How To Live Or A Life Of Montaigne Part 4

It was the commentaries Montaigne hated most, as he did secondary literature of any kind: It is more of a job to interpret the interpretations than to interpret the things, and there are more books about books than about any other subject: we do nothing but write glosses about each other.

Rabelais had satirized the mountain of doc.u.ments that piled up around every case: his character Judge Bridlegoose spent hours reading and pondering before making his final decisions by tossing dice, a method he found as reliable as any other. Many authors also attacked the widespread corruption among lawyers. In general, justice was recognized as being so unjust that, as Montaigne complained, ordinary people avoided it rather than seeking it out. He cited a local incident in which a group of peasants found a man lying stabbed and bleeding on a path. He begged them to give him water and help him to his feet, but they ran off, not daring to touch him in case they were held responsible for the attack. Montaigne had the job of talking to them after they were tracked down. "What could I say to them?" he wrote. They were right to be afraid. In another case he mentions, a gang of killers confessed to a murder for which someone had already been tried and was about to be executed. Surely this ought to mean a stay of execution? No, decided the court: that would set a dangerous precedent for overturning judgments.

Montaigne was not the only one to call for legal reform in the sixteenth century. Many of his criticisms echoed those being put forward at the same time by France's enlightened chancellor, Michel de L'Hopital, in a campaign which resulted in real improvements. Some of Montaigne's other arguments were more original and far-reaching. For him, the greatest problem with the law was that it did not take account of a fundamental fact about the human condition: people are fallible. A final verdict was always expected, yet by definition it was often impossible to reach one that had any certainty. Evidence was often faulty or inadequate, and, to complicate matters, judges made personal mistakes. No judge could honestly think all his decisions perfect: they followed inclinations more than evidence, and it often made a difference how well they had digested their lunch. This was natural and thus unavoidable, but at least a wise judge could become conscious of his fallibility and take it into account. He could learn to slow down: to treat his initial responses with caution and think things through more carefully. The one good thing about the law was that it made human failings so obvious: a good philosophical lesson.

If lawyers were error-p.r.o.ne, so too were the laws they made, since they were human products. Again, that was a fact that could only be acknowledged and accommodated rather than changed. This sideways step into self-doubt, self-awareness, and acknowledgement of imperfection became a distinctive mark of Montaigne's thought on all subjects, not just the law. It does not seem a great stretch to trace its initial spark to those early years of experience in Bordeaux.

When not in court, Montaigne's job involved another field of activity calculated to bring home to anyone how limited and unreliable human affairs are: politics. He was often sent on errands to other cities, including several to Paris, a week or so's journey away, where he had to liaise with the Paris parlement parlement and sometimes with the royal court. The latter, in particular, was an education in human nature. and sometimes with the royal court. The latter, in particular, was an education in human nature.

The first court Montaigne got to know was that of Henri II. He must have met the king in person, for he complained that Henri "could never call by his right name a gentleman from this part of Gascony"-presumably himself, this being a time when he still went under the regional name of Eyquem. Henri II was nothing like his brilliant father Francois I, from whom he had inherited the throne in 1547. He lacked Francois's political insight and relied heavily on advisers, including an aging mistress, Diane de Poitiers, and a powerful wife, Catherine de' Medici. Henri II's weakness was partly to blame for France's later problems, as rival factions sensed an opportunity and began a power struggle that would dominate the country for decades. The compet.i.tion centered on three families: the Guises, the Montmorencys, and the Bourbons. Their private ambitions mixed poisonously with religious tensions already building up in France, as in much of Europe.

In matters of religion, Henri II was more repressive than Francois, who had cracked down on heresy only after an aggressive Protestant propaganda campaign in 1534. The French Reformist leader John Calvin fled to Geneva and made it a sort of revolutionary headquarters in exile. It was Calvinism, rather than the milder-mannered Lutheranism of the early Reformation, that now became the main form of Protestantism in France. It represented a real threat to royal and Church authority.

Calvinism is a minority religion today, but its ideology remains impressively powerful. It takes as its starting point a principle known as "total depravity," which a.s.serts that humans have no virtues of their own and are dependent on G.o.d's grace for everything, including their salvation and even the decision to convert to Calvinism. Little personal responsibility is required, for everything is preordained, and no compromise is possible. The only possible att.i.tude to such a G.o.d is one of perfect submission. In exchange, G.o.d grants His followers invincible strength: you give up your personal will, but receive the entire weight of G.o.d's universe behind you. This does not mean that you can sit back and do nothing. While Lutherans tend to stay aloof from worldly affairs, living according to their private conscience, Calvinists are supposed to engage with politics, and work to bring about G.o.d's will on earth. In the sixteenth century, accordingly, Calvinists were trained in Switzerland in a special academy, and sent to France armed with arguments and forbidden publications to convert the natives and destabilize the state. At some point in the 1550s, the name "Huguenot" became attached to Calvin's followers both inside and outside the country. The word probably derived from an earlier branch of exiled Reformists, the "Eidgenossen" or "confederates." It stuck: French Protestants used it of themselves, and their enemies used it of them too.

In the early days, the Catholic Church had responded to the Protestant threat by trying to reform itself. Montaigne thus grew up within a church committed to soul-searching and self-questioning, activities religious inst.i.tutions do not often embrace with much fervor. But while this was going on, more militant forces gained strength. The Jesuit order, founded by Ignacio Lopez de Loyola in 1534, set itself to fighting a battle of ideas against the enemy. A fiercer, less intellectual movement, arising in France from the 1550s, was loosely grouped under the name of the "Leagues." Their aim was not to outwit the heretics by fancy argument but to wipe them from the face of the earth by force. They and their Calvinist counterparts faced each other without a shred of compromise in their hearts, as fanatical mirror images. Leaguists opposed any French king who made feeble attempts at tolerance of Protestantism; this opposition became stronger as the decades went on.

Henri II was easily swayed by Leaguist pressure, so he introduced tough heresy laws and even a new chamber of the Paris parlement parlement devoted to trying religious crimes. From July 1557, blasphemy against the saints, the publication of banned books, and illegal preaching were all punishable by death. Between such moves, however, Henri reversed gear and tried to soothe Huguenot sensibilities by allowing limited Protestant wors.h.i.+p in certain areas, or reducing the heresy penalties again. Each time he did this, the Catholic lobby protested, so he accelerated forward into repression. He moved back and forth, satisfying no one. devoted to trying religious crimes. From July 1557, blasphemy against the saints, the publication of banned books, and illegal preaching were all punishable by death. Between such moves, however, Henri reversed gear and tried to soothe Huguenot sensibilities by allowing limited Protestant wors.h.i.+p in certain areas, or reducing the heresy penalties again. Each time he did this, the Catholic lobby protested, so he accelerated forward into repression. He moved back and forth, satisfying no one.

