rivals should use such satire as I have put into their mouths; for, after all, though
the one were a Roman, and the other a queen, they were both women. It is true,
some actions, though natural, are not fit to be represented; and broad
obscenities in words ought in good manners to be avoided: expressions
therefore are a modest clothing of our thoughts, as breeches and petticoats are
of our bodies. If I have kept myself within the bounds of modesty, all beyond, it is
but nicety and affectation; which is no more but modesty depraved into a vice.
They betray themselves who are too quick of apprehension in such cases, and
leave all reasonable men to imagine worse of them, than of the poet.
Honest Montaigne goes yet further: Nous ne sommes que ceremonie; la
ceremonie nous emporte, et laissons la substance des choses. Nous nous
tenons aux branches, et abandonnons le tronc et le corps. Nous avons appris
aux dames de rougir, oyans seulement nommer ce qu'elles ne craignent
aucunement a faire: Nous n'osons appeller a droit nos membres, et ne
craignons pas de les employer a toute sorte de debauche. La ceremonie nous
defend d'exprimer par paroles les choses licites et naturelles, et nous l'en
croyons; la raison nous defend de n'en faire point d'illicites et mauvaises, et
personne ne l'en croit. My comfort is, that by this opinion my enemies are but
sucking critics, who would fain be nibbling ere their teeth are come.
Yet, in this nicety of manners does the excellency of French poetry consist. Their
heroes are the most civil people breathing; but their good breeding seldom
extends to a word of sense; all their wit is in their ceremony; they want the genius
which animates our stage; and therefore it is but necessary, when they cannot
please, that they should take care not to offend. But as the civilest man in the
company is commonly the dullest, so these authors, while they are afraid to
make you laugh or cry, out of pure good manners make you sleep. They are so
careful not to exasperate a critic, that they never leave him any work; so busy
with the broom, and make so clean a riddance that there is little left either for
censure or for praise: For no part of a poem is worth our discommending, where
the whole is insipid; as when we have once tasted of palled wine, we stay not to
examine it glass by glass. But while they affect to shine in trifles, they are often
careless in essentials. Thus, their Hippolytus is so scrupulous in point of
decency, that he will rather expose himself to death, than accuse his stepmother
to his father; and my critics I am sure will commend him for it. But we of grosser
apprehensions are apt to think that this excess of generosity is not practicable,
but with fools and madmen.
