Part 5

XI. The same that happens in point of food, happens with respect to everything else, for whether it proceeds from the force of habit or the proportion of temperament or disposition of each nation respectively, or that things of the same species, have different qualities in different countries, which make them more or less commodious or agreeable; every one finds himself better satisfied with the things of his own country, than with those of a foreign one, and he is therefore attached to it, because he feels his own convenience better gratified there, and his partiality for it is not influenced by the supposed love of his country.

XII. The inhabitants of the Marian islands, which are so called from Dona Mariana of Austria, who sent missionaries among them for their conversion, made no use of, nor had any knowledge of fire. Who, however, would venture to assert, that this element was not indispensably necessary to human life, or that there was any nation whatever, which could subsist without it? But notwithstanding this, those islanders, without fire, lived contented and happy. They were not sensible of the want of it, because they did not know it. Roots, fruit, and crude fish, were all their aliment; and still they were more healthy and robust than we, for living to a hundred years of age, was very frequent and common among them.

XIII. The force of custom is amazingly powerful, for it is capable of not only making the greatest asperities sufferable, but by peoples being familiarized to them, it also causes their being satisfied under them. He who was not well apprized of this truth, would be led to think what passed between Esteban King of Poland, and the Peasants of Livonia, incredible. This glorious Prince having observed, that these poor people were cruelly and very ill-treated by the nobles of the province, convened them together, and after condoling with them on their misery, told them, he proposed to make their subjection less severe and easier to be tolerated, by restraining the exercise of power in the nobility, within more mild and moderate bounds; but wonderful to relate, instead of seeming sensible of his benevolence, and embracing the offer he made them, they threw themselves at his feet, and begged he would not alter their customs, with which, through long usage, they were quite satisfied. What will not the force of habit conquer, if it is capable of making tyranny agreeable! Join to this, the circumstance of the Muscovite women, who are not happy or contented, unless their husbands, without their giving them any occasion for it, beat or cudgel them every day, regarding this unprovoked ill-treatment, as a token of their great love for them.

XIV. We may add to the foregoing remarks, that an uniformity of language, religion, and customs, makes the intercourse with our countrymen grateful and pleasing, as a diversity in those matters, makes the society of strangers aukward and unentertaining. Our particular connections and personal friendships also, tend to produce the same effect; and generally speaking, the love of convenience, and of that private ease and happiness, which every man finds in his own country, is what attracts him to, and retains him in it, and not the love of the country itself. He who should experience better personal accommodation in another region, would do as St. Peter did, who, as soon as he found himself happily situated on Mount Tabor, resolved to fix his lasting abode on that eminence, and to abandon for good and all the valley in which he was born.

SECT. III.

XV. It is also true, that not only real, but imaginary conveniences, have their influence, to promote an adherence to our country. Entertaining a flattering opinion of the country in which we were born, and preferring it to all others in the world, is one of the most common of all common errors. There is scarce any man, and among the lower class of people not a single one, who does not think his own country the first production of nature, and abounding in a three-fold proportion, with all the goods she distributes, either with respect to the genius or ability of the natives, the fertility of the soil, or the happiness of the climate. To understandings of inferior rank, near objects are represented as by the corporeal eye, which although they are really less, appear larger than things at a distance. In his nation only, are to be found learned and wise men, those of other kingdoms are hardly civilized; the customs of his country only are rational, and the language of it is the only soft and sufferable one; the hearing a stranger speak, as effectually excites them to laughter, as seeing Jack Pudding on a stage; his nation only abounds in riches, and the Prince of it is the only powerful one. At the end of the last century, when the arms of France were so prevalent, a junto of people at Salamanca being talking on this subject, a low Portugueze who was among them, with an air of great sagacity and importance, made the following political remark: _There is certainly now no Prince in Europe capable of resisting the King of France, except the King of Portugal._ But what Michael Montona, in his treatise intitled _Moral Reflections_, relates of a rustic Savoyard, is more extravagant still, who said, _I don’t believe the King of France has the ability he is said to have, for if that was the case, he would have negotiated with our Duke long ago, about making him his Major Domo._ Nearly after this manner, do all the low vulgar discourse of the things of their own country.