During these years, other problems troubled France, including runaway inflation, which injured the poor more than anyone and benefited the landed gentry, who received higher rents and responded by buying more and more property-as happened with several generations of Montaigne's family. For less fortunate cla.s.ses, the economic crisis fed extremism. Humanity had brought this misery on the world with its sins, so it must appease G.o.d by following the one true Church. But which was the true Church?

It was from this religious, economic, and political anguish that the civil wars would arise-wars which dominated France through most of the rest of the century, from 1562, when Montaigne was twenty-nine, to 1598, well after his death. Before the 1560s, military adventures in Italy and elsewhere had provided an outlet for France's tensions. But in April 1559 the treaty of Cateau Cambresis ended several of the foreign wars at a blow. By removing distractions and filling the country with unemployed ex-soldiers amid an economic depression, this peace almost immediately brought about the outbreak of a much worse war.

The first bad omen occurred during jousting tournaments held to celebrate two dynastic marriages linked to the peace treaty. The king, who loved tournaments, took a leading role. In one encounter, an opponent accidentally knocked his visor off with the remains of a broken lance. Splinters of wood pierced the king's face just above one eye. He was carried away; after several days in bed, he seemed to recover, but a splinter had entered his brain. He developed a fever on the fourth day, and on July 10, 1559, he died.

Protestants interpreted the death as G.o.d's way of saying that Henri II had been wrong to repress their religion. But Henri's death would make things worse for them rather than better. The throne now pa.s.sed successively to three of his sons: Francois II, Charles IX, and Henri III. The first two were minors, succeeding at fifteen and ten years old, respectively. All were weak, all were dominated by their mother Catherine de' Medici, and all were inept at handling the religious conflict. Francois II died of tuberculosis almost immediately, in 1560. Charles took over, and would reign until 1574. During the early years, his mother ruled as regent. She tried to achieve a balance between religious and political factions, but had little success.

The situation at the beginning of the 1560s, the decade during which Montaigne developed his career in Bordeaux, was thus marked by a weak throne, greedy rivalries, economic hards.h.i.+p, and rising religious tensions. In December 1560, in a speech expressing a feeling widespread at the time, the chancellor Michel de L'Hopital said, "It is folly to hope for peace, repose, and friends.h.i.+p among people of different faiths." Even if desirable, it would be an impossible ideal. The only path to political unity was religious unity. As a Spanish theologian remarked, no republic could be well governed if "everyone considers his own G.o.d to be the only true G.o.d...and everyone else to be blind and deluded." Most Catholics would have considered this too self-evident to be worth mentioning. Even Protestants tended to impose unity whenever they got their own state to manage. Un roi, une foi, une loi Un roi, une foi, une loi, went the saying: one king, one faith, one law. Hatred of anyone who ventured to suggest a middle ground was practically the only thing on which everyone else could agree.

L'Hopital and his allies did not promote tolerance or "diversity," in any modern sense. But he did think it better to lure stray sheep back by making the Catholic Church more appealing, rather than driving them back with threats. Under his influence, the heresy laws were relaxed somewhat at the beginning of the 1560s. An edict of January 1562 allowed Protestants to wors.h.i.+p openly outside towns, and privately within town walls. As with earlier compromises, this satisfied no one. Catholics felt betrayed, while Protestants were encouraged to feel they should demand more. Some months earlier, the Venetian amba.s.sador had written of a "great fear" spreading through the kingdom; this had now grown into a sense of imminent disaster.

The trigger came on March 1, 1562, at the town of Va.s.sy, or Wa.s.sy, in the Champagne area of the northeast. Five hundred Protestants gathered to wors.h.i.+p in a barn in the town, which was illegal, for such a.s.semblies were allowed only outside the walls. The duc de Guise, a radical Catholic leader, was pa.s.sing through the area with a group of his soldiers and heard about the meeting. He marched to the barn. According to survivors' accounts, he allowed his men to storm in shouting, "Kill them all!"

The Huguenot congregation fought back; they had long expected trouble and were ready to defend themselves. They forced the soldiers out and barricaded the barn door, then climbed out on scaffolding over the roof to pelt Guise's men with stones, piled there in case of need. The soldiers fired their arquebuses, and managed to reenter the barn. The Protestants now fled for their lives; many fell from the roof or were shot down as they ran. About thirty died, and over a hundred were wounded.

The consequences were dramatic. The national Protestant leader, Louis I de Bourbon, prince de Conde, urged Protestants to rise up to save themselves from further attacks. Many took up arms and, in response, Catholics did the same-both sides being driven more by fear than hatred. Catherine de' Medici, acting on behalf of the twelve-year-old Charles IX, ordered an inquiry into Va.s.sy, but it fizzled out as public inquiries do, and by now it was too late. Leaders of both sides converged on Paris with crowds of their supporters. As the duc de Guise entered the city, he happened to pa.s.s a Protestant procession led by Conde; the two men exchanged cold salutes with the pommels of their swords.

One observer, a lawyer and friend of Montaigne's named etienne Pasquier, remarked in a letter that all anyone could talk about after the Va.s.sy ma.s.sacre was war. "If it was permitted to me to a.s.sess these events, I would tell you that it was the beginning of a tragedy." He was right. Increasing clashes between the two sides escalated into outright battles, and these became the first of the French civil wars. It was savage but short, ending the following year when the duc de Guise was shot, leaving the Catholics temporarily without a leader and reluctantly willing to conclude a treaty. But there was no feeling of resolution, and neither side was happy. A second war would be set off on September 30, 1567, by another ma.s.sacre, this time of Catholics by Protestants, at Nimes.

