have rendered yourself one before whom you dare not trip, and till you have a bashfulness and respect for yourself,
"Obversentur species honestae animo;"
["Let honest things be ever present to the mind"
—Cicero, Tusc. Quaes., ii. 22.]
present continually to your imagination Cato, Phocion, and Aristides, in whose presence the fools themselves will hide their faults, and make them controllers of all your intentions; should these deviate from virtue, your respect to those will set you right; they will keep you in this way to be contented with yourself; to borrow nothing of any other but yourself; to stay and fix your soul in certain and limited thoughts, wherein she may please herself, and having understood the true and real goods, which men the more enjoy the more they understand, to rest satisfied, without desire of prolongation of life or name." This is the precept of the true and natural philosophy, not of a boasting and prating philosophy, such as that of the two former.
ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
A man must either imitate the vicious or hate them
Abhorrence of the patient are necessary circumstances
Acquire by his writings an immortal life
Addict thyself to the study of letters
Always the perfect religion
And hate him so as you were one day to love him
Archer that shoots over, misses as much as he that falls short
Art that could come to the knowledge of but few persons
Being over-studious, we impair our health and spoil our humour
By the misery of this life, aiming at bliss in another
Carnal appetites only supported by use and exercise
Coming out of the same hole
Common friendships will admit of division
Dost thou, then, old man, collect food for others' ears?
Either tranquil life, or happy death
Enslave our own contentment to the power of another?
Entertain us with fables: astrologers and physicians
Everything has many faces and several aspects
Extremity of philosophy is hurtful
Friendships that the law and natural obligation impose upon us
Gewgaw to hang in a cabinet or at the end of the tongue
Gratify the gods and nature by massacre and murder
He took himself along with him
He will choose to be alone
Headache should come before drunkenness
High time to die when there is more ill than good in living
Honour of valour consists in fighting, not in subduing
How uncertain duration these accidental conveniences are
I bequeath to Areteus the maintenance of my mother
I for my part always went the plain way to work.
I love temperate and moderate natures.
Impostures: very strangeness lends them credit
In solitude, be company for thyself.—Tibullus
In the meantime, their halves were begging at their doors
Interdict all gifts betwixt man and wife
It is better to die than to live miserable
Judge by the eye of reason, and not from common report
Knot is not so sure that a man may not half suspect it will slip
Lascivious poet: Homer
Laying themselves low to avoid the danger of falling
Leave society when we can no longer add anything to it
Little less trouble in governing a private family than a kingdom
Love we bear to our wives is very lawful
Man (must) know that he is his own
Marriage
Men should furnish themselves with such things as would float
Methinks I am no more than half of myself
Must for the most part entertain ourselves with ourselves
Never represent things to you simply as they are
No effect of virtue, to have stronger arms and legs
Not in a condition to lend must forbid himself to borrow
Nothing is so firmly believed, as what we least know
O my friends, there is no friend: Aristotle
Oftentimes agitated with divers passions
Ordinary friendships, you are to walk with bridle in your hand
Ought not only to have his hands, but his eyes, too, chaste
Our judgments are yet sick
Perfect friendship I speak of is indivisible
Philosophy
Phusicians cure by by misery and pain
Prefer in bed, beauty before goodness
Pretending to find out the cause of every accident
Reputation: most useless, frivolous, and false coin that passes
Reserve a backshop, wholly our own and entirely free
Rest satisfied, without desire of prolongation of life or name
Stilpo lost wife, children, and goods
Stilpo: thank God, nothing was lost of his
Take two sorts of grist out of the same sack
Taking things upon trust from vulgar opinion
Tearing a body limb from limb by racks and torments
The consequence of common examples
There are defeats more triumphant than victories
They can neither lend nor give anything to one another
They have yet touched nothing of that which is mine
They must be very hard to please, if they are not contented
Things that engage us elsewhere and separate us from ourselves
This decay of nature which renders him useless, burdensome
This plodding occupation of bookes is as painfull as any other
Those immodest and debauched tricks and postures
Though I be engaged to one forme, I do not tie the world unto it
Title of barbarism to everything that is not familiar
To give a currency to his little pittance of learning
To make their private advantage at the public expense
Under fortune's favour, to prepare myself for her disgrace
Vice of confining their belief to their own capacity
We have lived enough for others
We have more curiosity than capacity
We still carry our fetters along with us
When time begins to wear things out of memory
Wherever the mind is perplexed, it is in an entire disorder
Who can flee from himself
Wise man never loses anything if he have himself
Wise whose invested money is visible in beautiful villas
Write what he knows, and as much as he knows, but no more
You and companion are theatre enough to one another