 Section 38 of The Fable of the Bees by Bernard Mandeville This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Horatio, it is certain that we seldom hear of public prostitutes, and such as have lost their shame, that they murder their infants, though they are otherwise the most abandoned wretches. I took notice of this in The Fable of the Bees, and it is very remarkable. Cleomenes. It contains a plain demonstration that the same passion may produce either a palpable good or a palpable evil in the same person, according his self-love and his present circumstances shall direct, and that the same fear of shame that makes men sometimes appear so highly virtuous may at others oblige them to commit the most heinous crimes, that, therefore, honor is not founded upon any principle, either of real virtue or true religion, must be obvious to all that will but mind what sort of people they are, that are the greatest votaries of that idol, and the different duties it requires in the two sexes. In the first place, the worshipers of honor are the vain and voluptuous, the strict observers of modes and fashions, that take delight in pomp and luxury, and enjoy as much of the world as they are able. In the second, the word itself, I mean the sense of it, is so whimsical, and there is such a prodigious difference in the signification of it, according as the attribute is differently applied, either to a man or to a woman, that neither of them shall forfeit their honor, though each should be guilty and openly boast of what would be the other's greatest shame. Horatio, I am sorry that I cannot charge you with injustice, but it is very strange that to encourage and industriously increase pride in a refined education should be the most proper means to make men solicitous in concealing the outward appearances of it. Cleomenes, yet nothing is more true, but where pride is so much indulged and yet to be so carefully kept from all human view, as it is in persons of honor of both sexes, it would be impossible for mortal strength to endure the restraint, if men could not be taught to play the passion against itself, and were not allowed to change the natural homebred symptoms of it for artificial foreign ones. Horatio, by playing the passion against itself, I know you mean placing a secret pride in concealing the bare-faced signs of it, but I do not rightly understand what you mean by changing the symptoms of it. Cleomenes, when a man exalts in his pride and gives a loose to that passion, the marks of it are as visible in his countenance, his mean, his gait and behavior as they are in a prancing horse, or a strutting turkey cock. These are all very odious, everyone feeling the same principle within which is the cause of those symptoms, and man being endued with speech, all the open expressions the same passion can suggest to him must for the same reason be equally displeasing. These, therefore, have in all societies been strictly prohibited by common consent in the very infancy of good manners, and men have been taught, in the room of them, to substitute other symptoms, equally evident with the first, but less offensive and more beneficial to others. Horatio, which are they? Cleomenes, fine clothes and other ornaments about them, the cleanliness observed about their persons, the submissions that is required of servants, costly equipages, furniture, buildings, titles of honor, and everything that men can acquire to make themselves esteemed by others, without discovering any of the symptoms that are forbid. Upon a satiety of enjoying these, they are allowed likewise to have the vapors and be whimsical, though otherwise they are known to be in health and of good sense. Horatio, but since the pride of others is displeasing to us in every shape, and these latter symptoms, you say, are equally evident with the first, what is got by the change? Cleomenes, a great deal. When pride is designately expressed in looks and gestures, either in a wild or tame man, it is known by all human creatures that see it. It is the same, when vented in words, by everybody that understands the language they are spoken in. These are marks and tokens that are all the world over the same. Nobody shows them, but to have them seen and understood, and few persons ever display them without designing that offense to others, which they never fail to give. Whereas the other symptoms may be denied to be what they are, and many pretenses that they are derived from other motives may be made for them, which the same good manners teach us never to refute, nor easily to disbelieve. In the very excuses that are made, there is a condescension that satisfies and pleases us. In those that are altogether destitute of the opportunities to display the symptoms of pride that are allowed of, the least portion of that passion is a troublesome, though often an unknown, guest. In them it is easily turned into envy and malice, and on the least provocation it sallies out in those disguises and is often the cause of cruelty, and there never was a mischief committed by mobs or multitudes which this passion had not a hand in. Whereas the more room men have to vent and gratify the passion in the warrantable ways, the more easy it is for them to stifle the odious part of pride, and seem to be wholly free from it. Horatio, I see very well that real virtues require as a conquest over untaught nature, and that the Christian religion demands a still stricter self-denial. It likewise is evident that to make ourselves acceptable to an omniscient power nothing is more necessary than sincerity, and that the heart should be pure. But setting aside sacred matters and a future state, do not you think that this complacence and easy construction of one another s actions do a great deal of good upon earth, and do you not believe that good manners and politeness make men more happy and their lives more comfortable in this world than anything else could make them without those arts? Cleomenes, if you will set aside what ought to employ our first care and be our greatest concern, and men will have no value for that felicity and peace of mind which can only arise from a consciousness of being good, it is certain that in a great nation and among a flourishing people whose highest wishes seem to be ease and luxury, the upper part could not, without those arts, enjoy so much of the world as that can afford, and that none stand more in need of them than the voluptuous men of parts that will join worldly prudence to sensuality and make it their chief study to refine upon pleasure. Horatio, when I had the honor of your company at my house, you said that nobody knew when or where, nor in what kings or emperors reigned the laws of honor were enacted. Pray, can you inform me when or which way, what we call good manners or politeness came into the world, what moralist or politician was it that could teach men to be proud of hiding their pride? Cleomenes, the resistless industry of man to supply his wants and his constant endeavors to meeliorate his condition upon earth have produced and brought to perfection many useful arts and sciences of which the beginnings are of uncertain eras, and to which we can align no other causes than human sagacity in general and the joint labor of many ages in which men have always employed themselves in studying and contriving ways and means to soothe their various appetites and to make the best of their infirmities. Wentz had we the first rudiments of architecture, how came sculpture and painting to be what they have been these many hundred years, and who taught every nation the respective languages they speak now? When I have a mind to dive into the origin of any maxim or political invention for the use of society in general, I do not trouble my head with inquiring after the time or country in which it was first heard of, nor what others have wrote or said about it, but I go directly to the fountainhead, human nature itself, to look for the frailty or defect in man that is remedied or supplied by that invention. When things are very obscure, I sometimes make use of conjectures to find my way. Horatio, do you argue or pretend to prove anything from those conjectures? Cleomenes, no, I never reason but from the plain observations which everybody may make on man, the phenomena that appear in the lesser world. Horatio, you have, without doubt, thought on this subject before now, would you communicate to me some of your guesses? Cleomenes, with abundance of pleasure. Horatio, you will give me leave now and then when things are not clear to me to put in a word for information's sake. Cleomenes, I desire you would, you will oblige me with it, that self-love was given to all animals at least, the most perfect for self-preservation is not disputed, but as no creature can love what it dislikes, it is necessary, moreover, that everyone should have a real liking to its own being, superior to what they have to any other. I am of opinion, begging pardon for the novelty, that if this liking was not always permanent, the love which all creatures have for themselves could not be so unalterable as we see it is. Horatio, what reason have you to suppose this liking which creatures have for themselves to be distinct from self-love, since the one plainly comprehends the other? Cleomenes, I will endeavor to explain myself better. I