The wars are generally described in the plural, but it makes at least as much sense to consider them a single long war with interludes of peace. Montaigne and his contemporaries often referred to outbreaks of fighting as "troubles." The consensus is that there were eight of these, and it may be convenient to summarize them here to get a sense of how much of Montaigne's life was conditioned by war: First Trouble (156263). Started by the ma.s.sacre of Protestants inVa.s.sy, ended by the peace of Amboise.Second Trouble (156768). Started by a ma.s.sacre of Catholics inNimes, ended by the Peace of Longjumeau.Third Trouble (156870). Started by new anti-Protestant legislation, ended by the peace of Saint-Germain.Fourth Trouble (157273). Started by the St. Bartholomew's Day ma.s.sacres of Protestants in Paris and elsewhere, ended by the Peaceof La Roch.e.l.le.Fifth Trouble (157476). Started by fighting in Poitou and Saintonge, ended by the "Peace of Monsieur."Sixth Trouble (157677). Started by anti-Protestant legislation at the Estates-General of Blois, ended by the Peace of Poitiers.Seventh Trouble (157980). Started by Protestants seizing La Fere in Normandy, ended by the Peace of Fleix.Eighth Trouble (158598). By far the longest and worst: started by Leaguist agitation, ended by the Treaty of Vervins and the Edict of Nantes.

Each followed the pattern established by the first and second wars. A period of peace would be interrupted by a sudden ma.s.sacre or provocation. Battles, sieges, and general misery would ensue, until signs of weakness on one side or another led to a peace treaty. This would leave everyone dissatisfied, but would stay roughly in place until another provocation-and so the pattern cycled on. Even the last treaty did not please everyone. Nor were there always two clearly defined opponents. At least three factions were involved in most of the troubles, driven by desire for influence over the throne. These were wars of religion, like those brewing in other European countries during this period, but they were just as much wars of politics.

The end of one foreign conflict had made the civil wars possible in the first place, and the beginning of another would ultimately bring them to a close, after Henri IV declared war on Spain in 1595. The beneficial effect of this act was well understood at the time. During the final "trouble," Montaigne observed that many wished for something like this. The violence needed draining out, like pus from an infection. He had mixed feelings about the ethics of the method: "I do not believe that G.o.d would favor so unjust an enterprise as to injure and pick a quarrel with others for our own convenience." But it was what France needed, and what it got at last, from Henri IV, the first clever king it had had for years.

That was still a long way off in the 1560s, when no one dreamed that the horror could go on so long. Montaigne's years in parlement parlement spanned the first three troubles; even during periods of peace, there was much political tension. By the time the third war ended, he had had enough and was on his way to retirement from public life. Until then, his position in Bordeaux placed him in the thick of it, amid a particularly complex community. Bordeaux was a Catholic city, but surrounded by Protestant territories and with a significant Protestant minority, which did not hesitate to indulge in icon-smas.h.i.+ng and other aggressive acts. spanned the first three troubles; even during periods of peace, there was much political tension. By the time the third war ended, he had had enough and was on his way to retirement from public life. Until then, his position in Bordeaux placed him in the thick of it, amid a particularly complex community. Bordeaux was a Catholic city, but surrounded by Protestant territories and with a significant Protestant minority, which did not hesitate to indulge in icon-smas.h.i.+ng and other aggressive acts.

In one especially violent confrontation, on the night of June 26, 1562-a few months after the Va.s.sy ma.s.sacre-a Protestant mob attacked the city's Chateau Trompette, bastion of government power. The riot was quelled, but, as with the salt-tax riots, the punishment proved worse than the crime. To teach a lesson to a city that seemed incapable of running its own affairs, the king sent in a new lieutenant-general named Blaise Monluc, and ordered him to "pacify" the troublesome area.

Monluc understood "pacification" to mean "ma.s.s slaughter." He set to work hanging Protestants in large numbers without trial, or having them broken on the wheel. After one battle at the village of Terraube, he ordered so many of its residents killed and thrown in the well that you could put your hand in from above and touch the top of the pile. Writing his memoirs years later, he reminisced about one rebel leader who begged him personally for mercy after Monluc's soldiers captured him. Monluc responded by grabbing the man's throat and throwing him against a stone cross so violently that the stone was smashed and the man died. "If I had not acted thus," wrote Monluc, "I would have been mocked." In another incident, a Protestant captain who had served under Monluc himself in Italy, many years earlier, hoped that his former comrade would spare his life for old times' sake. On the contrary, Monluc made a point of having him killed at once, and explained that he did this because he knew how brave the man was: he could never be anything other than a dangerous enemy. These were the kinds of scene that would recur frequently in Montaigne's essays: one person seeks mercy, and the other decides whether or not to grant it. Montaigne was fascinated by the moral complexity involved. What moral complexity? Monluc would have said. Killing was always the right solution: "One man hanged is more effective than a hundred killed in battle." Indeed, so many executions took place in the area that the supply of gallows equipment ran low: carpenters were commissioned to make more scaffolds, wheels for breaking limbs, and stakes for burning. When the scaffolds were full, Monluc used trees, and boasted that his travels through Guyenne could be traced in bodies swinging by the roadside. By the time he had finished, he said, nothing stirred in the whole region. All who survived kept their silence.

Montaigne knew Monluc, though mainly in later life, and took more interest in his private personality than his public deeds-especially his failings as a father and the regrets that tormented him after he lost a son, who died in his prime. Monluc confessed to Montaigne that he realized too late that he had never treated the boy with anything other than coldness, although in reality he loved him a great deal. This was partly because he had followed an unfortunate fas.h.i.+on in parenting, which advocated emotional frigidity in dealings with one's children. "That poor boy saw nothing of me but a scowling and disdainful countenance," Monluc would say. "I constrained and tortured myself to maintain this vain mask." The talk of masks is apt, since, in 1571-around the time of Montaigne's retirement-Monluc was disfigured by an arquebus shot. For the rest of his life, he never went out without covering his face to conceal the scars. One can imagine the disconcerting effect of an actual mask on top of the inexpressive mask-like face of a cruel man whom few people dared to look in the eye.

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(ill.u.s.tration credit i4.3)

Throughout the troubled 1560s, Montaigne often went to Paris on parlement parlement business, and apparently remained away through much of 1562 and early 1563, though he popped back to Bordeaux almost as readily as a modern car driver or train pa.s.senger might. He was certainly in the area in August 1563 when his friend etienne de La Boetie died. And he must have been in Bordeaux in December 1563, for a strange incident occurred then, the most noteworthy of Montaigne's few appearances in the city records. business, and apparently remained away through much of 1562 and early 1563, though he popped back to Bordeaux almost as readily as a modern car driver or train pa.s.senger might. He was certainly in the area in August 1563 when his friend etienne de La Boetie died. And he must have been in Bordeaux in December 1563, for a strange incident occurred then, the most noteworthy of Montaigne's few appearances in the city records.

