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 Plutarch [ca46-120], Brute Beastes Have Use of Reason in The Philosphie Commonlie Called the Morals, trans. by Philemon Holland (London, 1603; Online at Animal Rights History, 2003).
THAT BRUTE BEASTES have use of reason.
The personages that discourse in this Dialogue,
ULYSSES, CIRCE, GRYLLUS.
ULYSSES.
ME thinks dame Circe that I have sufficiently conceived, and firmely imprinted these matters in my memorie. Now would I gladly aske the question, and know of you, whether among those men which be transformed into wolves and lions, you have any Greeks or no?
CIRCE.
Yes mary have I, and those very many, deere heart Ulysses; but wherefore demaund you this question?
ULYSSES.
Because I am perswaded, it will be greatly for mine honour amont the Greeks, if by your gracious favour I may obtain thus much, as at your hands to receive them men againe, and save them, strangers though they be, as well as my companions; nor so neglect their state, as to suffer them against nature to age & waxe old in the bodies of wilde beasts, leading a life so miserable, ignominious, and infamous.
CIRCE.
See the simplicitie of this man; he would through his folly, that his ambitious minde should procure damage and calamity not to himslelfe onely and his friends, but also to those who are meere aliens, and nothing belonging to him?
ULYSSES.
I perceive very well (ô Circe that you are about the tempering and brewing of another cup and potion of words, to bewitch me; for certainly you should make a very beast of me in deed, if I would suffer my selfe to be perswaded, that it were a detriment or losse to become a man againe of a brute beast.
[563]
CIRCE.
Why? have you not already done woorse for your selfe than so, and committed greater absurdities? considering that letting goe a life immortall, and not subject to old age, which you might enjoy if you would make your abode and dwell with me; you will needs goe in all the haste to a woman mortall, and (as I dare well say) very aged by this time, and that through ten thousand dangers, which yet you must endure, promising your selfe, that you shall thereby be better regarded, more honored and renowned from hence foorth, than now you are; and in the meane while you consider not that you seeke after a vaine felicitie, and the image or shawdow onely for the thing indeed.
ULYSSES.
Well Circe, I am content that it be so as you say; for why should we so often contest and debate thus about the same still? But I pray you of all loves, unbinde and let loose these poore men for my sake, and give them me.
CIRCE.
Nay, that I will not, I sweare by Hecate: You shall not come so easily by them; for I tell you they be no meane persons, and of the common sort: But you were best to aske them first if they themselves be willing thereto or no? And if they answer nay? then, like a noble valiant gentleman as you are, deale with them effectually, and induce them thereto: But in case you cannot with all your reasons bring them to it, and that they be able to convince you by force of argument, let it suffice you that you have advised your selfe and your friends but badly.
ULYSSES.
Is it so indeed good lady? and are you about to mocke and make a foole of me? For how can they either yeeld or receive reason in conference, so long as they be asses, swine and lions, as they are.
CIRCE.
Goe to sir, most ambitious man that you are; let that never trouble you; for I will uphold them sufficient both to heare and understand whatsoever you shall alledge unto them, yea, and able to reason and discourse with you: Or rather, I passe not much if one of them for all his fellowes shall both demaund and answer: Lo heare is one, deale with him as it pleaseth you.
ULYSSES.
And by what name shall we call him, Circe? or who might he be, when he was a man?
CIRCE.
What matter that? and what maketh it to the disputation and question in hand? Howbeit, name him if you thinke good, Gryllus: and to the end that you should not thinke, that for to graifie or doe me a pleasure, he may seeme to reason crosse and against your minde, I will for the time retire my selfe out of the place.
GRYLLUS.
God save you Ulysses.
ULYSSES.
And you also gentle Gryllus.
GRYLLUS.
What is your will with me, and what would you demaund of me?
ULYSSES.
I wot well that you and the rest were sometimes men, and therefore I have great ruth and pitie to see you all in this estate, but as good reason is, it grieveth me most for the Greeks, that they are fallen into this calamity: But so it is, that even now I requested Circe, to loosen as many of you as be willing thereto, and after she hath restored them to their auncient shape, to give them leave to goe with me.
GRYLLUS.