fancy that to increase the care and creatures to preserve themselves, nature has given them an instinct by which every individual values itself above its real worth. This in us, I mean in man, seems to be accomplished with a difference, arising from a consciousness, or at least an apprehension, that we do overvalue ourselves. It is that makes us so fond of the approbation, liking, and ascent of others, because they strengthen and confirm us in the good opinion we have of ourselves. The reason why this self-liking, give me leave to call it so, is not plainly to be seen in all animals that are of the same degree of perfection, are many. Some want ornaments, and consequently the means to express it, others are too stupid and listless. It is to be considered likewise, that creatures which are always in the same circumstances, and meet with little variation in their way of living, have neither opportunity nor temptation to show it. That the more metal and liveliness creatures have, the more visible this liking is. And that in those of the same kind, the greater spirit they are of, and the more they excel in the perfections of their species, the fonder they are of showing it. In most birds it is evident, especially in those that have extraordinary finery to display. In a horse it is more conspicuous than in any other irrational creature. It is most apparent in the swiftest, the strongest, the most healthy and vigorous, and may be increased in that animal by additional ornaments, and the presence of man, whom he knows, to clean, take care of, and delight in him. It is not improbable, that this great liking which creatures have for their own individuals, is the principle on which the love to their species is built. Cows and sheep, too dull and lifeless to make any demonstration of this liking, yet herd and feed together, each with his own species, because no others are so like themselves. By this they seem to know likewise, that they have the same interest, and the same enemies. Cows have often been seen to join in a common defense against wolves, birds of a feather flock together, and I dare say that the screech owl likes her own note better than that of the nightingale. Horatio, Montaigne seems to have been somewhat of your opinion when he fancied that if brutes were to paint the deity they would all draw him of their own species, but what you call self-liking is evidently pride. Cleomenes, I believe it is, or at least the cause of it. I believe moreover that many creatures show this liking when, for want of understanding them, we do not perceive it. When a cat washes her face, and a dog licks himself clean, they adorn themselves as much as it is in their power. Man himself, in a savage state, feeding on nuts and acorns, and destitute of all outward ornaments, would have infinitely less temptation, as well as opportunity, of showing this liking of himself than he has when civilized. Yet if a hundred males of the first, all equally free, were together, within less than half an hour, this liking in question, though their bellies were full, would appear in the desire of superiority that would be shown among them, and the most vigorous, either in strength or understanding, or both, would be the first that would display it. If, as supposed, they were all untaught, this would breed contention, and there would certainly be war before there could be any agreement among them, unless one of them had some one or more visible excellencies above the rest. I said males and their bellies full, because if they had women among them or wanted food, their quarrel might begin on another account. Horatio, this is thinking abstractly indeed, but do you think that two or three hundred single savages, men and women, that never had been under any subjection and were above twenty years of age, could ever establish a society and be united into one body, if, without being acquainted with one another, they should meet by chance? Cleomenes, no more I believe than so many horses, but societies never were made that way. It is possible that several families of savages might unite, and the heads of them agree upon some sort of government or other, for their common good, but among them it is certain likewise that those superiority was tolerably well settled, and every male had females enough, strength and prowess in this uncivilized state would be infinitely more valued than understanding. I mean in the men, for the women will always prize themselves for what they see the men admire in them. Hence it would follow that the women would value themselves and envy one another for being handsome, ugly and deformed, and all those that were least favored by nature would be the first that would fly to art and additional ornaments. Seeing that this made them more agreeable to men, it would soon be followed by the rest, and in a little time they would strive to outdo one another as much as their circumstances would allow of. And it is possible that a woman with a very handsome nose might envy her neighbor with a much worse for having a ring through it. You take great delight in dwelling on the behavior of savages, but relation has this to politeness. Cleomenes, the seeds of it are lodged in this self-love and self-liking, which I have spoke of, as will soon appear if we would consider what would be the consequence of them in the affair of self-preservation, and a creature endued with understanding, speech and visibility. Self-love would first make it scrape together everything it wanted for sustenance, provide against the injuries of the air, and do everything to make itself and young ones secure. Self-liking would make it seek for opportunities by gestures, looks and sounds to display the value it has for itself, superior to what it has for others. An untaught man would desire everybody that came near him to agree with him in the opinion of his superior worth, and be angry as far as his fear would let him with all that should refuse it. He would be highly delighted with and love everybody whom he thought to have a good opinion of him, especially those that, by words or gestures, should own it to his face. Whenever he met with any visible marks and others of inferiority to himself, he would laugh and do the same at their misfortunes, as far as his own pity would give him leave, and he would insult everybody that would let him. Horatio, this self-liking, you say, was given to creatures for self-preservation. I should think rather that it is hurtful to men, because it must make them odious to one another, and I cannot see what benefit they can receive from it, either in a savage or a civilized state. Is there any instance of its doing any good? Cleomenes, I wonder to hear you ask that question. Have you forgotten the many virtues which I have demonstrated may be counter-fitted to gain applause, and the good qualities a man of sense and great fortune may acquire by the sole help and instigation of his pride? Horatio, I beg your pardon, yet what you say only regards man in the society, and after he has been perfectly well educated. What advantage is it to him as a single creature? Self-love I can plainly see induces him to labor for his maintenance and safety, and makes him fond of everything which he imagines to tend to his preservation, but what good does the self-liking to him? Cleomenes, if I should tell you that the inward pleasure and satisfaction a man receives from the gratification of that passion is a cordial that contributes to his health, he would laugh at me and think it far-fetched. Horatio, perhaps not, but I would set against it the many sharp vexations and heartbreaking sorrows that men suffer on the score for this passion from disgraces, disappointments, and other misfortunes which, I believe, have sent millions to their graves much sooner than they would have gone if their pride had less affected them. Cleomenes, I have nothing against what you say, but it is no proof that the passion itself was not given to man for self-preservation, and it only lays open to us the precariousness of subliminary happiness and the wretched condition of mortals. There is nothing created that is always a blessing. The rain and sunshine themselves, to which all earthly comforts are owing, have been the causes of innumerable calamities. All animals of prey and thousand others hunt after food with the hazard of their lives, and the greater part of them perish in their pursuits after sustenance. Plenty itself is not less fatal to some than want is to others, and of our own species every opulent nation has had great numbers that in full safety from all other dangers have destroyed themselves by excesses of eating and drinking. Yet nothing is more certain than that hunger and thirst were given to creatures to make them solicitous after and crave those necessaries without which it would be impossible for them to subsist. Horatio, still I can see no advantage accruing from their self-liking to man, considered as a single creature which can induce me to believe that nature should have given it us for self-preservation. What you have alleged is obscure. Can you name a benefit every individual person receives from that principle within him that is manifest and clearly to be understood? Cleomenes. Since it has been in disgrace and everybody disowns the passion its seldom is seen in its proper colors