The previous month, an extremist Catholic named Francois de Peruse d'Escars had launched a direct challenge to the parlement' parlement's moderate president, Jacques-Benoit de Lagebaton, marching into the chambers and accusing him of having no right to govern. Lagebaton successfully faced him down, but d'Escars challenged him again the following month, and in response Lagebaton produced a list of the court members he believed to be in cahoots with d'Escars, probably working for him for pay. Surprisingly, among these names appear those of Montaigne and of the recently deceased etienne de La Boetie. One would have expected to find both firmly on Lagebaton's side: La Boetie had been working actively for the chancellor L'Hopital, of whom Lagebaton was a follower, and Montaigne too expressed admiration for that faction in his Essays Essays. On the other hand, d'Escars was a family friend, and La Boetie had been at d'Escars's home when he came down with the illness which would kill him. This was suspicious, and perhaps Montaigne came under scrutiny by a.s.sociation.

All the accused had a right to defend themselves before parlement parlement-a chance for Montaigne to use his rhetorical skills again. Of them all, he was the speaker who made the biggest impression. "He expressed himself with all the vivacity of his character," reads the note in the records. He finished his speech by stating "that he named the whole Court," then he flounced off.

The court called him back and ordered him to explain what he meant by this. He replied that he was no enemy of Lagebaton, who was a friend of his and of everyone in his family. But-and there was clearly a "but" coming-he knew that accused persons were traditionally allowed to make counter-claims against their accuser, so he wished to take advantage of this right. Again, he left everyone puzzled, but the implication was that it was Lagebaton who was guilty of some impropriety. Montaigne made no further explanation. Pressed to withdraw the remark, he did, and there the matter ended. The accusations apparently came to nothing serious, and were quietly forgotten.

It remains an enigmatic incident, but it certainly shows us a different Montaigne from the cool, measured writer of the Essays Essays, or his own portrait of his youthful self a-slumber over his books. This is a man known for "vivacity" and given to rus.h.i.+ng in and out of rooms, making accusations which he cannot substantiate, and jabbering so wildly that no one is sure what he means to say. Montaigne does admit, in the Essays Essays, that "by my nature I am subject to sudden outbursts which, though slight and brief, often harm my affairs." The last part of this makes one wonder if he damaged his career in parlement parlement with his intemperate words, on other occasions if not on this one. with his intemperate words, on other occasions if not on this one.

Even more surprising than meeting the hot-headed side of young Montaigne is seeing him bracketed with the bigots and extremists. His political allegiances were complicated; it is not always easy to guess where he will come out on any particular topic. But this case may have had more to do with personal loyalties than conviction. His own family had connections on both sides of the political divide, and he had to stay on good terms with them all. Perhaps the strain of this conflict made him volatile. The accusation was also an insult-to himself and, more seriously, to La Boetie, who was no longer around to offer any defense. Lagebaton was querying the honor of the most honorable man Montaigne had ever known: the person he probably loved most in his entire life, and whom he had just lost. A response of helpless rage is understandable.

Slowness and forgetfulness were good responses to the question of how to live, so far as they went. They made for good camouflage, and they allowed room for thoughtful judgments to emerge. But some experiences in life brought forth a greater pa.s.sion, and called for a different sort of answer.

5. Q. How to live? A. Survive love and loss

LA BOeTIE: LOVE AND TYRANNY LOVE AND TYRANNY.

MONTAIGNE WAS IN his mid-twenties when he met etienne de La Boetie. Both were working at the Bordeaux his mid-twenties when he met etienne de La Boetie. Both were working at the Bordeaux parlement parlement, and each had heard a lot about the other in advance. La Boetie would have known of Montaigne as an outspoken, precocious youngster. Montaigne had heard of La Boetie as the promising author of a controversial ma.n.u.script in local circulation, called De la Servitude volontaire De la Servitude volontaire ("On Voluntary Servitude"). He read this first in the late 1550s, and later wrote of his grat.i.tude to it, because it brought him to its author. It started a great friends.h.i.+p: one "so entire and so perfect that certainly you will hardly read of the like...So many coincidences are needed to build up such a friends.h.i.+p that it is a lot if fortune can do it once in three centuries." ("On Voluntary Servitude"). He read this first in the late 1550s, and later wrote of his grat.i.tude to it, because it brought him to its author. It started a great friends.h.i.+p: one "so entire and so perfect that certainly you will hardly read of the like...So many coincidences are needed to build up such a friends.h.i.+p that it is a lot if fortune can do it once in three centuries."

Although the two young men were curious about each other, they somehow did not meet for a long time. In the end the encounter happened by chance. Both were at the same feast in the city; they got talking, and found themselves "so taken with each other, so well acquainted, so bound together" that, from that moment on, they became best friends. They had only six years, about a third of which was spent apart, since both were sometimes sent to work in other cities. Yet that short period bound them to each other as tightly as a lifetime of shared experience.

Reading about Montaigne and La Boetie, you often get the impression that the latter was much older and wiser than the former. In reality La Boetie was only a couple of years Montaigne's senior. He was neither das.h.i.+ng nor handsome, but one has the impression that he was intelligent and warmhearted, with an air of substance. Unlike Montaigne, he was already married when they met, and he held a higher position in the parlement parlement. Colleagues knew him both as a writer and as a public official, whereas Montaigne had yet to write anything except legal reports. La Boetie attracted attention and respect. If you were to tell their Bordeaux acquaintances of the early 1560s that he is now remembered mainly for being Montaigne's friend rather than the other way around, they would probably refuse to believe you.

Some of La Boetie's air of maturity may have come from his having been orphaned at an early age. He was born on November 1, 1530, in the market town of Sarlat, about seventy-five miles from the Montaigne estate, in a fine, steep, richly ornamented building which survives today. This house had been built just five years earlier by La Boetie's father, another hyperactive parent, who then died when his son was ten years old. His mother died, too, so La Boetie was left alone. An uncle who shared the name of etienne de La Boetie took him in and apparently gave the boy a fas.h.i.+onable humanist education, though a less radical one than Montaigne's.

Like Montaigne, La Boetie went on to study law. Some time around 1554, he married Marguerite de Carle, a widow who already had two children (one of whom would marry Montaigne's younger brother Thomas de Beauregard). In May of the same year-two years before Montaigne started in Perigueux-La Boetie took up office at the Bordeaux parlement parlement. He was probably one of those Bordeaux officials who looked askance at the better paid Perigueux men when they arrived.