Peace Ulysses, and say not a word more I beseech you; for we all have you in contempt now, seeing that you have bene taken and named all this whiles for a singular man, and seemed far to surpasse all others in wisedome, whereas there is little or no cause thereof; in that you have bene afraid even of this, to change from the woorse to the better; and never considered, that as children abhorre the medicines and drogues that Physicians ordeine, and refuse to learne those sciences and disciplines, which of sickly, diseased and foolish, might make them more healthie, sound, & wise; even so you have rejected & cast behind you this oportunitie to be transformed and changed from one to another; and even still you tremble and dare not venture to keepe[564]companie and lie with Circe, for dread and feare , lest ere you be aware, she should make of you either a swine, or a woolfe; and you would perswade us, that whereas we live now in abudance, and enjoy the affluence of all good things, we should quit the same, and withall, abandon and forsake her who hath procured us this happinesse, and all to goe away with you, when we are become men againe; that is to say, the most wretched creatures in the world.
ULYSSES.
It seemeth Gryllus that the potion which you dranke at Circes hands, hath not onely marred the forme and fashion of your bodie, but also spoiled your wit and understanding; having intoxicate your braine, and filled your head with corrupt, strange, and monstrous opinions for ever; or els some pleasure that you have taken by the acquaintance of this body so long, hath cleane bewitched you.
GRYLLUS.
Nay iwis, good sir, it is neither so nor so, if it please you ô king of the Cephallenians; but if you be disposed to argue with reason, rather than to wrangle with opprobrious tearmes, we will soone bring you to another opinion, and proove by sound arguments, upon the experience which we have of the one life and the other, that there is great reason why we should love and embrace this present state above the former.
ULYSSES.
For mine owne part I am readie to give you the hearing.
GRYLLUS.
And I as willing likewise to deliver my minde: But first and formost, begin I will to speake of vertues, upon which I see you stand so much, and in regard whereof, you woondrously please your selves, as who would be thought in justice, in wisedome, in magnanimitie and other vertues, to excell and farre surpasse all brute breasts: Answer me therefore I beseech you, the wisest man of all other, to this point: For I have heard say, that upon a time you made relation unto Circe of the Cyclopes countrey, how the soile there is naturally so good and fertill, that without plowing, sowing, or planting at all, it bringeth foorth of it selfe all sorts of fruit Tell me I say, whether you esteeme better of it (so frutefull as it is) or of Ithaca a rough and mountaine region, good onely for to breed goats in, and which harldy and with great labour yeeldeth unto those that till it, small store (God wot) of poore and leane frutes, which will not quit for the cost and paines? But take heed it grieve you not to answer contrarie to your minde, for the love that you beare unto you native countrey.
ULYSSES.
I love verily (for I must not lie) yea, and I inbrace and holde most deare, mine owne countrey and place of nativitie: howbeit, I praise and admire that other region of theirs.
GRYLLUS.
Why then belike, the case stands thus, and this we are to say, that the wisest man is of opinion, that there be some things which are to praise and commend, and other things to chose and love: and verily, I thinke that your judgement is the same of the soule; for the like reason there is of it and a land or plot of ground, namely, that the soule is better, which without any travell or labour, bringeth forth vertue, as a fruit springing and growing of it selfe.
ULYSSES.
Well: be it so as you say.
GRYLLUS.
You grant then and confesse already, That the soule of brute beasts is by nature more kinde, more perfect and better disposed to yeeld vertue, considering that without compulsion, without commandement, or any teaching, which is as much to say, as without tillage and sowing it bringeth forth and nourisheth that vertue which is meet and convenient for every one.
ULYSSES.
And what vertue is that (my good friend Gryllus) whereof beasts be capable?
GRYLLUS.