and disguises itself in a thousand different shapes. We are often affected with it when we have not the least suspicion of it. But it seems to be that which continually furnishes us with what relish we have for life even when it is not worth having. Whilst men are pleased self-liking has every moment a considerable share though unknown in procuring the satisfaction they enjoy. It is so necessary to the well-being of those that have been used to indulge it that they can taste no pleasure without it and such is the deference and the submissive veneration they pay to it that they are deaf to the loudest calls of nature and will rebuke the strongest appetites that should pretend to be gratified at the expense of that passion. It doubles our happiness in prosperity and buoys us up against the frowns of adverse fortune. It is the mother of hopes and the end as well as the foundation of our best wishes. It is the strongest armor against despair and as long as we can like any ways our situation either in regard to present circumstances or the prospect before us. We take care of ourselves and no man can resolve upon suicide whilst self-liking lasts. But as soon as that is over all our hopes are extinct and we can form no wishes but for the dissolution of our frame till at last our being becomes so intolerable to us that self-love prompts us to make an end of it and seek refuge and death. Horatio, you mean self-hatred for you have said yourself that a creature cannot love what it dislikes. Cleomenes, if you turn the prospect you are in the right but this only proves to us what I have often hinted at that man is made up of contraries otherwise nothing seems to be more certain than that whoever kills himself by choice must do it to avoid something which he dreads more than that death which he chooses. Therefore how absurd so ever a person's reasoning may be there is in all suicide a palpable intention of kindness to oneself. Horatio, I must own that your observations are entertaining. I am very well pleased with your discourse and I see an agreeable glimmering of probability that runs through it but you have said nothing that comes up to a half proof on the side of your conjecture if it be seriously considered. Cleomenes, I told you before that I would lay no stress upon nor draw any conclusions from it but whatever nature's design was in bestowing this self-liking on creatures and whether it has been given to other animals besides ourselves or not it is certain that in our own species every individual person likes himself better than he does any other. Horatio, it may be so generally speaking but that it is not universally true I can assure you from my own experience for I have often wished myself to be Count Theodati whom you knew at Rome. Cleomenes, he was a very fine person indeed and extremely well accomplished and therefore you wish to be such another which is all you could mean. Celia has a very handsome face, fine eyes, fine teeth but she has red hair and is ill-made therefore she wishes for Chloe's hair and Belinda's shape but she would still remain Celia. Horatio, but I wished that I might have been that person, that very Theodati. Cleomenes, that is impossible. Horatio, what? Is it impossible to wish it? Cleomenes, yes, to wish it unless you wished for annihilation at the same time. It is that self we wish well to and therefore we cannot wish for any change in ourselves but with a proviso, that toe self that part of us that wishes should still remain for take away that consciousness you had of yourself whilst you was wishing and tell me, pray, what part of it you is that could be the better for the alteration you wished for? Horatio, I believe you are in the right no man can wish but to enjoy something which no part of that same man could do if he was entirely another. Cleomenes, that he itself the person wishing must be destroyed before the change could be entire. Horatio, but when shall we come to the origin of politeness? Cleomenes, we are at it now and we need not look any further than in the self-liking which I have demonstrated every individual man to be possessed of. Do but consider these two things. First, that from the nature of that passion it must follow that all untaught men will ever be hateful to one another in conversation where neither interest nor superiority are considered. Four, if of two equals one only values himself more by half than he does the other though that other should value the first equally with himself they would both be dissatisfied if their thoughts were known to each other but if both valued themselves more by half than they did each other the difference between them would still be greater and a declaration of their sentiments would render them both insufferable to each other which among uncivilized men would happen every moment because without a mixture of art and trouble the outward symptoms of that passion are not to be stifled. The second thing I would have you consider is the effect which in all human probability this inconvenience arising from self-liking would have upon creatures endued with a great share of understanding that are fond of their ease to the last degree and as industrious to procure it. These two things I say but duly weigh and you shall find that the disturbance and uneasiness that must be caused by self-liking whatever struggleings and unsuccessful trials to remedy them might precede must necessarily produce at long run what we call good manners and politeness. Horatio, I understand you I believe everybody in this undisciplined state is affected with the high value he has for himself and displaying the most natural symptoms which you have described they would all be offended at the bear-faced pride of their neighbors and it is impossible that this should continue long among rational creatures but the repeated experience of the uneasiness they received from such behavior would make some of them reflect on the cause of it which, in tractive time, would make them find out that their own bear-faced pride must be as offensive to others as that of others is to themselves. Cleomenes, what you say is certainly the philosophical reason of the alterations that are made in the behavior of men by their being civilized but all this is done without reflection and men by degrees and great length of time fall as it were into these things spontaneously. Horatio, how is that possible when it must cost them trouble and there is a palpable self-denial to be seen by the restraint they put upon themselves? Cleomenes, in the pursuit of self-preservation men discover a restless endeavor to make themselves easy which insensibly teaches them to avoid mischief on all emergencies and when human creatures once submit to government and are used to live under the restraint of laws it is incredible how many useful cautions, shifts and stratagems they will learn to practice by experience and imitation without being aware of the natural causes that oblige them to act as they do vis the passions within that unknown themselves govern their will and direct their behavior. Horatio, you will make men mere machines as cart does brutes. Cleomenes, I have no such design but I am of opinion that men find out the use of their limbs by instinct as much as brutes do the use of theirs and that without knowing anything of geometry or arithmetic, even children may learn to perform actions that seem to be speak great skill in mechanics and a considerable depth of thought and ingenuity in the contrivance besides. Horatio, what actions are they which you judge this from? Cleomenes, the advantageous postures which they will choose in resisting force in pulling, pushing or otherwise removing weight from their slight and dexterity in throwing stones and other projectiles and the stupendous cunning made use of in leaping. Horatio, what stupendous cunning I pray? Cleomenes, when men would leap or jump a great way, you know they take a run before they throw themselves off the ground it is certain that by this means they jump farther and with greater force than they could do otherwise the reason likewise is very plain the body partakes of and is moved by two motions and the velocity impressed upon it by leaping must be added to so much as it retained the velocity that was put into by running whereas the body of a person who takes this leap as he is standing still has no other motion than what is received from the muscular strength exerted in the act of leaping. See a thousand boys as well as men jump and they will make use of this stratagem but you will not find one of them that does it knowingly for that reason what I have said of that stratagem I desire you would apply to the doctrine of good manners which is taught and practiced by millions who never thought on the origin of politeness or so much as knew the real benefit it is of to society. The most crafty and designing will everywhere be the first that for interest's sake will learn to conceal this passion of pride and in a little time nobody will show the least symptom of it whilst he is asking favors or stands in need of help Horatio, that rational creature should do all this without thinking or knowing what they are about is inconceivable, bodily motion is one thing and the exercise of the understanding is another and therefore agreeable postures, a graceful mean an easy