Produced by David Widger
Translated by Charles Cotton
Edited by William Carew Hazilitt
1877
IX. Of Vanity
There is, peradventure, no more manifest vanity than to write of it sovainly. That which divinity has so divinely expressed to us—["Vanityof vanities: all is vanity."—Eccles., i. 2.]—ought to be carefully andcontinually meditated by men of understanding. Who does not see that Ihave taken a road, in which, incessantly and without labour, I shallproceed so long as there shall be ink and paper in the world? I can giveno account of my life by my actions; fortune has placed them too low: Imust do it by my fancies. And yet I have seen a gentleman who onlycommunicated his life by the workings of his belly: you might see on hispremises a show of a row of basins of seven or eight days' standing; itwas his study, his discourse; all other talk stank in his nostrils.Here, but not so nauseous, are the excrements of an old mind, sometimesthick, sometimes thin, and always indigested. And when shall I have donerepresenting the continual agitation and mutation of my thoughts, as theycome into my head, seeing that Diomedes wrote six thousand books upon thesole subject of grammar?
[It was not Diomedes, but Didymus the grammarian, who, as Seneca (Ep., 88) tells us, wrote four not six thousand books on questions of vain literature, which was the principal study of the ancient grammarian.—Coste. But the number is probably exaggerated, and for books we should doubtless read pamphlets or essays.]
What, then, ought prating to produce, since prattling and the firstbeginning to speak, stuffed the world with such a horrible load ofvolumes? So many words for words only. O Pythagoras, why didst not thouallay this tempest? They accused one Galba of old for living idly; hemade answer, "That every one ought to give account of his actions, butnot of his home." He was mistaken, for justice also takes cognisance ofthose who glean after the reaper.
But there should be some restraint of law against foolish and impertinentscribblers, as well as against vagabonds and idle persons; which if therewere, both I and a hundred others would be banished from the reach of ourpeople. I do not speak this in jest: scribbling seems to be a symptom ofa disordered and licentious age. When did we write so much as since ourtroubles? when the Romans so much, as upon the point of ruin? Besidesthat, the refining of wits does not make people wiser in a government:this idle employment springs from this, that every one applies himselfnegligently to the duty of his vocation, and is easily debauched from it.The corruption of the age is made up by the particular contribution ofevery individual man; some contribute treachery, others injustice,irreligion, tyranny, avarice, cruelty, according to their power; theweaker sort contribute folly, vanity, and idleness; of these I am one.It seems as if it were the season for vain things, when the hurtfuloppress us; in a time when doing ill is common, to do but what signifiesnothing is a kind of commendation. 'Tis my comfort, that I shall be oneof the last who shall be called in question; and whilst the greateroffenders are being brought to account, I shall have leisure to amend:for it would, methinks, be against reason to punish littleinconveniences, whilst we are infested with the greater. As thephysician Philotimus said to one who presented h