“I am not sorry that we notice the barbarous horror of such acts,but I am heartily sorry that,judging their faults rightly,we should be so blind to our own.I think there is more barbarity in eating a man alive than eating him dead;...”
Such a frank kind of reasoning seems to be too much striking at first,since Montaigne goes even further in justifying the behaviour of the cannibals and degrades that of modern men’s.As acts of modern men are degraded by likening them to eating a man alive.
“...as we have not only read but seen within fresh memory,not among ancient enemies,but among neighbours and fellow citizens,and what is worse,on the pretext of piety and religion.”
It is to be discerned that Montaigne also satirizes the conflicts which were brutal between Catholics and Protestans as something to be despised and dishonouring.Yet,he advocates that modern men – ignorant of his own barabarity which exceeds that of the cannibals’ – justify themselves calling the cannibals savage and barbarous with regards to the rules of reason.
“So we may well call these people barbarians,in respect to the rules of reason,but not in respect to ourselves,who surpass them in every kind of barbarity.”
But,isn’t it the very same “reasoning” that renders man to defy the Nature and fosters his attempts to dominate it.Notwithstanding the origin the Man comes from,he aspires for wisdom and for the sake of it he spoils the purity of the Nature.No artifice is capable of of matching to the beauty and the originality of the Nature itself.All efforts to imitate the Nature and by this way to gain wisdom are bound to end in failure – in other words they are imperfect.
“All things,says Plato,are produced by nature,by fortune,or by art;the greatest and most beautiful by one or the other of the first two,the least and most imperfect by the last.”
Hence,the motto that wisdom – artifices as the by-products of it – only renders man to get away from Nature,which in addition alienates him to humanly feelings but makes him a selfish and destructive being is argued in both “Of Cannibals” and “The Praise of Folly”.
“Therefore,just asamong mortals those men who seek wisdom are furthest from happiness – indeed,they are fools twice over because,forgetting the human condition to which they were born,they aspire to the life of the immortal gods and wage war against Nature with the engines of learning – so too,the least miserable among men are those who come closest to the level of intelligence (that is,the folly) of brute animals and never undertake anything beyond human nature.”
Moreover,it can be inferred that “ folliness and retaining Man’s originality in Nature” have a deeper meaning,which is supposed to be percieved as “genuine intelligence”.For,folly symbolises here the high intelligence;never going beyond the boundaries of human nature,who posses folliness act in compliance with what is ordained by Nature – or by God.This opinion is supprted with Christ’s behaviour and words.
“For them,too,he carefully prescribed folly,warning them against wisdom,when he set before them the eaxmple of children,lilies,mustard seed,and sparrows – stupid creatures lacking all intelligence,leading their lives according to the dictates of nature,artless and carefree - ...”
“To the same effect is the prohibition of God,the architect of the world,that they should not eat any fruit from the tree of knowledge,as if knowledge would poison their happiness.”
With all these instances wisdom and modern man’s artifices with his search for wisdom that offend the Nature are condemned.Yet,in today’s world,roles that the men undertake – which conceal their true identity are to some extent obligatory.What makes man undertake these roles is certainly the the set of norms accepted by the society,and what is taken as the main criteria in determining these norms – in other words these roles is the agreement among the number of peole that constitute the majority.Although,these vary from one society to the other;they have to be in compliance within the same society not to break the harmony or the conscious illusion.
“...from what I have been told,except that each man calls barbarism whatever is not his own practice;for indeed it seems we have no other test of truth and reason than the example and pattern of the opinions and customs of the country we live in.”
However,if a man argues,spoiling the whole illusion and breaking the conventions that all the men on the stage are wearing false costumes – that are in fact not the people the spectators see ;but just the opposite,will he be called a madman,whose only guilt is waking the people from their illusion?What he causes will only create an uneasiness among the majority – as although what he says is true,he defies to run with the herd;therefore he is to be called a madman.Everyone is supposed to overlook the faults in order to perform the play of life remaining content with it.
Yet,the essay “Of Cannibals” makes a contrast with this opinion to a some extent as the natives in the newly discovered land do not have neither any social norms nor any social institutions.They live simply,not distorted with any kind of artifice,although they live as uncivilized people – which is called by the modern man with respect to the rules of reason and manners – they never offend their origin,which is the Nature and perhaps live more civilly than modern man with regards to their purity.
In conclusion,it is to be confessed that costumes or roles of the man do not necesssarily signify one’s civility and purity.They are only veils that are sometimes worn on purpose,sometimes by obligation.What is to be seen as purity of intentions and happiness is the closeness to the Nature and keeping away from evil deeds to gain too much wisdom,which only bring misery to human life.