carriage and a gentile outward behavior in general may be learned and contracted perhaps without much thought but good manners are to be observed everywhere in speaking, writing and ordering actions to be performed by others Cleomenes, to men who never turned their thoughts that way it certainly is almost inconceivable to what prodigious height from next to nothing some art may be and have been raised by human industry and application by the uninterrupted labor and joint experience of many ages though none but men of ordinary capacity should ever be employed in them what a noble as well as beautiful what a glorious machine is a first rate man of war when she is under sail, well rigged and well manned as in bulk and weight it is vastly superior to any other movable body of human invention so there is no other that has an equal variety of differently surprising contrivance to boast of there are many sets of hands in the nation that not wanting proper materials would be able in less than half a year to produce, fit out and navigate a first rate, yet it is certain that this task would be impracticable if it was not divided and subdivided into a great variety of different labors and it is as certain that none of these labors require any other than working men of ordinary capacities. Horatio, what would you infer from this? Cleomenes, that we often ascribe to the excellency of man's genius and the depth of his penetration what is in reality owing to the time and the experience of many generations all of them very little different from one another in natural parts and sagacity and to know what it must have cost to bring that art of making ships for different purposes to the perfection in which it is now we are only to consider in the first place that many considerable improvements have been made in it within these fifty years and less and in the second the inhabitants of this island did build and make use of ships eighteen hundred years ago and that from that time to this they have never been without. Horatio, which altogether make a strong proof of the slow progress that art has made to be what it is. Cleomenes, the Chevalier Renault has wrote a book in which he shows the mechanism of sailing and accounts mathematically for everything that belongs to the working and steering of a ship. I am persuaded that neither the first inventors of ships in sailing or those who have made improvements since in any part of them ever dreamed of those reasons any more than now the rudest and most illiterate of the vulgar do when they are made sailors which time and practice will do in spite of their teeth. We have thousands of them that were first hauled on board and detained against their wills and yet in less than three years time knew every rope and every pulley in the ship and without the least scrap of mathematics had learned the management as well as use of them much better than the greatest mathematician could have done in all his lifetime if he had never been at sea. The book I mentioned among other curious things demonstrates what angle the rudder must make with the keel to render its influence upon the ship the most powerful. This has its merit but a lad of fifteen who has served a year of his time on board of a hoy knows everything that is useful in this demonstration practically. Seeing the poop always answering the motion of the helm he only minds the latter without making the least reflection on the rudder until in a year or two more his knowledge and sailing and capacity of steering his vessel become so habitual to him that he guides her as he does his own body by instinct though he is half asleep or thinking on quite another thing. Horatio if as you said in which I now believe to be true the people first invented and afterwards improved upon ships and sailing never dreamed of those reasons of Monsieur Renault it is impossible that they should have acted from them as motives that induced them a priori to put their inventions and improvements in place with knowledge and design which I suppose is what you intended to prove. Cleomenes it is and I verily believe not only that the raw beginners who made the first essays in either art good manners as well as sailing were ignorant of the true cause the real foundation those arts are built upon in nature but likewise that even now both arts are brought to great perfection the greatest part of those that are most expert and daily making improvements in them know as little of the rationale of them as their predecessors did at first though I believe at the same time Monsieur Renault's reasons to be very just and yours as good as his that is I believe that there is as much truth and solidity in your accounting for the origin of good manners as there is in his for the management of ships they are very seldom the same sort of people those that invent arts and improvements in them and those that inquire into the reason of things this ladder is most commonly practiced by such as our idle and indolent that are fond of retirement hate business and take delight in speculation whereas none succeed oftener in the first than active stirring and laborious men such as will put their hand to the plough try experiments and give all their attention to what they are about Horatio it is commonly imagined that speculative men are the best at invention of all sorts Cleomenes yet it is a mistake soap boiling grain drying and other trades and mysteries are from mean beginnings brought to great perfection but the many improvements that can be remembered to have been have for the generality been owing to persons who either were brought up to or had long practiced and had been conversant in those trades and not to general proficient in chemistry or other parts of philosophy whom one would naturally expect those things from in some of these arts especially grain or scarlet dying there are processes really astonishing and by the mixture of various ingredients by fire and fermentation several operations are performed which the most sagacious naturalist cannot account for by any system yet known a certain sign that they were not invented by reasoning a priori when once the generality begin to conceal the high value they have for themselves men must become more tolerable to one another now new improvements must be made every day until some of them grow impudent enough not only to deny the high value they have for themselves but likewise to pretend that they have greater value for others than they have for themselves this will bring in complacence and now flattery will rush in upon them like a torrent as soon as they are arrived at this pitch of insincerity they will find the benefit of it and teach it their children the passion of shame is so general and so early discovered in all human creatures that no nation can be so stupid as to be long without observing and making use of it accordingly the same may be said of the credulity of infants which is very inviting to many good purposes the knowledge of parents is communicated to their offspring and everyone's experience in life being added to what he learned in his youth every generation after this must be better taught than the proceeding by which means in two or three centuries good manners must be brought to great perfection Horatio when they are thus far advanced it is easy to conceive the rest for improvements I suppose are made in good manners as they are in all other arts and sciences but to commence from savages men I believe would make but a small progress in good manners the first 300 years the Romans who had a much better beginning had been a nation above six centuries and were almost masters of the world before they could be said to be a polite people what I am most astonished at and which I am now convinced of is that the basis of all this machinery is pride another thing I wonder at is that you choose to speak of a nation that entered upon good manners before they had any notions of virtue or religion which I believe there never was in the world Cleomenes pardon me Horatio I have nowhere insinuated that they had none but I had no reason to mention them in the first place you asked my opinion concerning the use of politeness in this world abstract from the considerations of a future state secondly the art of good manners has nothing to do with virtue or religion though it seldom clashes with either it is a science that is ever built on the same steady principle in our nature whatever the age or climate may be in which it is practiced Horatio how can anything be said not to clash with virtue or religion that has nothing to do with either and consequently disclaims both Cleomenes this I confess seems to be a paradox yet it is true the doctrine of good manners teaches men to speak well of all virtues but requires no more of them in any age or country than the outward appearance of those in fashion and as to sacred matters it is everywhere satisfied with seeming conformity and outward worship for all the religions in the universe are equally agreeable to good manners where they are national and pray what opinion must we say a teacher to be of to whom all opinions are probably alike all the precepts of good manners throughout the world have the same tendency and are no more than the various methods of making ourselves acceptable to others with as little prejudice to ourselves