Nay, what vertue are they not capable of? yea, and more than the wisest man that is. But first, consider we (if you please) valour and fortitude, whereupon you beare your selfe and vaunt so hightly, neither are you abashed and hide your selfe for feare, but are very well pleased wehn as men surname you, Hardie, Bolde, and a Winner of cities: whereas you have (most wicked wretch that you are) circumvented and deceived men, who know no other way of making war, but that which is plaine and generous, and who were altogether unskilfull of fraud, guile and [565] leasing, by your wily shifts and subtill pranks, attributing the name of vertue unto cunning casts, the which in deed knoweth not what deceit and fraud meaneth. But you see the combats of beasts aswell against men as when they fight one against another, how they are performed without any craftinesse or sleight, onely by plaine hardiness and cleane strength, and as it were upon a native magnanimitie, they defend themselves, and be revenged of their enemies: and neither by enforcement of lawes, nor for feare to be judicially reprooved and punished for cowardise, but onely through instinct of nature avoiding the shame and disgrace to be conquered, they endure and holde out fight to the very extremitie, and all to keepe themselves invincible: for say they be in body the weaker, yet they yeeld not for all that, nor are faint-hearted and give over, but chuse to die in fight: and many of them there be, whose courage and genersitie, even when they are readie to die, being retired into some one corner of their bodie, and there gathering it selfe, resisteth the killer, it leapeth and fretteth still, untill such time as, like a flame of fire, it be quenched and put out once for all: they can not skill of praying and intreating their enemie, they crave no pardon and mercy; and it were strange in any of them, to confesse that they are overcome; neither was it ever seene that a lion became a slave unto a lion, or one horse unto another in regard of fortitude, like as one man to another, contenting himselfe and willingly embracing servitude as next cousin and a surname appropriate unto cowardise. And as for those beasts which men have surprised and caught by snares, traps, subtill fleights and devices of engins, such if they be come to their growth and perfect age, reject all food, refuse nourishment, yea, and endure thirst, to such extremitie, that they chose to die and seeke to procure their owne death, rather than to live in servitude; but to their yoong ones and whelps, which for their tender age be tractabe, pliable, and easie to be led which way one will, they offer so many deceitfull baits to entice and allure them with their sweetnesse, that they have no sooner tasted thereof, but they become enchanted and bewitched therewith: for these pleasures, and this delicate life, contrary to their nature, in tract of time causeth them to be soft and weake, receiving that degeneration (as it were) and effæminate habit of their courage, which folke call tamenesse, and in deed but basenesse and defect of their naturall generositie: whereby it appeareth, that beasts by nature are bred and passing well disposed to be audacious and hardie; whereas contrariwise, it is not kindly for men to be so much as bolde of speech and resolute in speaking their mindes. And this you may (good Ulysses) learn and know especially by this one argument: for in all brute beastas, nature swaieth indifferently and equally of either side, as touching courage and boldness, nether is the female in that point inferior to the male, whether it be in susteining paine and travell for getting of their living, or in fight for defence of their little ones. And I am sure you heard of a certeine Cromyonian swine, what soule worke she make, being a beast of the fæemale sex, for Theseus, & how the troubled him: as also of that monstrous Sphinx, which kept upon the rocke Phicion, and held in aw all that tract underneath and about it: for surely all her craft and subtilty in devising ridles, and proposing darke questions, had booted her nothing, in case she had not beene withall, of greater force and courage than all the Cadmeians. In the very same quarter was (by report) the fox of Telmesus, a wily and craftie beast. And it is given out, that neere unto the said place, was also the sell dragon which fought in single fight hand to hand with Apollo, for the Seignorie of the oracle at Delphi. And even your great king Agamemnon, tooke that brave mare Aethe, as a gift, of an inhabitant of Sycion, for his dispensation and immunity, that he might not be prest to the warres: wherein he did well and wisely in mine opinion, to preferre a good