La Boetie's career in the Bordeaux parlement parlement was a very good one. The strange accusations of 1563 aside, he was generally the kind of man who inspires confidence. He was given sensitive missions, and often entrusted with work as a negotiator-as Montaigne would later be. For the moment, La Boetie was probably thought the more reliable figure. He had the required air of gravity, and a better att.i.tude to hard work and duty. The differences were significant, but the two men locked into each other like pieces in a puzzle. They shared important things: subtle thinking, a pa.s.sion for literature and philosophy, and a determination to live a good life like the cla.s.sical writers and military heroes they had grown up admiring. All this brought them together, and set them apart from their less adventurously educated colleagues. was a very good one. The strange accusations of 1563 aside, he was generally the kind of man who inspires confidence. He was given sensitive missions, and often entrusted with work as a negotiator-as Montaigne would later be. For the moment, La Boetie was probably thought the more reliable figure. He had the required air of gravity, and a better att.i.tude to hard work and duty. The differences were significant, but the two men locked into each other like pieces in a puzzle. They shared important things: subtle thinking, a pa.s.sion for literature and philosophy, and a determination to live a good life like the cla.s.sical writers and military heroes they had grown up admiring. All this brought them together, and set them apart from their less adventurously educated colleagues.

La Boetie is now known mainly through Montaigne's eyes-the Montaigne of the 1570s and 1580s, who looked back with sorrow and longing for his lost friend. This created a nostalgic fog through which one can only squint to try to make out the real La Boetie. Of Montaigne as seen by La Boetie, a clearer picture is available, for La Boetie wrote a sonnet making it clear what he thought Montaigne needed by way of self-improvement. Instead of a perfect Montaigne frozen in memory, the sonnet captures a living Montaigne in the process of transition. It is by no means certain that this flawed character will ever make anything of himself, especially if he continues to waste his energies partying and flirting with pretty women.

Although La Boetie speaks to Montaigne like a fondly disapproving uncle, he adorns his poem with less familial emotions: "You have been bound to me, Montaigne, both by the power of nature and by virtue, which is the sweet allurement of love." Montaigne writes in the same way in the Essays Essays, saying that the friends.h.i.+p seized his will and "led it to plunge and lose itself in his," just as it seized the will of La Boetie and "led it to plunge and lose itself in mine." Such talk was not unconventional. The Renaissance was a period in which, while any hint of real h.o.m.os.e.xuality was regarded with horror, men routinely wrote to each other like lovestruck teenagers. They were usually in love less with each other than with an elevated ideal of friends.h.i.+p, absorbed from Greek and Latin literature. Such a bond between two well-born young men was the pinnacle of philosophy: they studied together, lived under each other's gaze, and helped each other to perfect the art of living. Both Montaigne and La Boetie were fascinated by this model, and were probably on the lookout for it when they met. The shortness of their time together spared them disillusionment. In his sonnet, La Boetie expressed the hope that his and Montaigne's names would be paired for all eternity, like those of other "famous friends" throughout history; he got his wish.

They seemed to think of their relations.h.i.+p above all by a.n.a.logy with one particular cla.s.sical model: that of the philosopher Socrates and his good-looking young friend Alcibiades-to whom La Boetie overtly compared Montaigne in his sonnet. Montaigne, in return, alluded to Socratic elements in La Boetie: his wisdom, but also a more surprising quality, his ugliness. Socrates was famous for being physically unprepossessing, and Montaigne pointedly refers to La Boetie as having an "ugliness which clothed a very beautiful soul." This echoes Alcibiades' comparison, in Plato's Symposium Symposium, of Socrates with the little "Silenus" figures popularly used as stash boxes for jewels and other precious items. Like Socrates, they sported grotesque faces and figures on the outside but held treasures within. Montaigne and La Boetie apparently enjoyed these roles, and played them up for their amus.e.m.e.nt. At least it amused Montaigne. La Boetie's sense of his own philosophical dignity would have prevented him from showing any sign if he felt insulted.

The ugly Socrates rejected the beautiful Alcibiades's advances, according to Plato, yet their relations.h.i.+p was unmistakably flirtatious and sensual. Was the same true of Montaigne and La Boetie? Few today think that they had an outright s.e.xual relations.h.i.+p, though the idea has had its followers. But the intensity of their language is striking, not just in La Boetie's sonnet, but in the pa.s.sages where Montaigne describes their friends.h.i.+p as a transcendent mystery, or as a great surge of love that swept them both away. His attachment to moderation in all things fails him when it comes to La Boetie, and so does his love of independence. He writes, "Our souls mingle and blend with each other so completely that they efface the seam that joined them, and cannot find it again." Words themselves refuse to do his bidding. As he wrote in a marginal addition: [image]

(ill.u.s.tration credit i5.1)

If you press me to tell why I loved him, I feel that this cannot be expressed, except by answering: Because it was he, because it was I.

Renaissance friends.h.i.+ps, like cla.s.sical ones, were supposed to be chosen in the clear, rational light of day. That was why they were of philosophical value. Montaigne's description of the love that "cannot be expressed" does not fit this pattern. Indeed, he admits: "Our friends.h.i.+p has no other model than itself, and can be compared only with itself." If it has a reference point at all, it again seems to be the Symposium Symposium, where Alcibiades finds himself equally confused by Socrates's charisma, saying, "Many a time I should be glad for him to vanish from the face of the earth, but I know that, if that were to happen, my sorrow would far outweigh my relief. In fact, I simply do not know what to do about him."

La Boetie, in his sonnet, does not go so far into perplexity as Montaigne; his emotion was not heightened by remembered grief as Montaigne's was. Similar talk of unreason and personal magnetism can be found in La Boetie, but not in the sonnet, or even in any of the mediocre love poetry he addressed to women. It appears, of all places, in his early treatise on politics-the one which was being pa.s.sed so eagerly around Bordeaux when Montaigne first heard of him.

La Boetie was apparently very young when he wrote this treatise, On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude. According to Montaigne, he was only sixteen, and produced it as a student exercise: "a common theme hashed over in a thousand places in books." Montaigne may have been deliberately underplaying the work's seriousness, for it was controversial and he did not want either to damage La Boetie's reputation or to get into trouble for mentioning it himself. Even if it was not quite so juvenile a piece as Montaigne made out, it did show early brilliance: one writer has called La Boetie the Rimbaud of political sociology.