as is possible by which artifice we assist one another in the enjoyments of life and the refining upon pleasure and every individual person is rendered more happy by it in the fruition of all good things he can purchase then he could have been without such behavior I mean happy in the sense of the voluptuous let us look back on old Greece the Roman Empire or the great eastern nations that flourished before them and we shall find that luxury and politeness ever grew up together and were never enjoyed asunder that comfort and delight upon earth have always employed the wishes of the Beaumond and that as their chief study and greatest solicitude to outward appearance have ever been directed to obtain happiness in this world so what would become of them in the next seems to the naked eye always to have been the least of their concern Horatio I thank you for your lecture you have satisfied me in several things which I had intended to ask but you have said some others that I must have time to consider after which I am resolved to wait upon you again for I begin to believe that concerning the knowledge of ourselves most books are either very defective or very deceitful Cleomenes there is not a more copious nor a more faithful volume than human nature to those who will diligently peruse it and I sincerely believe that I have discovered nothing to you which if you had thought of it with attention you would not have found out yourself but I shall never be better pleased with myself than when I can contribute to any entertainment you shall think by averting end of section 38 section 39 of The Fable of the Bees by Bernard Mandeville this LibriVox recording is in the public domain the fourth dialogue between Horatio and Cleomenes Cleomenes your servant Horatio what say you now Cleomenes is it not this without ceremony? Cleomenes you are very obliging Horatio when they told me where you was I would suffer nobody to tell you who it was that wanted you or to come up with me Cleomenes this is friendly indeed Horatio you see what a proficient I am in a little time you will teach me to lay aside all good manners Cleomenes you make a fine tutor of me Horatio you will pardon me I know this study of yours is a very pretty place Cleomenes I like it because the sun never enters it Horatio a very pretty room Cleomenes shall we sit down in it it is the coolest room in the house Horatio with all my heart Cleomenes I was in no hopes to have seen you before now you have taken a long time to consider Horatio just eight days? Cleomenes have you thought on the novelty I started? Horatio I have and I think it not void of probability for that there are no innate ideas and men come into the world without any knowledge at all I am convinced of and therefore it is evident to me that all arts and sciences must once have had a beginning in somebody's brain whatever oblivion that may now be lost in I have thought twenty times since I saw you last on the origin of good manners and what a pleasant scene it would be to a man who is tolerably well versed in the world to see among a rude nation those first essays they made of concealing their pride from one another Cleomenes you see by this that it is chiefly the novelty of things that strikes as well in beginning our aversion as in gaining our approbation and that we may look upon many indifferently when they come to be familiar to us though they were shocking when they were new you are now diverting yourself with a truth which eight days ago you would have given a hundred guineas not to have known Horatio I begin to believe there is nothing so absurd that it would appear to us to be such if we had been accustomed to it very young Cleomenes in a tolerable education we are so industriously and assiduously instructed from our most early infancy in the ceremonies of bowing and pulling off hats and other rules of behavior that even before we are men we hardly look upon a mannerly deportment as a thing acquired or think conversation to be a science thousand things are called easy and natural in postures and motions as well as speaking and writing that have caused infinite pains to others as well as ourselves and which we know to be the product of art what awkward lumps have I known which the dancing master has put limbs to Horatio yesterday morning as I sat musing by myself an expression of yours which I did not so much reflect upon at first when I heard it came my head and made me smile speaking of the rudiments of good manners in an infant's nation when they once entered upon concealing their pride you said that improvements would be made every day quote till some of them grew impudent enough not only to deny the high value they had for themselves but likewise to pretend that they had greater value for others than they had for themselves unquote Cleomenes it is certain that this everywhere must have been the forerunner of flattery Horatio, when you talk of flattery and impudence what do you think of the first man that had the face to tell his equal that he was his humble servant Cleomenes, if that had been a new compliment I should have wondered much more at the simplicity of the proud man that swallowed than I would have done at the impudence of the nave that made it Horatio, it certainly once was knew which prey do you believe more ancient, pulling off the hat or saying your humble servant Cleomenes, they are both of them gothic and modern Horatio, I believe pulling off the hat was first it being the emblem of liberty Cleomenes, I do not think so for he who pulled off his hat the first time could not have been understood if saying your servant had not been practiced and to show respect a man as well might have pulled off one of his shoes as his hat if saying your servant had not been an established and well known compliment, Horatio so he might as you say and had a better authority for the first than he could have for the latter Cleomenes, and to this day taking off the hat is a dumb show of a known civility in words my now the power of custom and imbibed notions we both laugh at this gothic absurdity and are well assured that it must have had its origin from the basest flattery yet neither of us walking with our hats on could meet an acquaintance with whom we are not very familiar without showing this piece of civility, nay it would be a pain to us not to do it but we have no reason to think that the compliment of saying your servant began among equals but rather that flatterers having given it to princes it drew afterwards more common for all those postures inflections of body and limbs had in all probability their rise from the adulation that was paid to conquerors and tyrants who having everybody to fear were always alarmed at the least show of opposition and never better pleased than with submissive and defenseless postures and you see that they all have a tendency that way they promise security and are silent endeavors to cease and rid them not only of their fears but likewise every suspicion of harm approaching them such as lying prostrate on our faces touching the ground with our hands kneeling bowing low laying our hands upon our breasts or holding them behind us folding our arms together and all the cringes that can be made to demonstrate that we neither indulge our ease nor stand upon our guard these are evident signs and convincing proofs to a superior that we have a mean opinion of ourselves in respect to him that we are at his mercy and have no thought to resist much less to attack him highly probable that saying your servant and pulling off the hat were at first demonstrations of obedience to those that claimed it Horatio which in tractive time became more familiar and were made use of reciprocally in the way of civility Cleomenes I believe so for as good manners increase we see that the highest compliments are made common and new ones to superiors invented instead of them Horatio so the word grace not long ago was a title that none but our kings and queens were honored with is devolved upon archbishops and dukes Cleomenes it was the same with highness which is now given to the children and even the grandchildren of kings Horatio the dignity that is annexed to the signification of the word lord has been better preserved with us than in most countries in Spanish, Italian, high and low Dutch it is prostituted to almost everybody Cleomenes it has had a better fate in France where likewise the word sire has lost nothing of its majesty and is only used to the monarch whereas with us it is a compliment of a dress that may be made to a cobbler as well as to a king Horatio whatever alterations may be made in the sense of words by time yet as the world grows more polished flattery becomes less bare faced and the design of it upon man's pride is better disguised than it was formerly to praise a man to his face was very common among the ancients considering humility to be a virtue particularly required of Christians I have often wondered how the fathers of the church could suffer those acclamations and applause that were made to them whilst they were preaching and which though some of them spoke against them many of them appear to have been extremely fond of Cleomenes human nature is always the same where they exert themselves to the utmost and take uncommon pains that spend and waste the spirits those applause are very