Plutarch’s method of characterization is statuesque. I feel the same contrast between Plutarch and Montaigne. In Rembrandt it is exactly the reverse: the face may be ugly, the body largely hidden in shadows, yet all the energy is focused on the expression-an expression of endless suggestion, which brings to us a definite human personality. The first is all surface-shapely limbs, a well-proportioned body, a harmonious face, whose eyes nevertheless stare out serenely into vacancy, suggesting nothing internal. Since it is exactly in this-the representation of personality-that I think Spengler’s idea most aptly applies in these two writers.Ĭompare the representation of a person in a classical Greek statue and in a portrait by Rembrandt, and I think you will catch my meaning. Now those that write lives, by reason they insist more upon counsels than events, more upon what sallies from within, than upon what happens from without, are the most proper for my reading and, therefore, above all others, Plutarch is the man for me.įor my part this quote better describes Montaigne than Plutarch. The historians are my right ball, for they are pleasant and easy, and where man, in general, the knowledge of whom I hunt after, appears more vividly and entire than anywhere else… the variety and truth of his internal qualities, in gross and piecemeal, the diversity of means by which he is united and knit, and the accidents that threaten him.
Indeed, Montaigne specifically praises Plutarch for his insight into human nature: The Frenchman idolized the Greek and the Essays are full of quotes of and references to Plutarch. I could not help making this comparison, you see, since it was Montaigne who led me to Plutarch. Specifically, I kept thinking of Spengler’s idea as I mentally compared Plutarch’s conception of personality with Montaigne’s. It is a somewhat vague statement, I know, but I kept coming back to Spengler’s idea as I read Plutarch’s Lives. In the course of his grand theory of history, Oswald Spengler distinguishes what he sees as the fundamental difference between the ancient Greco-Roman and the contemporary Western cultures: the Greek’s ideal concept was of bounded, perfect forms, while the Western soul craves the boundless, the formless, and the infinite. It is the time which is spent in laborious production for which we are repaid by the durable character of the result. Running the (Full) M… on The Madrid Half-MarathonĮase, and speed of execution, seldom produces work of any permanent value or delicacy. 2023: New Year… on In the Heat: Elche & …Īlicante & the I… on Summertime in Andalucía: Jerez…Īlicante & the I… on The Monastery of El Escor…
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