The subject of Voluntary Servitude Voluntary Servitude is the ease with which, throughout history, tyrants have dominated the ma.s.ses, even though their power would evaporate instantly if those ma.s.ses withdrew their support. There is no need for a revolution: the people need only stop cooperating, and supplying armies of slaves and sycophants to prop the tyrant up. Yet this almost never happens, even to those who maltreat their subjects monstrously. The more they starve and neglect their people, the more the people seem to love them. The Romans mourned Nero when he died, despite his abuses. The same happened on the death of Julius Caesar-whom, unusually, La Boetie does not admire. (Montaigne had similar reservations.) Here was an emperor "who abolished the laws and liberty, a personage in whom there was, it seems to me, nothing of value," yet he was adored out of all measure. The mystery of tyrannical dominance is as profound as that of love itself. is the ease with which, throughout history, tyrants have dominated the ma.s.ses, even though their power would evaporate instantly if those ma.s.ses withdrew their support. There is no need for a revolution: the people need only stop cooperating, and supplying armies of slaves and sycophants to prop the tyrant up. Yet this almost never happens, even to those who maltreat their subjects monstrously. The more they starve and neglect their people, the more the people seem to love them. The Romans mourned Nero when he died, despite his abuses. The same happened on the death of Julius Caesar-whom, unusually, La Boetie does not admire. (Montaigne had similar reservations.) Here was an emperor "who abolished the laws and liberty, a personage in whom there was, it seems to me, nothing of value," yet he was adored out of all measure. The mystery of tyrannical dominance is as profound as that of love itself.

La Boetie believes that tyrants somehow hypnotize their people-though this term had not yet been invented. To put it another way, they fall in love with him. They lose their will in his. It is a terrible spectacle to see "a million men serving miserably with their necks under the yoke, not constrained by a greater force, but somehow (it seems) enchanted and charmed by the mere mention of the name of one, whose power they should not fear, since he is alone, and whose qualities they should not love, since he is savage and inhuman towards them." Yet they cannot wake from the dream. La Boetie makes it sound almost like a kind of witchcraft. If it occurred on a smaller scale, someone would probably be burned at the stake, but when bewitchment seizes a whole society, it goes unquestioned.

La Boetie's a.n.a.lysis of political power comes very close to Montaigne's sense of mystery about La Boetie himself: "Because it was he, because it was I." That a tyrant's charisma can work like a spell or a love potion has been made apparent by a series of autocrats in our own recent history. When one henchman of the Ugandan dictator Idi Amin was asked in an interview why he had loved his leader so loyally, he replied in a way that sounds just like Montaigne talking about La Boetie, or Alcibiades about Socrates: You see, love, something called love: you will find a man loving a woman who's one-eyed. If you ask that man, why do you love that ugly woman, do you think that person will tell you? The secret behind that thing is between two. What made me to love him and what also made him to love me.

Tyranny creates a drama of submission and domination, rather like the tense battle confrontation scenes often described by Montaigne. The populace willingly gives itself up, and this only encourages the tyrant to take away everything they have-even their lives, if he sends them to war to fight for him. Something in human beings drives them to a "deep forgetfulness of freedom." Everyone, from top to bottom of the system, is mesmerized by their voluntary servitude and by the power of habit, since often they have known nothing else. Yet all they need to do is to wake up and withdraw their cooperation.

Whenever a few individuals do break free, adds La Boetie, it is often because their eyes have been opened by the study of history. Learning of similar past tyrannies, they recognize the pattern in their own society. Instead of accepting what they are born into, they acquire the art of slipping out of it and seeing everything from a different angle-a trick Montaigne, in the Essays Essays, would make his characteristic mode of thinking and writing. Alas, there are usually too few of these free spirits to do any good. They do not work together, but live "alone in their imaginings."

One can see why Montaigne, after reading On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude, was so keen to meet its author. It is a bold work; whether Montaigne agreed with it all or not, it must have astounded him. Its reflections on the power of habit, a key theme of his own in the Essays Essays, and its idea that freedom could come from reading historians and biographers, would have resonated with him. So would its sheer intellectual audacity and its ability to think, as it were, around corners.

La Boetie probably did not mean his treatise as a call to revolution. He circulated it in a few discreet copies, and may never have intended to publish it at all. If he did, his aim would have been to exhort the governing elite to more responsible behavior, not to make the undercla.s.s rise up and seize control. He would have been horrified, therefore, had he lived to see what was done with his work. Just over a decade after he died, On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude reappeared as a radical Protestant tract, renamed reappeared as a radical Protestant tract, renamed Contr'un Contr'un (Against One) for greater effect, and set in the context of a call to rebellion against the French monarch. A series of Protestant publications printed it, first the anonymous (Against One) for greater effect, and set in the context of a call to rebellion against the French monarch. A series of Protestant publications printed it, first the anonymous Reveille-matin des Francois et de leurs voisins Reveille-matin des Francois et de leurs voisins (1574) and then various editions of Simon Goulart's (1574) and then various editions of Simon Goulart's Memoires de l'estat de France sous Charles IX Memoires de l'estat de France sous Charles IX (1577). It was incendiary, and it met with an incendiary response. The Bordeaux (1577). It was incendiary, and it met with an incendiary response. The Bordeaux parlement parlement burned Goulart's second edition in public on May 7, 1579, just two days before Montaigne obtained his official privilege for the first edition of the burned Goulart's second edition in public on May 7, 1579, just two days before Montaigne obtained his official privilege for the first edition of the Essays Essays. No wonder he wanted to stress the fact that La Boetie's work was a youthful exercise, presenting no threat to anyone.

This was the beginning of a long and colorful afterlife for On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude. Even now, it is still sometimes published as a call to arms, or at least to principled resistance. During the Second World War it appeared in America under the t.i.tle Anti-Dictator Anti-Dictator, with marginal notes drawing attention to such themes as "Appeas.e.m.e.nt is useless" and "Why Fuhrers make speeches." Later, anarchist and libertarian groups took it up and put out editions with radical prefaces and commentaries. La Boetie's posthumous story as a hero of anarchism is the one great exception to the rule that he is remembered only for being Montaigne's friend.

What anarchists and libertarians admire most is his Gandhi-like idea that all a society needs, in order to free itself of tyranny, is to quietly withdraw cooperation. One modern preface holds up La Boetie as the inspiration for an "anonymous, low-visibility, one-man revolution"-certainly the purest kind of revolution imaginable. "Voluntaryism" adopts La Boetie in support of its view that all political activity should be shunned, including even democratic voting, since it gives the state a false air of legitimacy. Some early Voluntaryists opposed female suffrage on the grounds that, if men should not vote, then women should not either.