reviving the fathers who spoke against them spoke chiefly against the abuse of them Horatio it must have been very odd to hear people bawling out as often the greatest part of an audience did Sophos divinitus non-potest Melius Mirabiliter acreter ingenius they told the preachers likewise that they were orthodox and sometimes called them Apostolus decimus terseus Cleomenes these words at the end of a period might have passed but the repetitions of them were often so loud and so general and the noise they made with their hands and feet so disturbing in and out of season that they could not hear a quarter of the sermon yet several fathers owned that it was highly delightful and soothing human frailty Horatio the behavior at churches is more decent as it is now Cleomenes since paganism has been quite extinct in the old western world the zeal of Christians is much diminished from what it was when they had many opposers the want of fervency had a great hand in abolishing that fashion Horatio but whether it was the fashion or not it must always have been shocking Cleomenes do you think that the repeated acclamations the clapping stamping and the most extravagant tokens of applause that are now used at our several theaters were ever shocking to a favorite actor or that the hazzas of the mob or the hideous shouts of soldiers were ever shocking to persons of the highest distinction to whose honor they were made Horatio I have known princes that were very much tired with them Cleomenes when they had too much of them but never at first in a working machine we ought to have regard to the strength of its frame limited creatures are not susceptible to infinite delight therefore we see that a pleasure protracted beyond its due bounds becomes a pain but where the custom of the country is not broken in upon no noise that is palpably made in our praise and which we may hear with decency can ever be ungrateful if it do not outlast a reasonable time but there is no cordial so sovereign that it may not become offensive by being taken to excess Horatio and the sweeter and more delicious liquors are the sooner they become fulsome and the less fit they are to sit by Cleomenes your simile is not a miss and the same acclamations that are ravishing to a man at first and perhaps continue to give him an unspeakable delight for eight or nine minutes may become more moderately pleasing indifferent, clawing troublesome and even so offensive as to create pain all in less than three hours if they were to continue so long without intermission. Horatio there must be great witchcraft and sounds that they should have such different effects upon us as we often see they have. Cleomenes the pleasure we receive from acclamations is not in the hearing but proceeds from the opinion we form of the causes that produces those sounds, the approbation of others. At the theaters all over Italy you have heard that when the whole audience demands and attention which there is an established mark of benevolence and applause the noise they make comes very near and is hardly to be distinguished from our hissing which with us is the plainest token of dislike and contempt and without doubt the catcalls to a front Faustina were far more agreeable to Cosoni than the most artful sound she ever heard from her triumphant rival. Horatio that was abominable. Cleomenes the Turks show their respects to their sovereigns by profound silence which is strictly kept throughout the Saraglio and still more religiously observed than nearer you come to the sultan's apartment. Horatio this latter is certainly the politer way of gratifying one's pride. Cleomenes all that depends on mode and custom. Horatio but the offerings that are made to a man's pride and silence may be enjoyed without the loss of his hearing which the other cannot. Cleomenes that is a trifle and the gratification of that passion we never enjoy higher pleasure from the appetite we would indulge than when we feel nothing from any other. Horatio but silence expresses greater homage and deeper veneration than noise. Cleomenes it is good to soothe the pride of a drone but an active man loves to have that passion roused and as it were kept awake whilst it is gratified and approbation from noise is more unquestionable than the other. However I will not determine between them much may be said on both sides. The Greeks and Romans use sounds to stir up men to noble actions with great success and the silence observed among the Ottomans has kept them very well in the slavish submission which their sovereigns require of them. Perhaps the one does better were absolute power as lodged in one person and the other where there is some show of liberty. Both are proper tools to flatter the pride of man when they are understood and made use of as such. I have known a very brave man used to the shouts of war and highly delighted with loud applause be very angry with his butler for making a little rattling with his plates. Horatio an old aunt of mine the other day turned away a very clever fellow for not walking upon his toes and I must own myself that the stamping of footmen and all unmanorly loudness of servants are very offensive to me though I never entered into the reason of it before now. In our last conversation when you describe the symptoms of self liking and what the behavior would be of an uncivilized man you named laughing I know it is one of the characteristics of our species. Pray do you take that to be likewise the result of pride? Cleomenes Hobbes is of that opinion and in most instances it might be derived from vents but there are some phenomena not to be explained by that hypothesis therefore I would choose to say that laughter is a mechanical motion which we are naturally thrown into when we are unaccountably pleased when our pride is feeling gratified when we hear or see anything which we admire or approve of or when we are indulging any other passion or appetite and the reason why we are pleased seems to be just and worthy we are then far from laughing these or actions are odd and out of the way and happen to please us when we can give no just reason why they should do so it is then generally speaking that they make us laugh Horatio I would rather side with what you said was Hobbes opinion for the things we commonly laugh at are such as are some way or other mortifying unbecoming or prejudicial to others Cleomenes but what will you say to tickling which will make an infant laugh that is deaf and blind Horatio can you account for that by your system? Cleomenes not to my satisfaction but I will tell you what might be said for it we know by experience that the smoother the softer and the more sensible skin is the more ticklish persons are generally speaking we know likewise that things rough sharp and hard when they touch the skin are displeasing to us even before they give pain and that on the contrary everything applied to the skin that is soft and smooth and not otherwise offensive is delightful it is possible that gentle touches being impressed on several nervous filaments at once every one of them producing a pleasing sensation may create that confused pleasure which is the occasion of laughter Horatio but how came you to think of mechanic motion in the pleasure of a free agent Cleomenes whatever free agency we may pretend to the overwhelming of ideas the effect of them upon the body is independent of the will nothing is more directly opposite to laughing than frowning the one draws wrinkles on the forehead knits the brows and keeps the mouth shut the other does quite the reverse expore gare frontem you know is a Latin phrase for being merry in sighing the muscles of the belly and breast are pulled inward and the diaphragm is pulled upward more than ordinary and we seem to endeavor though in vain to squeeze and compress the heart whilst we draw in our breath in a forcible manner and when in that squeezing posture we have taken in as much air as we can contain we throw it out with the same violence we sucked it in with and at the same time give a sudden relaxation to all the muscles we employed before nature certainly designed this for something in the labor for self-preservation which she forces upon us how mechanically do all creatures that can make any sound cry out and complain in great afflictions as well as pain and imminent danger in great torments the efforts of nature are so violent that way that to disappoint her and to prevent the discovery of what we feel by sounds and what she bids us make we are forced to draw our mouth into a purse or else suck in our breath bite our lips or squeeze them close together and use the most effectual scenes to hinder the air from coming out in grief we sigh in mirth we laugh and the latter little stress is laid upon the respiration and this is performed with less regularity than it is at any other time all the muscles without and everything within feel loose and seem to have no other motion than what is communicated to them by the convulsive shakes of laughter Horatio, I have seen people laugh till they lost all their strength Cleomenes, how much is all this the reverse of what we observe in sighing when pain or depth of woe make us cry out the mouth is drawn round or at least into an oval the lips are thrusted forward without touching each other and the tongue is pulled in which is the reason