The Essays of Montaigne Ch. 11: When Fortune

Michel de Montaigne

When Fortune Tellers Fail

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Summary

Cicero already asked why the oracles at Delphi had gone silent, and not only in his own age. Montaigne walks the same ground. Christianity has abolished most public rites of bird-flight, thunder, and entrails, yet people still hunt the future in stars, dreams, and the shapes of faces, as if the present were not work enough. Francesco, Marquis of Saluzzo, had the king's favour and a restored marquisate. Prophecies of French ruin, laid as bets in Rome, so frightened him that he turned to the Emperor. He held towns and a clear opening, yet the Crown lost only Fossano after a long siege. Whatever constellation ruled that year did not pay him.

Montaigne would rather settle a choice by the chance of a die than by Tuscan dreams of the child-god Tages rising from a furrow. Almanacs look wise when one forecast lands, because nobody keeps the pile of misses. Diogenes, shown temple paintings of men saved from shipwreck, asks where the pictures of the drowned are, since they are by much the greater number. Vague prophetic cant stays in riddle so later readers can claim any event as proof.

He allows one exception that is not a market. Socrates' inner push may have been a trained will moving faster than argument, and Montaigne has followed sudden, weakly reasoned hunches that later looked lucky. The point is not a new oracle. It is to finish a day and be able to say you have lived it, and to leave tomorrow's weather unbought.

In this chapter:Terms Characters Key Quotes Modern Story

Why This Matters

Counting Missed Forecasts

A confident forecast can feel like shelter in a shaky week, even when the speaker has never shown you a miss. Francesco of Saluzzo left Francis I after Italian prophecies of French ruin, then gained almost nothing while breaking loyalty.

Before you change a job, a plan, or a loyalty on someone else's certainty, ask them to name the forecasts they got wrong.

This chapter

Inside the Mind: The Temple Wall

Diogenes is shown temple paintings of men saved by vow. He asks where the pictures are of those cast away, who are by much the greater number. The wall keeps the hits and hides the wrecks, so a forecast feels like shelter because the misses were never allowed to stay in the room.

Continue this thoughtThe Firmest Beliefs Are the Ones Nobody Can Check

Coming Up in Chapter 12

Constancy, for Montaigne, is not a stiff pose in the ranks. He says honest means of avoiding a blow are commendable, and no clumsy duck is shameful if it keeps the strike off you. The hard part is naming the harm that cannot be dodged, then standing there.

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Chapter 11

When Fortune Tellers Fail

OF PROGNOSTICATIONS For what concerns oracles, it is certain that a good while before the coming of Jesus Christ they had begun to lose their credit; for we see that Cicero troubled to find out the cause of their decay, and he has these words: “Cur isto modo jam oracula Delphis non eduntur, non modo nostro aetate, sed jam diu; ut nihil possit esse contemptius?” [“What is the reason that the oracles at Delphi are no longer uttered: not merely in this age of ours, but for a long time past, insomuch that nothing is more in contempt?” —Cicero, De…

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When Fortune Tellers Fail

Summary

Why This Matters