and couragious beast, before a coward and dastardly man: and you your own selfe (Ulysses) have seene many times lionesses and she libbards, how they give no place at all to their males in courage and hardinesse, as your lady Penelope doth, who gives you leave to be abroad in warfarre, whiles she fits at home close by the hearth, and by the fire side, and dares not doe so much as the very swallowes, in repelling those back who come to destroy her and her house, for all sheis a Laconian woman borne: What should I tell you of the Carian or Mæonian women? for by that hath beene said already, it is plaine and evident, that men naturally are not endued with prowesse, for if they were, then should women likewise have their part with them in vertue and valour: And thereupon I inferre and conclude that you and such as you are, exerercise a kind of valiance (I must needs say) which is not voluntarie nor naturall, but constreined by force of lawes, subject and servile to (I wot not what) customes reprehensions ; and you meditate I say and practise for vain-glorious opinion, fortitude, gaily set out with trim words; you sustaine travels and perils, not for that you set light by them, nor for any hardinesse and confidence in your selves, but because you are afraid lest others should goe [566] before you, and he esteemed greater than you. And like as heere among your mates at sea, he that first riseth to his businesse of rowing, laieth hand and seizeth upon the lightest oare that he can meet with, doth it not, for that he despiseth it, but because he avoideth and is affraid to handle one that is heavier: and he that endureth the knocke of a baston or cudgel, because he would not receive any wound by the sword; as also, he that resisteth an enemie, for to avoid some ignominous infamie of death, is not to be said valiant in respect of the one, but coward in regard of the other; even so the valour in you, is nothing els but a wise and warie cowardise, and your prowesse and boldnesse, is no better than timerousnesse, accompanied with the skill and knowledge how to decline one danger by another. To be breife, if you thinke your selves to be more hardie and valiant than beasts, how commeth it, that your Poets tearme those who fight manfully against their enemies, [Greek omitted] that is, wolves for courage; [Greek omitted] that is, lion-hearted: and [Greek omitted] that is, resembling the wilde boare in animositie and force: but never doth any of them call a lion, [Greek omitted] that is, as valiant as a man: or a wild boare, [Greek omitted] that is, comparable to a man in courage and strength. Yet I wot well, when they would speake excessively in comparison, their maner is, to call men that are swift in running, [Greek omitted] that is, light-footed like the wind: and those who be faire ad beautifull, [Greek omitted] that is, angelicall, or see to, like unto angels: and even so, they compare and resemble brave warriours in the highest degree, unto beasts, who in that case are much more excellent than men; the reason is this, for that choler and heat of courage is (as it were) the steele, the file, yea, the very whetstone that giveth the edge unto fortitude; and this doe brute beasts bring with them pure and simple unto fight; whereas in you, it being alway mingled and tempered with some discourse of reason, as if wine were delaied with a little water, it is gone and to seeke in the greatest dangers, and faileth at the very point of opportunity, when it is most to be used. And some of you are of opinion, and sticke not to say, that in battell and fight there is no need at all of anger, but that laying aside all choler, we are to employ sober and staied reason; wherein they speake not amisse, and I holde well with them, when the question is of defence onely, and the secruing of a mans owne life: but surely, if the case be so, that we are to offend, to annoy and defait our enemie, they talke most shamefully. Is it not a very absurd thing, that ye should reproove and blame nature, for that she hath not set unto your bodies any stings or pricks, nor given you tusks and teeth to revenge your selves with, ne yet armed you with hooked clawes and tallons to offend your enemies; and in the meane while your owne selves take, spoile, and bereave the soule of that naturall weapon which is inbred with it, or at leastwise cut the same short and disable it?
ULYSSES.
What Gryllus ! you seeme (as farre as I gesse) to have beene heeretofore some wittie and great oratour; who now grunting out of your stie or frank, have so pithily argued the case, and discoursed of the matter in hand: but why have you not in the same traine disputed likewise of temperance?
GRYLLUS.
