Chap. XXI An Answer to the Objection, That the Mirth Which Wine Inspires Is Chimerical
It will be objected, without doubt, that the mirth which wine inspires is imaginary, and without any foundation, and that, as Boileau has it,
“Rien n’est beau que le vrai. Le vrai seul est aimable.”
Nothing so beautiful as what is true,
That it is only lovely is its due.
I very willingly own, that this joy and mirth is nothing else than the effect of our imagination.
Full well I’m satisfied ’tis nothing all
But a deceitful hope, less solid far,
A thousand times, than is the moving sand;
But are not all things so with wretched man?
All things soon pass away like rapid streams
Which hasten to the sea, where lost for ever
In th’ ocean’s vast abyss unknown they lie.
Our wisest wishes and desires are vain,
Abstracted vanities, gay painted bubbles,
That break when touch’d, and vanish into air.
Love, wisdom, knowledge, riches, phantoms all.
But before we thoroughly refute this objection, I shall observe by the way, that errors and illusions are necessary to the world. “1In general, indeed, it is true to say, that the world, as it is now, cannot keep itself in the same condition, were not men full of a thousand false prejudices and unreasonable passions; and if philosophy went about to make men act according to the clear and distinct ideas of reason, we might, perhaps, be satisfied, that mankind would quickly be at an end. Errors, passions, prejudices, and a hundred other the like faults, are as a necessary evil to the world. Men would be worth nothing for this world, were they cured, and the greatest part of the things which now take up our time, would be useless, as Quintilian well knew, namely, eloquence.
Things are in this condition, and will not easily change, and we may wait long enough for such a happy revolution, before we shall be able to say, with Virgil,
“Magnus ab integro sæculorum nascitur ordo.”1a
A series long of ages now appear,
Entirely new to man, before unknown.
On the other hand, “2If you take away from man every thing that is chimerical, what pleasure will you leave him? Pleasures are not things so solid, as to permit us to search them to the bottom; one must only just touch them and away. They resemble boggy and moorish ground, we must run lightly over them, without ever letting our feet make the least impression.”
No, wheresoe’er we turn our wishing eye,
True pleasures never can our souls enjoy.
Let us add, “3That if we did not help to deceive ourselves, we should never enjoy any pleasure at all. The most agreeable things in this world are, in the bottom, so trivial, that they would not much affect us, if we made but never so little serious reflection upon them. Pleasures are not made to be strictly examined into, and we are obliged every day to pass over a great many things in them, about which it would not be proper to make one-self uneasy.”
Besides, “4Is not the illusion we enjoy as valuable as the good we possess? M. Fontenelle makes a very excellent observation hereupon in these verses5:—
“Souvent en s’attachant a des fantômes vains
Notre raison seduite avec plaisir s’egare.
Elle-même joüit des objets qu’elle a feints.
Et cette illusion pour quelque tems repare
Le defaut des vrais biens que la Nature avare
N’a pas accordez aux humains.”
Often enchanted by the ’luring charms
Of phantoms gay, our reason all seduc’d,
With pleasure roams thro’ endless desarts wild,
Enjoys the objects which herself has form’d.
And this illusion for some time repairs
The want of real joys, which niggard Nature
Never has granted to unhappy man.
“Enjoyment,” says Montaigne6, “and possession, belong principally to imagination, which embraces more eagerly that which it is in pursuit of, than that which we have in our power.”
And certainly, one may pronounce them happy, who thus amuse themselves, and believe themselves to be so. And indeed, when a man is so far gone in this persuasion, every thing that is alleged to the contrary is rejected as a fable.
But to shew, at present, the reality, if one may say so, of mere illusion, we need go no farther than the poets, who are certainly the happiest mortals living in that respect.
To instance no more, there’s Mr. ————, who would fain be a rhimer, and that is his folly; but though the poor man, for his insipid verses, and improper epithets, richly deserves our pity, yet is he wonderfully pleased with his performances, and with a great deal of tranquillity mounts up Parnassus, in his own conceit, in loftier tracts than Virgil or Theocritus ever knew. But, alas! what would become of him, if some audacious person should dare unbind his eyes, and make him see his weak and graceless lines, which, however smoothly they may run, are, at best, but exquisitely dull; contain terms that have no meaning in them, and have no other ornament, but unintelligible jingle, and initial letters? How would he curse the day which deprived his senseless soul of that happy error that so much charmed his thoughts, and amused his imagination?
What is here said of the poets is applicable to all mankind; and so a man, whom any one should undertake to persuade, that the mirth and joy inspired by wine is chimerical, would do well to answer him, after the manner as a certain madman did the doctor that cured him. The story is this:—
Once upon a time a certain bigot, otherwise a man of sense, had his brain a little touched with whimsies, and continually fancied he heard the heavenly music of the blessed spirits. At last a physician, very expert in his profession, cured him, either by his skill, or by chance, no matter which; but when he came to demand his fees; for what? says the other, in a violent passion, by your damned slip-slops and hellish art, you have robbed me of my Paradise, though you have cured me of my error. This I borrow from Boileau7, as he did from Horace8.
“9There are,” says Pere Bouhours, writing to Bussi Rabutin, “agreeable errors, which are much more valuable than that which the Spaniards called desengano, and which might be called in our language disabusement, if this word, which one of our best writers has ventured upon, had been received.”
We shall conclude with M. de Sacy10, “That it is not always doing mankind an agreeable service to dissipate their illusions.” And we say of those who taste those satisfactions wine inspires, what M. Bayle says very pleasantly of news-mongers who are still in hopes of what they wish for. “They are11,” says he, “the least unhappy, whatever happens. There is a great deal of reality in their agreeable sentiments, how chimerical soever their foundation may be; so that they do not willingly suffer themselves to be disabused; and they sometimes say, when one gives them reasons why they should believe the news, that makes them so joyful, is doubtful or absolutely false, Why do you envy us the pleasures we enjoy? Do not disturb our entertainment, or rob us of what we hold most dear. A friend more opposite to error than charity is a very troublesome reasoner; and if he meddles with their chimeras they will endeavour to do him a diskindness.”
We come now to another objection, and that is, that this joy inspired by wine is but of a very short continuance; and the pleasure one tastes in so short a space, dearly repaid with a long and tedious uneasiness. Ebrietas unius horæ hilarem insaniam longo temporis tedio pensat.
I own that it is a very great misery, that our pleasures are so short: and the shorter too, the more exquisite they are. And, perhaps, this may be a kindness to us, since some are so superlatively so, that should they continue a much longer space, mankind could not support themselves under these ecstacies. But be this as it will, can we make them otherwise than they are? We must therefore have patience, and take them as we find them. In short, there is no present happiness in the world; all we can do, is to be contented with the present, not uneasy at what is to come, but sweeten with an equality of soul the bitter miseries of human life.
1. Lett. xvi. sur la Crit. de Calvin, p. 516.
1a. Virgil, Eclogues IV.5.
2. Fontenelle Dial. d’Elisab. et du D. d’Alençon.
3. Fontenelle Dial. des Morts de Callirh. et de Paulin.
4. Nov. Dial. des Dieux. p. 68.
5. Poesies Pastor.
6. Essais, lib. iii. ch. 9.
7. Satire iv. M. la Vayer.
8. Lib. ii. ep. 2.
9. Lett. de Rab. t. iii. lett. 63.
10. De l’Amitié, p. 2.
11. Rep. aux Quest. d’un Prov. t. i. ch. 20.