The Complete Essays by Michel de Montaigne Read Free Book Online Page B

nature.
     
    Plutarch could reach that pious height: a Roman Stoic could also assert that if a man is to aspire towards God he must ‘rise above himself’. So far so good.
    We are doubtless stirred by such eloquent aspirations. But the final words of the chapter tip over the house of cards. If any human being is to rise up towards that Eternal Being glimpsed by Plutarch, it will not be through Greek philosophy or proud Stoic Virtue: it will be ‘by grace’ or, more widely, ‘by purely heavenly means’. That will be an event ‘extraordinary’ – outside the natural
order
of the universe. In the process, the individual human being will not raise himself but
be
raised to a higher form. He will (in the last word of the chapter) be ‘metamorphosed’: transformed and transfigured. 30
    That leaves Montaigne free as always to continue to explore his ‘master-mould’; to examine his relative ‘being’ – his body-and-soul conjoined.
    Nowhere else in the
Essays
does Pyrrhonian scepticism make the running – it does not make all of it even in the ‘Apology’. But to the solidbastion of his faith Montaigne added a shield of last resort, ever ready in reserve to use against those who sought to oppose his Church’s infallibility by a rival one. As Edward Stillingfleet, Dean of St Paul’s, perceived in the following century, Pyrrhonism comes into play only when men are not content to ‘take in the assistance of Reason, which, though not Infallible, might give such Evidence, as afforded Certainty, where it fell short of Demonstration’. But as soon as ‘Epicurus thought there could be no Certainty in Sense, unless it were made Infallible’, he could only defend his hypothesis with absurdity: ‘the Sun must be no bigger than a bonfire’. 31
    Of course Pyrrhonian scepticism shocked many. It always does. But when Montaigne’s
Essays
were examined by a courteous censor in Rome, such little fuss there was at the time came from factions among the French. The Maestro del Sacro Palazzo, Sisto Fabri, told him to take no notice and do what he thought fit. 32
    In the following century Montaigne’s respect for the beasts and his distrust of unaided human reason brought him many enemies among dogmatic philosophers and theologians; they brought him many friends as well, ranging from Francis Bacon to Daniel Huët, Bishop of Avranches. In his
Philosophical Treatise on the Weakness of the Human Spirit
(1723) Huët reminded his readers that when Pyrrhonism was rejected in Ancient times, it was nothing to do with Christians fearful for the Faith but of pagans fearful for their Science. What is dangerous to Christianity, he added, is not Pyrrhonism but Pride. 33

    But Montaigne had done his job well – well enough for many free-thinkers including those of the Enlightenment to see him as a forerunner of their sceptical Deism or atheistic naturalism. This was in part inevitable: truth is one and unchanging while men are ever-changing. Truth cannot be set finally in words. It was a sound theologian, Bishop Wescott, who said, ‘No formula which expresses clearly the thought of one generation can convey the same meaning to the generation which follows.’ In a different climate of opinion, Montaigne’s protestations of loyalty to his Church inseveral of his chapters were taken to be moonshine. Allusions to ‘Christian folly’ were interpreted as smirking and knowing ackowledgements that Christianity was silly or stupid, fit for fools. Read in this way, selectively, the
Essays
could, did and do provide weapons and delight to a variety of readers. This became more easily possible after Hellenistic philosophy lost its hold on many in the eighteenth century. Hellenistic Christianity (like Hellenistic Philosophy) accepts that the true nature of things lies behind their visible appearances, and beyond time and space. It holds with Plotinus that nothing that is can ever perish. 34 Such a conviction dominated the thought of Renaissance