Because forsooth I thought that you would first have refuted that which hath already beene spoken; but I see well you desire to heare me speake of temperance, because your are the husband of a most chaste wife, and you thinke besides, that your selfe have shewed good proofe of your own continencie, in that you have rejected the love & wanton company of Circe; but even heerein you are not more perfect, I meane in continence, than any one beast, for even they also lust not at all to companie or engender with those that are of a more excellent kind than their owne, but take their pleasure with those, and make love to such as be of the same sort, and therefore no marvell, that as the Medesian buck-goat in Aegypt, when he was shut up with many faire and beautifull women, never for all that made to any of them, but abhorred to meddle with them: whereas he was raging wood in heat of lust after the does or female goats: So you taking delight in your ordinary love, have no desire at all, being a man, to sleepe or deale carnally with an immortall goddesse: And as for the chasitie and continence of your owne lady Penelope, I tell you there be ten thousand crowes in the world, that after their manner, caing and croking as they doe, will make a meere mocke of it, and shew that it is no such matter to be accounted of; for there is not one of them, but if the male or cock chance to die, remaineth a widow without seeking after a make, not for a little while, but even for the space of nine ages & lives of a man; so that in this respect, your faire Penelope commeth behind the poorest crow or raven that is, and deserveth not the ninth part of her hounour for chastitie: But seeing you are ware that I am so eloquent an oratour, I care not much if I observe a methodicall order in this discourse [567] course of mine, and like a clearke indeed, beginne first with the definition of temperance, and then proceed to the division of appetites and lusts, according to their several distinct kinds right formally. Temperance therefore is a certaine restraint, abridgement, or regularitie of lusts, and desires, a restraint I say, and abating of such as are forren, strange, and superflous, to wit, unnecessarie, and a regularitie which by election and choice of time and temperature of a meane, doth moderate those that be naturall and necessarie; for you see that in lusts and desires, there be infinit differences: As for example, the appetite to drink, besides that it is naturall, is also necessarie; But the lust of the flesh, or concupiscence, although nature hath given the beginning thereof; yet so it is, that we may live commodiously without it; so as well it may be called naturall, but in no wise necessarie. Now there is another sort of desires, that be neither naturall nor necessarie, but accidentall, and infused from without by a vaine opinion, and upon ignorance of that which is good, and there be such a number of them, that they goe verie neere to chase away and thrust out, all your naturall appetites, much like as when the aliens and strangers that swarme in a citie, drive out and expell the naturall inhabitants; whereas brute beasts give no entrance nor any communication and fellowship to forren affections for to settle in their soules, but in their whole life, & all their actions be farre remote from vain-glory, selfe-conceit, & fond opinions, as if they abode within the mediterranean parts, distant from the sea: True it is that in their port and carriage, they be not so elegant, so fine & curious as men: howbeit otherwise, for temperance & good government of their affections, which be not many in number, either domesticall, or strange & forren, they are more precise & woonderfull exact in the observing of them than they; for the proofe and truth heereof, the time was once, when I my selfe no lesse doated and was besotted upon gold than you are now, thinking verily that there was no good nor possession in the world comparable to it; I was in love also of silver and ivorie, and he that had most store heereof, me thought was a right happie man, and most highlie in grace and favour with the gods, whether he were Phrygian or Carian it skilled not, more base minded than Dolon, or infortunate otherwise than Priamus; insomuch as being linked fast and tied to these desires, I reaped and received no pleasure nor any contentment at all from al other blessings; for notwithstanding I was sufficiently furnished with them, yet I tooke my selfe lest needie and destitute of those which I accounted the greatest; therefore I well remember, when I saw you upon a time stately arraid, with a rich robe in candie, I wished not to have your wisedome and vertue, but your beautifull cassock so deintily and finely wrought, your mantell I say of purple, so delicate & soft, the beautie whereof I beheld with such admiration, that I was even ravished and transported with the sight thereof, as for the button or claspe, al of pure gold, belonging thereto, it had in it a singularitie by itselfe, and an excellent workeman hee was no doubt, who tooke delight in the turning and graving thereof; and verily for mine owne part, I followed after you for to see it, as if I had beene enchaunted