The Essays of Michael de Montaigne Author:Michel de Montaigne Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IV. How the Soul discharges its Passions upon false Objects, .when the true are wanting. A. GENTLEMAN of my country, who was frequent- ly tormente... more »d with the gout, being often importuned by his physicians to abstain from salt meats, used to re- ply merrily, That there was a necessity for his having The ioni something to quarrel with in the extremity of his™oh-e pain, and that he fancied, that sometimes railing at, jufprit$ and cursing the Bologna sausages, at other times "ether"' the dried tongues, and the gammon, was some mi-true or tigation of it. And in truth, as we are chagrined if a l the arm which is advanced to strike misses the mark, and spends itself in vain ; and as also, that to make a prospect pleasant, the sight should not be lost and dilated in the aether, but have some bounds to limit it at a reasonable distance; Ventus ut amittit vires, nisi robore densae Occurrant sijlvce, spatio dijfusus inani. As winds exhaust their strength, unless withstood By some thick grove of strong opposing wood. In like manner it appears, that the soul, being agi- tated and discomposed, is lost in itself, if it has not something to encounter with, and therefore always requires an object to aim at, and keep it employed. Plutarch says very well of those who are fond of lap- dogs and monkeys, that the amorous part which is in u, for want of a right object, rather than lie idle, does, in a manner, forge in the fancy one that is false and frivolous. And we see that the soul, in the exercise of its passions, rather deceives itself by creating a false and fantastical subject, even contrary to its own belief, than not to have something to work upon. After this manner brute beasts spend: Lucan, lib, iii. ver. 362, 363.. their fury upon the stone or weapon that ha...« less