290 MY BOOKSHELVES 



to convince people that there was more to be got out 

 of life than by the hollow unreality of chivalry and the 

 clumsy machinery of feudalism. How he loved to 

 escape from the din and display, from the mummery 

 and massacre, to the little library he has depicted so 

 minutely in the third story of his tower, of which the 

 basement contained a chapel and the second floor his 

 bedroom. One can enjoy the very view from his window 

 in Perigord. 



' le suis sur 1'entree, et vois sous moy mon iardin, ma basse- 

 cour, ma cour, et dans la plupart des membres de ma maison. 

 . . . La ie feuillette a cette heure vn liure, a cette heure un 

 autre, sans ordre et sans dessein, k pieces descousues. Tan- 

 tost ie resue, tantost i'enregistre et dicte, en me promenant, 

 mes songes que voycy.' 



For five centuries these ' songes ' have been the source 

 of perennial delight to successive generations. Scores 

 of later essayists and diarists have amused and in- 

 terested us; Samuel Pepys may be more minutely 

 frank ; Rousseau more conscientious ; Addison more 

 elevating; Lamb more jocund; but not one of the 

 whole tribe has ever excelled or, as I think, equalled 

 Montaigne in the charm created by delicately handling 

 grave matters with levity, and trivial things with 

 gravity. In the most agonizing spasms of a deadly 

 disease, he had still the spirit to discuss affairs most 

 remote from his own circumstances : 



' Quand on me tient le plus atterre, et que les assistants 

 m'espargnent, i'essaye souvent mes forces, et leur entame 