or bewitched; as women that bee amorous of their lovers: But now being delivered from these vaine and foolish opinions, and having my braine purged from such fantasticall conceits, I passe over gold and silver, and make no more account of them, than I doe of other ordinarie stones; your goodly habilliments, your fine embroidered garments of needle worke and tapistrie, I set so light by, that I make more reckoning I assure you, of a good deepe puddle of soft mire and dirt to walter and wallow in a mine ease, and for to sleepe when my belly is ful, than of them: neither is there any of these appetites comming from without, that hath place in our soule, but our life for the most part we passe in desires and pleasures necessarie; and even those which are meere natural onely, and not altogether so necessarie, wee use them neither disorderly, nor yet unmeasurably: And of them let us first discourse: As for that familiar pleasure which proceedeth from sweet odours, and such things, as by their sent doe affect the smelling, over and besides the simple delight that it yeeldeth, which costeth nought, it bringeth therewith a certaine profit and commoditie, for to discerne nourishment, and make choise of food; for the tongue is named, as it is indeede, the judge of sweet, of sharpe, eager and soowre sapours, namely when as the juices of those things which are tasted, come to bee mingled and concorporate with the discretive facuitie, and not before: But our sense of smelling, before wee once taste those juices or sapours, judgeth of the force and qualitie of every thing, yea, and senteth them much more exquisitely than all the tasters that give essaie before the kings and princes: As for that which is familiar and agreeable unto us, it receiveth inwardly, but whatsoever is strange and offensive, it rejecteth and sendeth foorth, neither will it suffer the same once to touch us, or to offend our taste; but it bewraieth, accuseth, and condemneth the evill and noisome [568] some qualitie thereof, before it doth us any harme, and otherwise it troubleth not us at all, as it doth you, whom it forceth to mixe and compound together for perfumes, cinamon, nard, spike, lavander camell, the sweet leafe malabathum, and the aromaticall calamus, or cane of Arabia, medling and incorporating one within another, by the exquisit skilling and cunning of the apothecarie and perfumer, forcing drogues and spices of divers natures to be blended and confected together, and buying for greate summes of money one pleasure, which is not beseeming men, but rahter fit for fine wenches and daintie damosels, and nothing at all profitable: And yet being thus corrupt as it is, it mareth not onely all women, but also the most part of you that are men, in so much as you will not otherwhiles, lie with your owne espoused wives, unlesse they be perfumed and besmeared all over with sweet oiles and ointment, or els bestrewed with odoriferous powders, when they come to companie with you: Wheras contrariewise among us, the sow allureth the bore, the doe or she goat draweth unto her the buck, & other females the males of their kinde, by their owne sent and smell, casting from them the pure and neat favour of the medowes, and the verdure of the fields, and so comming together as in marriage for generation ,with a kinde of mutuall love and reciprocall pleasure; neither doe the females hold off and make it daintie, disguising and covering (as it were) their owne lust as harlots doe, with looking strange and coie at the matter, pretending colourable excuses, or making semblance of refusall, and all to enchant, entise, and draw on the rather; nor the males when they come unto them, being pricked with the furious instinct of lust to generation, doe buie either for money or for great paine and travell, or for long subjection and servitude, the act of generation; but they performe the same unfeignedly, and without deceit in due time and season, without anie cost, when as nature in the spring stirreth up and provoketh the generative concupiscence of all living creatures, even as it putteht foorth the buds and sprouts of plants, and anon delaieth as it were and quencheth the same; for neither the female after she is once sped and hath conceived, seeketh after the male, nor the male wooeth her any more, nor followeth after her; of so little regard and small price is this pleasure among us; but nature is all in all, and nothing doe we regard and samll price is this pleasure among us; but nature is all in all, and nothing doe wee against it: Heereofalso it is, that there hath not beene knowne unto this day, any lust so farre to transpote brute beasts, as that males should joine in this act with males, or females with females; whereas among you, there be many such examples, even of such as otherwise were accounted great and woorthie personages, for I let those passe who were of no woorth or note to speake of: Even Agamemnon went through all Bæotia, chasing and hunting after Argynnus, who fledde secretly from him; meane while he pretended colourabe, yet false excuses of his abode there, to wit, the sea and the windes, and afterwards this faire and goodly knight, bathed himselfe gently in the poole