The "quiet refusal" aspect of On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude's politics had an obvious appeal for Montaigne. He agreed that the most important thing in confronting political abuse was to maintain one's mental freedom-and that could mean opting out of public life rather than engaging with it. With its insistence on avoiding collaboration and on guarding one's integrity, the Voluntary Servitude Voluntary Servitude could almost be one of Montaigne's own could almost be one of Montaigne's own Essays Essays, perhaps one written at an early stage when he was still polemical and had not yet perfected the art of sitting on every part of the fence at once. Like Ralph Waldo Emerson reading the Essays Essays centuries later, Montaigne might well have exclaimed of the centuries later, Montaigne might well have exclaimed of the Voluntary Servitude Voluntary Servitude, "It seemed to me as if I had myself written the book, so sincerely it spoke to my thought and experience."

Before its appropriation by Huguenot propagandists, he had actually intended to make it part of his own Essays Essays, though duly credited to La Boetie. He was going to insert it following the chapter on friends.h.i.+p-the one where he writes most pa.s.sionately about his feelings. The idea seems to have been to host the work as a sort of guest star or centerpiece, set off by surrounding chapters like a picture by its frame.

But by the time he delivered the book to the publisher, the situation had changed. On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude was now thought of as a revolutionary tract: instead of standing as a tribute to his friend's brilliance, as Montaigne intended, it would look like a provocation. So he withdrew it, but left his own brief introduction as a stump marking the site of amputation. He wrote, "Because I have found that this work has since been brought to light, and with evil intent, by those who seek to disturb and change the state of our government without worrying whether they will improve it, and because they have mixed his work up with some of their own concoctions, I have changed my mind about putting it in here." It was probably now that he added his own remark about the work's junior and tentative nature. was now thought of as a revolutionary tract: instead of standing as a tribute to his friend's brilliance, as Montaigne intended, it would look like a provocation. So he withdrew it, but left his own brief introduction as a stump marking the site of amputation. He wrote, "Because I have found that this work has since been brought to light, and with evil intent, by those who seek to disturb and change the state of our government without worrying whether they will improve it, and because they have mixed his work up with some of their own concoctions, I have changed my mind about putting it in here." It was probably now that he added his own remark about the work's junior and tentative nature.

Having done this, he had another change of mind. He did not want to make La Boetie sound insincere. So he added a note, saying that, of course, La Boetie must have believed in what he was writing; he was not the type to speak without conviction. Montaigne even said that his friend would have preferred to be born in Venice-a republic-than in the local town of Sarlat, that is, in the French state. But wait-that made La Boetie sound like a rebel again! Another reversal was needed: "But he had another maxim sovereignly imprinted in his soul, to obey and submit most religiously to the laws under which he was born." All in all, Montaigne seems to have got into quite a jumble over La Boetie's tract. One imagines him scribbling all this at the last moment in a corner of the printer's office, the removed ma.n.u.script still tucked under one arm.

Considering that On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude was currently being burned in Bordeaux, it was daring for Montaigne to mention the work at all, let alone to make excuses for it. Contradictory as ever, he acted with prudence in withdrawing the publication, but with courage in defending it. Moreover, in discussing how La Boetie came to write the piece, Montaigne actually revealed who the author was. That was probably well known anyway, but none of the Protestant publications had gone so far. was currently being burned in Bordeaux, it was daring for Montaigne to mention the work at all, let alone to make excuses for it. Contradictory as ever, he acted with prudence in withdrawing the publication, but with courage in defending it. Moreover, in discussing how La Boetie came to write the piece, Montaigne actually revealed who the author was. That was probably well known anyway, but none of the Protestant publications had gone so far.

Having decided to get rid of it, Montaigne wrote: "In exchange for this serious work, I shall subst.i.tute another, produced in that same season of his life, gayer and more l.u.s.ty." This was a selection of La Boetie's verses: not the ones written to himself, but a set of twenty-nine sonnets addressed to an unidentified young woman. Some years later, however, Montaigne changed his mind again and removed these too. What was left, in the end, was only his own introduction and dedication, plus a brief note: "These verses may be seen elsewhere." One entire chapter, number 29 in Book I, became a double deletion: a ragged stub or hole which Montaigne deliberately refused to disguise. He even drew attention to its frayed edges. It is odd behavior, and has inspired a lot of speculation. Was Montaigne simply adding and subtracting material in a fl.u.s.ter, without bothering to tidy up the results, or was he trying to alert us to something?

One radical theory has come and gone from circulation a few times in recent years. As remarked, On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude has features so Montaignelike that it could almost be his own writing. It talks about habit, nature, perspective, and friends.h.i.+p-four themes that resound throughout the has features so Montaignelike that it could almost be his own writing. It talks about habit, nature, perspective, and friends.h.i.+p-four themes that resound throughout the Essays Essays. It emphasizes inner freedom as a path to political resistance: a Montaignean position. The work is filled with examples from cla.s.sical history, just like the Essays Essays. It feels feels like an like an Essay Essay. It is persuasive, entertaining, and digression-p.r.o.ne. The author often goes off at some tangent-say, into a discussion of the Pleiade group of sixteenth-century poets-before coming to with a remark such as, "But to return to our purpose, which I had almost lost," or "But to return from where, I don't know how, I had lost the thread of my discussion." This playful pretense at disorganization seems unusual in a young man's literary exercise, but it fills the piece with life and spontaneity. The author talks to us as if we were sitting together over a gla.s.s of wine, or had b.u.mped into each other on a Bordeaux street corner. The suspicion dawns: could Montaigne, rather than La Boetie, have been the author of On Voluntary Servitude? On Voluntary Servitude?

But it must have been by La Boetie, comes the reply; copies of the ma.n.u.script were being pa.s.sed around Bordeaux. Yet none of today's surviving copies is in La Boetie's hand-all were made by others-and the only clear source we have for the "pa.s.sed around" story is Montaigne himself. It is also Montaigne who identifies the author as La Boetie, and Montaigne who talks of it as a student piece. Perhaps the teenage Rimbaud here was the hothead given to rus.h.i.+ng in and out of parlement parlement chambers, not the prematurely judicious La Boetie. Or perhaps it was not the work of a young man at all: that would explain a few anachronistic references in the text. Perhaps, as some enthusiastic conspiracy theorists suggest, Montaigne wrote the piece much later and inserted the anachronisms to tip off smart readers to the deception. chambers, not the prematurely judicious La Boetie. Or perhaps it was not the work of a young man at all: that would explain a few anachronistic references in the text. Perhaps, as some enthusiastic conspiracy theorists suggest, Montaigne wrote the piece much later and inserted the anachronisms to tip off smart readers to the deception.

