Commerce with Montaigne

Abstract

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• Commerce with Montaigne
• Jeffrey R. Di Leo (bio)

In 1676, the Catholic Church put Montaigne's Essays on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum. According to the New Catholic Encyclopedia (2003), the index, "established in 1557 by Pope Paul IV, was a list of books that Catholics were prohibited from reading on pain of excommunication," it continues, "because they contained material considered dangerous or contrary to faith or morals." The list would continue as Catholic doctrine until 1966, when Pope Paul VI abolished it on the grounds that it was "contrary to the teaching of Vatican II concerning freedom of inquiry."

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Replica of a card from the original Villanova University Library card catalog.

For those who doubt that this list meant very much before Vatican II abolished it, consider an exhibit from the Villanova University Library (Figure 1). Here we find a catalog card for an English translation of Montaigne's Essays, which is marked in italics "On Church Index" above the call number and author information. While professors could freely check out the Essays, students wanting to check it out "had to report to the Library Director's office with a permission slip from their professor to request access to the book." The reason for its inclusion in the Index was apparently that it was contrary to the philosophy of Descartes, which dominated at the time and regarded animals as automata, whereas Montaigne regarded animals as capable of reason. The Catholic Church contended that Montaigne's doctrine on animal reason placed in peril the immortality of humans. Hence, almost three centuries later—and just a year before the summer of love—students at Villanova and presumably other Catholic universities in America needed a permission slip from their professors to check it out of the library. [End Page 1]

One wonders though how Catholic university professors in the 1960s came to the decision to allow—or deny—their students access to books such as Montaigne's Essays "that Catholics were prohibited from reading on pain of excommunication." In addition, it is hard today not to think about such decisions in the context of zealous right-wing public library boards considering whether to allow—or deny—access to LGBTQ+ reading material. Whereas Vatican II eliminated the Index with the intention of freedom of inquiry, right-wing zealots are working hard today to reestablish a new version of it in public libraries across America. Nevertheless, it is still to be determined how comprehensive the New Index Librorum Prohibitorum will be—and if checking out Montaigne's Essays from your local public library will require presentation of a permission slip from a library board member to the director of the public library. After all, he does maintain that animals can reason, which I am sure is contrary to the faith or morals of some library board member—somewhere in America.

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Late in his life, Montaigne wrote an essay titled "De trois commerces" (1585–88). It is essay 3 in book 3 of his Essays. Variously translated as "Of Three Kinds of Intercourse" (E. J. Trenchmann, 1927), "Of Three Kinds of Association" (Donald Frame, 1957), "On Three Kinds of Social Intercourse" (M. A. Screech, 1991), the title noted on the Vanderbilt Library catalog card was a much more literal one: "Of Three Commerces" (Charles Cotton, 1686). It is a very personal essay where Montaigne discusses the three forms of "commerce" that enrich his life and make it worth living.

The first form of commerce involves friendship:

The people whose society and intimacy I court are those they call refined and talented men, the idea of whom puts me out of liking for others. It is, if rightly understood, the rarest type with us, a type that is chiefly due to Nature. The aim of this commerce is simply frequent and intimate forgathering and conversation; the exercise of wits, without any other fruit. In our talks all subjects are alike to me; it matters little to me if there be neither gravity nor profundity in them; charm and pertinency are never wanting. [End Page 2]

But the commerce with friends that he writes about here differs drastically...