The Power of Imagination — The Essays of Montaigne

The schoolmen say strong imagination begets the event itself, and Montaigne is painfully susceptible: another's cough tickles his lungs, and he usurps their sensations. He could live on jolly company alone. Fancy can raise fevers and even kill those who entertain it too willingly; Simon Thomas prescribed that a sick old man study Montaigne's fresh complexion, forgetting the visitor might sicken in return. Montaigne avoids the sick he loves more than strangers he does not.

Examples multiply across history and gossip. Gallus Vibius studied madness until he became mad; men die on scaffolds when pardons are read; Cippus grows horns after dreaming of bulls; Passion gives voices nature denied. Sexual dread shows the pattern plainly: a friend cured impotence by confessing it beforehand; Montaigne once staged a gold-plate charm and ribbon ritual for a count's wedding night because empty ceremony, when believed, steadies the soul. Women should put off coy disdain with the petticoat, he adds, since a hostile face extinguishes vigor.

The body disobeys the will in hair, tears, appetite, and the indocile member Montaigne half-defends against universal blame. Physicians exploit the same force: a merchant took clysters that were only warm water; a woman vomited a pin after a trick basin; guests sickened because the host joked they had eaten cat. Even dogs mourn masters and horses whinny in sleep. Montaigne would plead for the unruly member as unjustly singled out when tears, appetite, and pulse also disobey the will.

Imagination also spreads outward, as plague does, marking unborn children, Jacob's sheep, or a cat and bird staring each other down. Montaigne piles marvels yet insists he reports honestly what may happen, borrowing examples as possibilities rather than demanding belief in magic. He prefers delivering what may happen over cataloging only what has happened, and admits historians may be too scrupulous for such work. The lesson: prepare the mind before the body performs, name fear before it manufactures failure, and treat belief as a bodily force that can harm, heal, or infect the room you share with others.