The first person to try attributing On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude to Montaigne, in 1906, was the maverick Montaignist Arthur-Antoine Armaingaud, a man with a record of making outrageous suggestions and sitting back to watch the feathers fly. Almost no one agreed with Armaingaud at the time, and few do now, but his hypothesis has won over a new generation of mavericks, notably Daniel Martin and David Lewis Schaefer. Schaefer is keen to find a revolutionary underbelly in Montaigne on principle, as was Armaingaud, while Daniel Martin has a general penchant for approaching the book like a cryptic crossword full of clues. "Removing to Montaigne, in 1906, was the maverick Montaignist Arthur-Antoine Armaingaud, a man with a record of making outrageous suggestions and sitting back to watch the feathers fly. Almost no one agreed with Armaingaud at the time, and few do now, but his hypothesis has won over a new generation of mavericks, notably Daniel Martin and David Lewis Schaefer. Schaefer is keen to find a revolutionary underbelly in Montaigne on principle, as was Armaingaud, while Daniel Martin has a general penchant for approaching the book like a cryptic crossword full of clues. "Removing On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude from the from the Essays Essays would be like removing the flute from a symphony orchestra," he writes. would be like removing the flute from a symphony orchestra," he writes.

The idea of Montaigne writing a radical, proto-anarchist tract, then whipping up a dust storm of false information and hiding hints where only the sharp-eyed could spot them, appeals on several levels. Like all conspiracy theories, it offers the thrill of fitting the pieces together, and it makes Montaigne glamorous: a one-man revolutionary cell and a master of intrigue.

Occasional signs can be found in the Essays Essays that Montaigne was capable of playing the slyboots when he wanted to. Once, he used an elaborate trick to help a friend who suffered from impotence and was afraid a spell had been cast on him. Instead of reasoning him out of it, Montaigne gave the friend a robe and a magical-looking coin engraved with "celestial figures." He told him to perform a series of rituals with this medallion whenever he was about to have s.e.x, first laying it over his kidneys, then tying it around his waist, then lying down with his partner and pulling the robe over both of them. The trick worked. Montaigne felt a bit guilty, even though he had done it for his friend's benefit. Yet this shows that he could practice deception if he felt the situation called for it, or if the psychology of the case fascinated him enough. that Montaigne was capable of playing the slyboots when he wanted to. Once, he used an elaborate trick to help a friend who suffered from impotence and was afraid a spell had been cast on him. Instead of reasoning him out of it, Montaigne gave the friend a robe and a magical-looking coin engraved with "celestial figures." He told him to perform a series of rituals with this medallion whenever he was about to have s.e.x, first laying it over his kidneys, then tying it around his waist, then lying down with his partner and pulling the robe over both of them. The trick worked. Montaigne felt a bit guilty, even though he had done it for his friend's benefit. Yet this shows that he could practice deception if he felt the situation called for it, or if the psychology of the case fascinated him enough.

On the whole, though, this sort of game-playing was rare for him, and he preferred to emphasize his honesty and openness in all matters, as well as his dull-wittedness at enigmas and puzzles. That could all be part of the game. But if he really was a thoroughgoing trickster, then one has to doubt almost every word he says in the book: a dizzying prospect. There are other unsettling implications. If La Boetie did not write On Voluntary Servitude On Voluntary Servitude, then he was not the man Montaigne made him out to be in the Essays Essays. He existed, all right, but with no clear features: a cipher for Montaigne's own cleverness. And if he did not have exceptional capabilities-if he was not the kind of man who would write the Servitude Servitude-why did Montaigne love him so much? He must have had a reason for feeling so strongly, and apparently it wasn't La Boetie's good looks, unless he was lying about that too.

If one takes their love story seriously, the conspiracy theory becomes almost unthinkable. For Montaigne to ascribe the Servitude Servitude to La Boetie as a cover for himself would be to play fast and free with La Boetie's memory-a memory he evidently wors.h.i.+ped to the point of idolatry. It is surprising that he revealed La Boetie's authors.h.i.+p of a work currently being burned in the public square of Bordeaux, but if La Boetie was not the author, it would be more than surprising; it would be a total betrayal, an act almost of hatred. There is nothing in any of Montaigne's writings about La Boetie (including remarks made in a travel journal never meant for publication) to suggest that he felt this way. to La Boetie as a cover for himself would be to play fast and free with La Boetie's memory-a memory he evidently wors.h.i.+ped to the point of idolatry. It is surprising that he revealed La Boetie's authors.h.i.+p of a work currently being burned in the public square of Bordeaux, but if La Boetie was not the author, it would be more than surprising; it would be a total betrayal, an act almost of hatred. There is nothing in any of Montaigne's writings about La Boetie (including remarks made in a travel journal never meant for publication) to suggest that he felt this way.

The intensity of their affection also provides a convincing explanation for why the two men's writing styles were so similar. Montaigne and La Boetie shared everything: they blended into one another, not as a writer blends into his pseudonym, but as two writers develop their ideas in partners.h.i.+p-often arguing, often disagreeing, yet constantly absorbing absorbing. Over their few years together, Montaigne and La Boetie must have talked from morning to night: about habit, about the need to reject received ideas and to change points of view, about tyranny, and about personal freedom. At first, La Boetie's ideas would have been more clearly articulated; later, probably, Montaigne would have overtaken him, pursuing thoughts about custom and perspective in directions La Boetie would not have thought of. It all eventually found its way into the Essays Essays, which became a monument to La Boetie in more ways than one. The two minds wove themselves so closely together that, with the best critical tools in the world, you could not pick them apart.

Neither man had any reason to think they could not go on like this for decades, becoming ever more successful and celebrated in their modernized Athens. But young Socrates was about to be called home from the feast.

LA BOeTIE: DEATH AND MOURNING.

It began on Monday, August 9, 1563. La Boetie had spent the day in the open air on the estate of Francois de Peruse d'Escars, the man who had rebelled against Lagebaton in the Bordeaux parlement parlement. That evening La Boetie was supposed to dine with Montaigne, but as he was about to leave d'Escars's house he came down with stomach pains and diarrhea. He sent Montaigne a message saying that he felt ill: would Montaigne come to see him instead? Montaigne did. Our knowledge of everything that followed comes from a long narrative Montaigne later wrote in the form of a letter to his father, and which he eventually published.