XVI. Neither are many of those exempted from so gross an error, although it is in a less degree, who by their birth or professions, are much superior to the lower class of people. The number of vulgar who do not associate with the common herd, but are intruded among people of understanding, is infinite. How many men of school learning, whose heads were stored with texts, have I seen filled with the caprice, that our nation is the only seat of knowledge and learning, and that in other countries, they print nothing but puerilities and bagatelles, more especially if they write in their own native idiom; nor does it appear to them, that any thing worth reading, can be published in French or Italian, which is in a manner maintaining, that the most important truths can’t be expressed or explained in other languages, although it is certain, the Apostles expounded the most essential and sublime ones in all tongues. But strangers are sufficiently revenged on us for this conceitedness, for in return for our considering them as people of little learning, they look upon us as illiberal and barbarous. Thus in all countries, you will find this piece of bad road to travel through, which is worn in holes and made rough, by the hacknied passage of carriages, loaded with the high notions and opinions the natives have of themselves, and the low ones they entertain of strangers.

SECT. IV.

XVII. The worst is, that those who do not think with the vulgar, talk like the vulgar. This proceeds, from what we call national passion or prejudice, the legitimate child of vanity, and emulation. Vanity teaches us, that we are interested in our nation being esteemed superior to all others, because every individual looks upon himself as a partaker in the pre-eminence; and emulation causes us to view strangers, especially those who are nearest us, with a jealous eye, and also inclines us to wish their abasement for our own security. From both these motives, people attribute to their own country, a thousand feigned excellencies, although at the time they mention them, they know they are fictitious.

XVIII. This abuse, has filled the world with lyes, and has corrupted the faith of almost all histories. When the glory of his own nation influences him, you will hardly find an historian competently sincere. Plutarch was one of the most impartial writers of antiquity; notwithstanding which, the love of his country, in matters that related to it, made him deviate not a little from his candour; for, as the illustrious Cano remarks, he aggrandizes the events and things appertaining to Greece, beyond their just proportion. And John Bodin observes, that upon examining his lives, you will find, although his comparisons between Greek heroes and Greek heroes, and between Roman and Roman ones, were rightly and fairly made; that when he came to draw the parallel between Greeks and Romans, he warped in favour of his own countrymen.

XIX. I have always admired Titus Livius, not only for his eminent discretion, method, and judgment, but also for his veracity. He does not conceal or dissemble the failings of the Romans, when in the course of his history they come in the way of his pen; but on the contrary he lays them open and exposes them; and what is more, at the hazard of offending Augustus, he highly extolled Pompey, and blazoned his character as preferrable to Cæsar’s, which in those times amounted to the same thing, as declaring himself a zealous republican. Notwithstanding this, I observe a fault in this prince of historians, which if it did not proceed from want of his adverting to, or being aware of it, we must confess to be the effect of his passion for the marvellous. In the two first ages of their republic, he gives an account of as many battles gained, and as many cities taken by the Romans, as would be sufficient to compleat the conquest of a vast empire; but at the end of this time, we see that republic confined within such narrow bounds, that few less states are at this day to be found in all Italy, which is a proof that the antecedent victories, were not so many nor so great in the original, as they are represented to be in the copy.

XX. There is scarce one of the modern historians I have read, in whom I have not observed the same inconsistency. If they relate the events of a long war, they paint them so favourably to their own side, that the reader from those premises, is induced to promise himself, that it will end in an advantageous peace, in which his nation will give the law to the enemy; but as the premises are false, the conclusion does not follow, and in the end, he finds things turn out quite contrary to what he expected.

XXI. I am not insensible, that during a war, such sort of lies may be politically necessary; therefore in all countries, they print Gazettes with privilege; I don’t say of lying, but of colouring events, so that they should not dishearten, but seem encouraging to the people; and in their description of things, they imitate the artifice of Apelles, who painted Antigonus in profile, to conceal his being blind of one eye; I mean, that they display the favourable side of events, and cover the adverse one by a deception. I say, that policy requires this should be done in Gazettes, to prevent the subjects being dismayed by the adverse strokes of fortune; but in books that are written many years after the transactions, what danger is there in speaking the truth?