that all nations when they exclaim cry Horatio, why pray Cleomenes, because whilst the mouth, lips and tongue remain in those postures with no other vowel and no consonant at all in laughing the lips are pulled back and strained to draw the mouth in its fullest length Horatio, I would not have you lay a great stress upon that for it is the same in weeping which is an undoubted sign of sorrow Cleomenes, in great afflictions where the heart is oppressed and anxieties which we endeavor to resist few people can weep but when they do it removes the oppression for then the resistance is gone and weeping in distress is not so much a sign of sorrow as it is an indication that we can bear our sorrow no longer and therefore it is counted unmanly to weep because it seems to give up our strength and is a kind of yielding to our grief but the action of weeping itself is not more peculiar to grief than it is to joy in adult people and there are men who show great fortitude in afflictions and bear the greatest fortunes with dry eyes that will cry heartily at a moving scene in a play some are easily wrought upon by one thing others are sooner affected with another but whatever touches us so forcibly as to overwhelm the mind prompts us to weep and is the mechanical cause of tears and therefore besides grief joy and pity there are other things no way relating to ourselves that may have this effect upon us such as the relation of surprising events and sudden turns of providence in behalf of merit instances of heroism of generosity in love and friendship in an enemy or the hearing or reading of noble thoughts and sentiments of humanity more especially if these things are conveyed to us suddenly in an agreeable manner and are looked for as well as lively expressions we shall observe likewise that none are more subject to this frailty of shedding tears on such foreign accounts than persons of ingenuity and quick apprehension and those among them that are the most benevolent generous and open-hearted whereas the dull and stupid the cruel selfish and designing are very seldom troubled with it weeping therefore in earnest is always a sure and involuntary demonstration that something strikes and overcomes the mind whatever that be which affects it we find likewise that outward violence as sharp winds and smoke the effluvia of onions and other volatile salts etc have the same effect upon the external fibers of the lacrimal ducts and glands that are exposed which the sudden swelling and pressure of the spirit has upon those within the divine wisdom is in nothing more conspicuous than in the infinite variety of living creatures of different construction every part of them being contrived with stupendous skill and fitted with the utmost accuracy for the different purposes they were designed for the human body above all is a most astonishing masterpiece of art the anatomist may have a perfect knowledge of all the bones and their ligaments the muscles and their tendons and be able to dissect every nerve and every membrane with great exactness the naturalists likewise may dive a great way into the inward economy and different symptoms of health and sickness they may all approve of and admire the curious machine but no man can have a tolerable idea of the contrivance, the art and the beauty of the workmanship itself even in those things he can see without being likewise versed in geometry and mechanics Horatio, how long is it a go that mathematics were brought into physics? that art I have heard is brought to great certainty by them Cleomenes, what you speak of is quite another thing mathematics never had can have anything to do with physics if you mean by the art of curing the sick the structure and motions of the body may perhaps be mechanically accounted for and all fluids are under the laws of hydrostatics but we can have no help from any part of the mechanics in the discovery of things infinitely remote from sight and entirely unknown as to their shapes and bulks physicians with the rest of mankind are wholly ignorant of the first principles and constituent parts of things in which all the virtues and properties of them consist and this as well as the blood and other juices of the body as the symbols and consequently all the medicines they make use of there is no art that has less certainty than theirs and the most valuable knowledge in it arises from observation and is such as a man of parts and application who has fitted himself for that study can only be possessed of after a long and judicious experience but the pretense to mathematics or the usefulness of it in the cure of diseases is a cheat and as errant a piece of quackery as a stage and a Mary Andrew Horatio but since there is so much skill displayed in the bones muscles and grosser parts is it not reasonable to think that there is no less art bestowed on those that are beyond the reach of our senses. Cleomenies I know why is doubt it microscopes have opened a new world to us and I am far from thinking that nature should leave off her work where we can trace her no further I am persuaded that our thoughts and the affections of the mind have a more certain and more mechanical influence upon several parts of the body than has been hitherto or in all human probability ever will be discovered the visible effect they have on the eyes and the muscles of the face must show the least attentive the reason I have for this assertion when in men's company upon our guard and would preserve our dignity the lips are shut and the jaws meet the muscles of the mouth are gently braced and the rest all over the face are kept firmly in their places turn away from these into another room where you meet with a fine young lady that is affable and easy immediately before you can think on it your countenance will be strangely altered and without being conscious of having done anything to your face you will have quite another look and everybody that has observed you will discover in it more sweetness and less severity than you had the moment before when we suffer the lower jaw to sink down the mouth opens a little if in this posture we look straight before us without fixing our eyes on anything we may imitate the countenance of a natural by dropping as it were our features and laying no stress on any muscle of the face infants before they have learned to swallow generally keep their mouths open and are always driveling in them before they show any understanding and whilst it is yet very confused the muscles of the face are as it were relaxed the lower jaw falls down and the fibers of the lips are unbraced at least these phenomena we observe in them during that time more often than we do afterwards in extreme old age when people begin to dot those symptoms return and most idiots they continue to be observed as long as they live hence it is that we say that a man wants a slabbering bib when he behaves very silly or talks like a natural fool when we reflect on all this on the one hand and consider on the other that none are less prone to anger than idiots and no creatures are less affected with pride I would ask whether there is not some degree of self liking that mechanically influences and seems to assist us in the decent wearing of our faces Horatio I cannot resolve you what I know very well is that by these conjectures on the mechanism of man I find my understanding very little informed I wonder how we came upon the subject Cleomenes you inquired into the origin of visibility which nobody can give an account of with any certainty and in such cases everybody is at liberty to make guesses no conclusions from them to the prejudice of anything better established but the chief design I had in giving you these indigested thoughts was to hint to you how really mysterious the works of nature are I mean how replete they are everywhere with a power glaringly conspicuous and yet incomprehensible beyond all human reach in order to demonstrate that more useful knowledge may be acquired from unwirried observation judicious experience arguing from facts a posteriori then from the haughty attempts of entering into first causes and reasoning a priori I do not believe there is a man in the world of that sagacity if he was wholly unacquainted with the nature of a spring watch that he would ever find out by dint of penetration the cause of its motion if he was never to see the inside but every middling capacity may be certain by seeing only the outside that it's pointing at the hour and keeping to time proceed from the exactness of some curious workmanship that is hid and that the motion of the hands what number of resorts so ever it is communicated by is originally owing to something else that first moves within in the same manner we are sure that as the effects of thought upon the body are palpable several motions are produced by it by contact and consequently mechanically but the parts the instruments which that operation is performed with are so immensely far remote from our senses and the swiftness of the action is so prodigious that it infinitely surpasses our capacity to trace them Horatio, but is not thinking the business of the soul? What has mechanism to do with that? Cleomenes, the soul whilst in the body cannot be said to think otherwise as an architect is said to build a house where the carpenter's brick layers etc. do the work which