of Copais, as it were there to quench the heat of his love, and to deliver himselfe from this furious lust. Semblabie Hercules pursing after a yoong beardlesse Genymade whom he loved, was left behind the other gallants and breave knights that enterprised the voiage for the golden fleece, and so not embarquing with them, betraied the fleet. Likewise upon a scutchian of the louver or valted roufe of Apollos temple, surnamed Ptoius, there was one of you, who secretly wrote this inscription; Achilles the faire; even after Achilles himselfe had begotten a sonne; and I heare say, that these letters remaine there to be seene even at this day: Now if it chaunce that a dunghill cocke tread another cocke, when there is no henne at hand; he is burnt quicke, for that some wizard, soothsaier, or interpreter of such straunge prodigies, will pronounce that it is omenous, and presageth some evill lucke: Thus you see, how men themselves are forced to confesse, that beasts are more continent than they, & that to satisfie & fulfil their lusts, they never violate nor abuse nature; whereas in you it is otherwise: for nature (albeit she have the helpe and aide of the law) is not able to keepe your intemperance within the limits and bounds of reason; but like unto a violent streame which runneth forcibly, often times and in many places it worketh much outrage, causing great disorder, scandall and confusion against nature, in this point of carnall love and fleshly lust: for there have bene men who attempted to meddle and deale with shee goats, with sowes and mares; as also women who have bene as wood and raging mad after certeine beasts of the male kinds: and verily, of such copulations as these, are come your Minotaures and Aegipanes; yea, and as I verily thinke, those Sphinxes and Centaures in time past, have bene bred by the same meanes. True it is (I confesse) that otherwhiles, upon necessity and extreame famine, a dogge hath bene knowen to have devoured a man or a woman, yea, and some fowle hath tasted of their flesh, and begun to eat it; but there was never found yet any brute beast to have lusted after man or woman, to engender with them; whereas men both in this lust and in many other pleasures, have [569] often times perpetrated outrage upon beasts. Now if they be so unbridled, so disordinate and incontinent in these appetites, much more dissolute they are knowen to be than beasts in other desires and lusts that be necessarie, to wit, in meats and drinks, whereof we never take pleasure, but it with some profit; but you seeking after the tickling pleasure and delight in drinking and eating, rather than the needfull nourishment of content and satisfie nature, are afterwards well punished for it by many grievous and long maladies, which proceed all from one source, to wit, surfeit and repleation, namely, when you stuffe and fill your bodies with all sorts of flatulent humors & ventosities, which hardly are purged & excluded forth: for first & foremost, ech sort of beasts hath a severall food and perculiar kinde of nourishment; some feed upon grasse, others upon roots, and some there be againe which live by fruits: as for those that devoure flesh, they never touch any other kinde of pasture, neither come they to take from the weaker and more feeble kind, their proper nouriture, but suffer them to grase & feed quietly. Thus we see that the lion permitteth the stag and hinde to grase; and the wolfe likewise the sheepe, according to natures ordinance and appointment; but man (being through his disordiante appetite of pleasures, and by his gluttonie, provoked to all things, tasting and assaying whatsoever he can meet with or heare of, as knowing indeed no proper and naturall food of his owne) is of all creatures living, he alone that eateth and devoureth all things; for first, he feedeth upon flesh, without any need or necessitie enforcing him thereto, considering that he may alwaies gather, presse, cut and reape from plants, vines and seeds, all sort of fruits, one after another in due and convenient season, untill he be weary againe, for the great quantity thereof; and yet for to content his delicate toothe, and upon a lothsome fulnesse of necessarie sustenance, he seeketh after other victuals, neither needfull nor meet for him, ne yet he pure and cleane, in killing living creatures, much more cruelly than those savage beasts that live of ravin: for bloud and carnage of murdered carcases is the proper and familar food for a kite, a wolfe, or a dragon; but unto man it serveth instead of his daintie dish; and more than so, man in the use of all sorts of beasts, doth not like other creatures that live of prey, which absteine from the most part, and warre with some small nöber, even for very necessity of food; for there is neither fowle flying in the aire, nor (in maner) any fish swimming in the sea, nor (to speake in one word) any beast feeding upon the face of the earth, that can escape those tables of yours, which you call gentle, kinde and hospitall. but you will say, that all this standeth in stead of sauce to season your food: be it so: why then doe you kill for the same for that purpose, and for to furnish those your milde and courteous tables?