XXII. The case is, that although none could happen to the public by it, the writer himself who should make the attempt, would be exposed to a great deal. The poor historians, scarce dare to do otherwise than disguise such truths, as are not advantageous to their countrymen. They must either flatter their own nation, or lay down the pen; for if they fail to do this, they will be branded with the epithet of being disaffected to their country. I lament most heartily the lot of father Mariana; this very learned Jesuit, over and above possessing the other talents necessary for an historian, was exceedingly sincere and ingenuous; but this illustrious quality, which aggrandized his glory with found critics, diminished it among the vulgar of Spain; they said he had not a Spanish heart, and that his affections and his pen were inimical to his country; and as heretofore, the extreme rigour of Septimus Severus to the Romans, was attributed to his being of African extraction by his father’s side, they imputed to father Mariana, a certain kind of pique against the Spaniards, and assigned as the cause of it, I don’t know whether with truth or not, his being of French descent on the side of his mother. They would have had him relate events, not as they happened, but in such a way as should seem most pleasing to them; and by such as are fond of adulation, the man who is not a flatterer is regarded as an enemy. But the same thing which made this great man ill looked upon in Spain, gained him the highest eulogiums from the most eminent personages in Europe: the following, bestowed on him by the great Cardinal Baronius, is sufficient to establish his honour and his fame: _Father John Mariana, a scrupulous lover of the truth, an excellent pattern and sectary of virtue, a worthy professor among the society of Jesus, and a Spaniard by birth, but void of all national passion or prejudice, in a learned and elegant stile, wrote a most perfect and faithful history of Spain._ (Baron. ad ann. Christi 688.)

XXIII. It is not only in Spain, that they would have their historians panegyrists, for the same thing happens in other countries. The King of England, sent for the famous Gregory Leti, to write the history of that kingdom; but he having protested he would not take pen in hand, unless he was allowed to speak the truth; the King, to encourage him to engage in the undertaking, assured him, that he should be permitted to comply with this indispensable obligation, upon which, he set to work, and compiled his history from the best authorities, and the most faithful monuments and records he could discover; but the natives having found reason to be dissatisfied with many of the facts laid open in it, the King repented of the permission he had given him, the copies were all called in by the procurement of administration, and the historian obliged to leave England, but ill recompensed for his trouble.

XXIV. We Spaniards, complain much of the French authors, alledging, that from their hatred to us, they disfigure transactions which are glorious to our nation, and aggrandize in proportion, such as are favourable to their own. This complaint is reciprocal, and I believe well founded on both sides. When there have been frequent wars between two nations, you will always observe, that from the jealousies and animosities these have produced, the wars are constantly kept up in the writings of the authors of both kingdoms; for united as in the arrow, the feather follows the impetus of the steel.

XXV. But as a tribute due to truth and justice, I can’t avoid taking notice in this place, of an unjust accusation, which has been fulminated by our countrymen against the authors of that nation. They say, that in relating the events of that kingdom in the reign of Francis the first, they are either silent, or deny the imprisonment of that King at the battle of Pavia. This complaint has not the least foundation, for I have read accounts of this advantage of our arms in various French authors, and even in one of them, I saw celebrated the piquant answer of a French lady to King Francis, on the event of his imprisonment. The King in a satyrical manner, that insinuated Time had robbed her of her charms, said to her, _Madam, how long is it since you came from the land of Beauty?_ To which the lady readily answered, _Ever since you came from the country of Pavia_.

XXVI. Where I find the most reason for the Spaniards to be angry with the French authors, is in their denying the coming of St. James to Spain, and in their refusing to acknowledge that his sacred body is deposited there; but these pretensions are more the offspring of criticism than national jealousy, and never were material objects of emulation between the two nations. It is on the subject of the justice of wars, and the advantages gained in the prosecution of them, that the pens engage with the most acrimony.

SECT. V.

XXVII. From this spirit of national prejudice, which prevails in almost all histories, it happens, that with respect to an infinite number of facts, the things which are past seem as uncertain to us, as those which are to come. I acknowledge, that the historical Pyrrhonism of Campanela was extravagant, who carried his want of confidence in history to such a point, as to say, he doubted whether there ever was an Emperor in the world named Charles the Great. But with respect to those events, which the historians of one nation affirm, and those of another deny; and as there are many such events, it will be prudent for us to suspend our judgment, till some well-informed third person shall decide upon them; for, excited either by vanity or inclination, or led by condescension, every one goes on to flatter his own nation; the light of truth at the same time, being concealed from the eyes of the people, by the smoke of the incense of flattery, and the harmony of adulation, preventing their listening to the voice of reason.

