A thousand contrasts frequently crowd together, and these contrasts are
in nature; they are no more astonishing than a fine day followed by
storm.
Men are equally mad everywhere; they have made the laws little by
little, as gaps are repaired in a wall. Here eldest sons have taken all
they could from younger sons, there younger sons share equally.
Sometimes the Church has commanded the duel, sometimes she has
anathematized it. The partisans and the enemies of Aristotle have each
been excommunicated in their turn, as have those who wore long hair and
those who wore short. In this world we have perfect law only to rule a
species of madness called gaming. The rules of gaming are the only ones
which admit neither exception, relaxation, variety nor tyranny. A man
who has been a lackey, if he play at lansquenet with kings, is paid
without difficulty if he win; everywhere else the law is a sword with
which the stronger cut the weaker in pieces.
Nevertheless, this world exists as if everything were well ordered; the
irregularity is of our nature; our political world is like our globe, a
misshapen thing which always preserves itself. It would be mad to wish
that the mountains, the seas, the rivers, were traced in beautiful
regular forms; it would be still more mad to ask perfect wisdom of men;
it would be wishing to give wings to dogs or horns to eagles.
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