But the wisedome of beasts, farre different; for it giveth place to no arte whatsoever, that is vaine and needless; and as for those that be necessareie, it enterteineth them not as comming from others, nor as taught by mercenarie masters for hire and money; neither is it required that it should have any exercise to glue (as it were, and joine after a slender maner) ech rule, principle and proposition, one to another; but all at once of it selfe, it yeeldeth them all as native and inbred therewith. We heare say, that all the Aegyptians be Physicians; but surely every beast hath in it selfe not onely the art and skill to cure and heale it selfe when it is sicke, but also is sufficiently instructed how to feed and nourish it selfe, how to use her owne strength, how to fight, how to hunt, how to stand at defence, yea, and in very musicke they are skillfull, ech one in that measure as is requisit and befitting the owne nature: for of whom have we learned, finding our selves ill at ease, to goe into the rivers for to seeke for crabbes and craifishes? who hath taught the tortoises, when they have eaten a viper, to seeke out the herbe Organ for to feed upon? who hath shewed unto the goasts of Candie, when they be shot into the bodie with arrowes, to finde out the herbe Dictamnus for to feed on it, and thereby to cause the arrow head to come forth and fall from them? For if you say (as the trueth is) that nature is the schoole-mistresse, teaching them all this, you referre and reduce the wisedoem and intelligence of dumbe beasts unto the sagest and most perfect cause principle that is; which if you thinke you may not call reason, nor prudence, ye outh then to seeke out some other name for it, that is better and more hounourable; and to say a trueth, by effects shee sheweth her puissance to be greater and more admirable, as being neither ignorant nor ill taught, but having learned rather of it self, not by imbecilitie and feebleness of nature, but contrariwise, through the force and perfection of naturall vertue, letting go, and nothing at all esteeming that beggerly prudence which is gotten from other by way of apprentissage. Neverthelesse, all those things which men either for delicacie or in mirth and pastime, do present unto them for to learne and to exercise their conceit and wit withall, howsoever they be against the naturall inclination of their bodies: yet such is their capacitie and the excellencie of their spirit, that they will reach thereto and compasse the [570] same thorowly. I say nothing how whelps follow and trace beasts by the foot, or how colts practise to set their feet forward in their pace by measures: but how crowes and ravens will talke and prattle, how dogs will leape and dance upon wheeles as they turne round about: also horses and oxen we see in the theaters, how they being taught to couch and lie downe, to dance, to stand upright on their hinder feet, so woonderfully, that men themselves have much adoo to performe the like dangerous gestures, and yet this they doe after they have once learned it from others, yea, and remember the feat thereof, onely for proofe, if there were nothing else, that docible they be and apt to learne whatsoever a man would have them, since that all this serveth for nothing else in the whole world. Now if you bee hard of beliefe, and will not be perswaded that we learne the arts, I will say more than so; namely, that we can teach the same: for the old rowen partridges teach their yoong ones how to runne awaie from before the fowler, and to escape by lying upon their backs, and holding up their feete a clod of earth to hide themselves under it; and see we not daily upon the tops of our houses, how the old storks standing by their little ones, traine and teach them how to flie; semblablie the nightingales instruct their yoong birds in song, insomuch as those which be taken unfledge out of the nest, and are nourished by mans hand, never afterwards sing so well, because they be had away before their time from schoole, and want their master of musick. For mine owne part after that I was entred into this bodie, I marvelled much at those reasons and discourses of sophisters, who mainteined and perswaded me before time, that all living creatures besides man were without reason or understanding.
ULYSSES.
You are indeed Gryllus now much changed, and you can shew unto us by sound demonstrations, that a sheepe is reasonable, and an asse hath wit, can you not?
GRYLLUS.
Yes iwis, good Ulysses, for even by these very arguments, a man may principally collect and gather, that the nature of beasts is not altogether void of the use of reason and intelligence: Like as therefore among trees, there is not one more or lesse destitute of soule, (I meane that which is sensitive) than another, but they all indifferently & equally void thereof, and not one of them is one jot endued therewith; even so in sensible beasts, there would not be one found more slow and unapt to learne things of wit and understanding than another, if they were not all partakers of reason and intelligence, although some have the same in more or lesse measure than others; and say there be some very blockith and exceeding dull of conceit, consider withall, how the wily sleights and craftie conceits of others may be put in balance against the same, namely, when you shall compare the fox, the woolfe, or the bees with the sheepe and the asse; it is all one as if you should set Polyphemus to your selfe; or that Homer of Corinth to your grandfather Autolycus: And yet I thinke verily, that there is not so great difference and distance betweene beast and beast, as there is ods in the matter of wisedome, discourse of reason, and use of memorie betweene man and man.
ULYSSES.
But take heed of one thing Gryllus, that it be not a strange and absurd positon, sounding of no probabiltie at all, to attribute any use of reason unto those who have no sense or knowledge at all of God.
GRYLLUS.
What Ulysses shall we not say that you being so wise and excellent as your are, were descended from the races of Sisyphus, &c.
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