Page:Essays Vol 1 (Ives, 1925).pdf/274

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
254
ESSAYS OF MONTAIGNE

“as if you might some day come to hate him; hate him as if you might some day come to love him.”[1] This precept, which is abominable in this sovereign and commanding friendship, is sound in the practice of ordinary, (c) commonplace friendships, to which we should apply the frequent saying of Aristotle: “O my friends, there is no friend.”[2]

(a) In this noble intercourse, the services and benefactions that keep alive other friendships do not deserve to be taken at all into account, being occasioned by the complete blinding of our wills; for, just as the friendship that I have for myself is not augmented by the aid that I give myself at need, — whatever the Stoics may say, — and as I am no wise grateful to myself for the service that I render to myself; so, the union of two such friends being truly perfect, it causes them to lose the sense of such duties, and to detest and banish as between themselves those words implying separation and difference — benefit, obligation, gratitude, entreaty, thanks, and their like. Every thing being in fact common as between them, — wills, thoughts, judgements, property, wives, children, honour, and life, — (c) and their accord being that of one soul in two bodies, according to the very apt definition of Aristotle,[3] — (a) they can not lend or give any thing to each other. That is why the lawmakers, in order to ennoble marriage by some fanciful resemblance to this divine union, forbid gifts between husband and wife, meaning by that to imply that every thing should belong to each of them, and that they have nothing to divide and part between them. If, in the sort of friendship of which I am speaking, one could give to the other, he who should receive the gift would be the one who conferred an obligation on his friend: for each seeking above all other things to confer a benefit on the other, he who affords the subject and the opportunity is the one who plays the liberal part,[4] giving his

  1. ↑ See Aulus Gellius, I, 3. This saying is attributed to Bias by Diogenes Laertius in his life of that philosopher; also by Aristotle, Rhetoric, II, 13, and by Cicero, De Amicitia, XVI.
  2. ↑ See Diogenes Laertius, Life of Aristotle.
  3. ↑ See Ibid.
  4. ↑ Qui faict le liberal. In the early editions the reading was, Qui faict l'honneste et le courtois.
This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.