he chocks out and super intends Horatio, which part of the brain do you think the soul to be more immediately lodged in? Or do you take it to be diffused throughout the whole? Cleomenes, I know nothing of it more than what I have told you already Horatio, I plainly feel that this operation of thinking is a labour or at least something that is transacting in my head and not in my leg or my arm what inside our real knowledge have we from anatomy concerning it? Cleomenes, none at all a priori, the most consummate anatomist knows no more of it than a butcher's apprentice. We may admire the curious duplicate of coats and close embroidery of veins and arteries that environ the brain, but when dissecting it we have viewed the several pairs of nerves with their origin and taken notice of some glands of various shapes and sizes which differing from the brain in substance could not but rush in view when these, I say, have been taken notice of and distinguished by different names some of them not very pertinent and less polite the best naturalist may acknowledge that even of these large visible parts there are but few the nerves and blood vessels accepted at the use of which he can give any tolerable guesses but as to the mysterious structure of the brain itself and the more abstruse economy of it that he knows nothing seems to be a medullary substance compactly treasured up in infinite millions of imperceptible cells that disposed in an unconceivable order are cluttered together in a perplexing variety of folds and windings he will add perhaps that it is reasonable to think this to be the capacious exchequer of human knowledge in which the faithful senses deposit the vast treasure of images constantly as through their organs they receive them that it is the office in which the spirits are separated from the blood and afterwards sublimed and volatilized into particles hardly corporeal and that the most minute of these are always either searching for or variously disposing the images retained and shooting through the infinite meanders of that wonderful substance employ themselves without ceasing in that inexplicable performance the contemplation of which fills the most exalted genius with amazement peratio these are very airy conjectures but nothing of all this can be proved the smallness of the parts you will say is the reason but if greater improvements were made in optic glasses and microscopes could be invented that magnified objects three or four millions of times more than they do now then certainly those minute particles so immensely remote from the senses you speak of might be observed if that which does the work is corporeal at all cleomenes that such improvements are impossible is demonstrable but if it was not even then we could have little help from anatomy the brain of an animal cannot be looked and searched into whilst it is alive should you take the main spring out of a watch and leave the barrel that contained it standing empty it would be impossible to find out what it had been that made it exert itself whilst it showed the time we might examine all the wheels and every other part belonging either to the movement or the motion and perhaps find out the use of them in relation to the turning of the hands but the first cause of this labor would remain a mystery forever Horatio the main spring in us is the soul which is immaterial and immortal but what is that to other creatures that have a brain like ours and no such immortal substance distinct from body do you not believe that dogs and horses think? Cleomenes I believe they do though in a degree of perfection far inferior to us Horatio what is it that super intense thought in them where must we look for it which is the main spring? Cleomenes I can answer you no otherwise than life Horatio what is life Cleomenes everybody understands the meaning of the word though perhaps nobody knows the principle of life that part which gives motion to all the rest Horatio where men are certain that the truth of a thing is not to be known they will always differ and endeavour to impose upon one another Cleomenes whilst there are fools and naves they will but I have not imposed upon you what I said of the labor of the brain I told you was a conjecture which I recommend no farther to you than you shall think it probable you ought to expect no demonstration of a thing that from its nature can admit of none when the breath is gone and the circulation ceased the inside of an animal is vastly different from what it was whilst the lungs played and the blood and juices were in full motion through every part of it you have seen those engines that raise water by the help of fire the steam you know is that which forces it up it is as impossible to see the volatile particles that perform the labor of the brain when the creature is dead as in the engine it would be to see the steam which yet does all the work when the fire is out and the water cold yet if this engine was shown to a man when it was not at work and it was explained to him which way it raised the water it would be a strange incredulity or great dullness of apprehension not to believe it if he knew perfectly well that by heat liquids may be rarefied into vapor Horatio but do you not think there is a difference in souls and that they are all equally good Cleomenes we have some tolerable ideas of matter in motion or at least of what we mean by them and therefore we may form ideas of things corporeal though they are beyond the reach of our senses and we can conceive any portion of matter a thousand times less than our eyes even by the help of the best microscopes are able to see it but the soul is altogether incomprehensible and we can determine but little about it that is not revealed to us I believe that the differences of capacities in men depends upon and is entirely owing to the difference there is between them either in the fabric itself that is the greater or lesser exactness in the composure of their frame or else in the use that is made of it the brain of a child newly born is carte blanche and as you have hinted very justly we have no ideas which we are not obliged for to our senses I made no question but that in this rummaging of the spirits through the brain in hunting after joining separating changing and compounding of ideas with inconceivable swiftness under the superintendency of the soul the action of thinking consists the best thing therefore we can do to infants after the first month besides feeding and keeping them from harm is to make them take in ideas beginning by the two most useful senses the sight and hearing and dispose them to set about this labor of the brain and by our example encourage them to imitate us in thinking which on their side is very poorly performed at first therefore the more an infant in health is talked to and jumbled about the better it is for it at least for the first two years and for its attendance in this early education to the wisest matron in the world I would prefer an active young wench whose tongue never stands still that should run about and never cease diverting and playing with it whilst it was awake and where people can afford it two or three of them to relieve one another when they are tired are better than one Horatio, then you think children reap great benefit from the nonsensical chat of nurses? Cleomenes, it is of inestimable use to them and teaches them to think as well as speak much sooner and better than equal aptitude of parts they would do without the business is to make them exert those faculties and keep infants continually employed about them for the time which is lost then is never to be retrieved Horatio, yet we seldom remember anything of what we saw or heard before we were two years old then what would be lost if children should not hear all that impertinence? Cleomenes, as iron is to be hammered whilst it is hot and ductile so children are to be taught when they are young as the flesh and every tube and membrane about them are then tender and will yield sooner to slight impressions than afterwards so many of their bones are but cartilages and the brain itself is much softer and in a manner fluid this is the reason that it cannot so well retain the images it receives as it does afterwards when the substance of it comes to be of better consistence but as the first images are lost so they are continually succeeded by new ones and the brain at first serves as a slate to cipher or a sampler to work upon what infants should chiefly learn is the performance itself the exercise of thinking and to contract a habit of disposing and with ease and agility managing the images retained to the purpose intended which is never attained better than whilst the matter is yielding and the organs are most flexible and supple so they but exercise themselves in thinking and speaking it is no matter what they think on or what they say that is inoffensive in sprightly infants we soon seen by their eyes the efforts they are making to imitate us before they are able and that they try at this exercise of the brain and make essays to think as well as they do to hammer out words we may know from the incoherence of their actions and the strange absurdities they utter but as there are more degrees of thinking well than there are speaking plain the first is of the greatest consequence end of section 39