XXVIII. I shall not dwell upon those authors, who carried the passion for their country, to lengths of extravagance, such as Goropius Becanus, a native of Brabant, who very deliberately endeavoured to prove, that the Flemish tongue was the first in the world; and Olaus Rudbec, a Swede, who, in a book he wrote on purpose, tried to evince, that all which the antients had said of the Fortunate Islands, the garden of the Hesperides and Elysian fields, alluded to Sweden, pronouncing at the same time, his own country to be the source and perfection of European learning; and asserting, that letters and the art of writing, did not descend from Phœnicia to Greece, but from Phœnicia to Sweden; in the prosecution of which undertaking, he rummaged out, and expended in waste, much hidden learning.

XXIX. It may also be proper to observe here, that another opposite vicious extreme, if it is not derived from, arises in consequence of this prejudice. It has been remarked by some, of a modern Spanish author, that he has been guilty of unjustly denying to Spain, the honour of some glorious antiquities, with a view of being applauded as a sincere man among strangers. Perhaps this was not his motive, but that his criticism was defective, for want of being tempered with a due mixture of the indulgent and the severe; and that to avoid the imputation of flattery, he ran into the opposite offensive extreme; for

_Dum vitant stulti vitia, in contraria currunt._

SECT. VI.

XXX. But the national prejudice of which we have spoken hitherto, is, if we may so call it, an innocent vice compared to another, which by being more common, is more pernicious. I speak of that preposterous affection, which is not relative to a republic at large, but applies to a particular district or territory which we call our own. I do not deny, that by the term country, is understood not only the republic or state of which we are members, and which may be called our common country, but also the province, diocese, city or district, where every one drew his first breath, and which on that account may be termed his particular country; but it is certain, the phrase “love of our country,” cannot be supposed to be confined or apply to our country according to this second definition, but according to the first; for that is the sense, in which it is recommended and enforced, by examples, persuasions, and apophthegms, of historians, orators, and philosophers. The country to which we should sacrifice our lives in heroic arms, and which we ought to esteem superior to all our private interests, and as the creditor of all our possible obsequies and services, is that body of state, under which we are united in one civil government, and protected by, and bound to the observance of the same laws. Thus Spain is the proper object of the love of a Spaniard, France of a Frenchman, and Poland of a Polander. But this should be understood, not to relate to such people, who by migrating to, and settling in other countries, make themselves members of other states, in which case, the duty they owe to the country where they reside, and are protected, ought to prevail over the affection they bear to the country in which they were born; and on this distinction, we shall in the sequel make an important remark. The dividing of a kingdom into provinces or districts, which is done for the convenience of administering justice, and conducting other business of government, has a material influence over, and is in a great measure the cause of dividing men’s hearts.

XXXI. The particular or limited love of one’s country, instead of being useful to a state, is in many respects injurious and hurtful, because it induces a division in the minds of those, who ought to be reciprocally united for the sake of making more firm and stable, the bond of common society; and because also this limited love of our country, is an incentive to civil wars, and revolts against the sovereign power; for always when a particular province or district fancies itself aggrieved, all the individuals of it think the redressing the grievances of their injured country, an obligation superior to all others; and finally, this confined principle, is an obstacle to the right administration of justice among all classes of people, and in every judicial and ministerial department.

XXXII. This last inconvenience is so common and apparent, as to be hidden from no man; and what is worse, no one endeavours to hide it. This pestilence of partiality to countrymen is, to the perversion and corruption of good regulation, introduced and cherished in the most bare-faced manner, into those departments which are vested with the power of distributing honourable and useful employments. What sanctuary has been able to protect or preserve us, from the violencies of this declared enemy of reason and equity? How many hearts, inaccessible to the temptations of gold, insensible to the allurements of ambition, intrepid, and proof against the threats of power, have suffered themselves to be miserably deluded and perverted, by national passion? Now-a-days, if a man is a candidate for an office or employment, he always reckons upon as many protectors as he has countrymen, who have any concern or interest in the disposal of it. His pretensions being unreasonable, to a man swayed by national or provincial prejudice, are no objection, because the only merit with such a one, is the candidate’s being his countryman. We have seen men, in other respects of unimpeachable integrity, who were much infected with this malady; from hence I have been inclined to conclude, that this is an infernal machine, artfully invented by the Devil, to subdue those souls, who by all other ways are invincible; but alas, Achilles, although in one little part only, you are vulnerable, what does it avail you, if Paris, in shooting the arrow, has the skill and address to hit that little part?

SECT. VII.