The Physiology of Taste by Brillat Savarin (suggested reading .TXT) 📕

hour after

dinner, slaughtered friends and enemies indiscriminately.

 

I have heard it said, that there were two persons in the army,

whom the general-in-chief always wished to have shot, the

commissary-in-chief and the head of his general staff. They were

both present. Cherin the chief of staff, talked back to him, and

the commissary, though he said nothing, did not think a bit the

less.

 

At that time, I was attached to his general staff, and always had

a plate at his table. I used, however, to go thither rarely, being

always afraid of his periodical outbreaks, and that he would send

me to dinner to finish my digestion.

 

I met him afterwards at Paris, and as he testified his regret that

he had not seen me oftener, I did not conceal the reason. We

laughed over the matter and he confessed that I was not wrong.

 

We were then at Offenbourg, and a complaint was made by the staff

that we ate no game nor fish.

 

This complaint was well founded, for it is a maxim, of public law,

that the conquerors should always live at the expense of the

conquered. On that very day I wrote a letter to the master of the

forests to point out a remedy.

 

This official was an old trooper, who doubtless was unwilling to

treat us kindly lest we should take root in this territory. His

answer was negative and evasive. The game keepers, afraid of our

soldiers, had gone, the fishermen were insubordinate, the water

muddy, etc. To all this, I said nothing, but I sent him ten

grenadiers to be lodged and fed until further orders.

 

The remedy was effective; for early on the next day after, I saw a

heavily loaded wagon come. The game-keepers had come back, the

fishermen were submissive; we had game and fish enough to last for

a week.

 

We had kid, snipe, lark, pike, etc.

 

When I received the offering, I freed the superintendent from his

troublesome guests, and during the whole time we remained in that

part of the country, we had nothing to complain of.

 

MEDITATION XVII.

 

REPOSE.

 

MAN is not made to enjoy an indefinite activity; nature has

destined him to a variable existence, and his perceptions must end

after a certain time. This time of activity may be prolonged, by

varying the nature of the perceptions to be experienced, and a

continuity of life brings about a desire for repose.

 

Repose leads to sleep, and sleep produces dreams.

 

Here we find ourselves on the very verge of humanity, for the man

who sleeps is something more than a mere social being: the law

protects, but does not command him.

 

Here a very singular fact told me by Dom Duhaget, once prior of

the Chartreuse convent of Pierre Chatel, presents itself.

 

Dom Duhaget was a member of a very good family in Gascogne, and

had served with some distinction as a captain of infantry. He was

a knight of St Louis. I never knew any one, the conversation of

whom was more pleasant.

 

“There was,” said he, “before I went to Pierre Chatel, a monk of a

very melancholy humor, whose character was very sombre, and who

was looked upon as a somnambulist.

 

“He used often to leave his cell, and when he went astray, people

were forced to guide him back again. Many attempts had been made

to cure him, but in vain.

 

“One evening I had not gone to bed at the usual hour, but was in

my office looking over several papers, when I saw this monk enter

in a perfect state of somnambulism.

 

“His eyes were open but fixed, and he was clad in the tunic in

which he should have gone to bed, but he had a huge knife in his

hand.

 

“He came at once to my bed, the position of which he was familiar

with, and after having felt my hand, struck three blows which

penetrated the mattrass on which I laid.

 

“As he passed in front of me his brows were knit, and I saw an

expression of extreme gratification pervaded his face.

 

“The light of two lamps on my desk made no impression, and he

returned as he had come, opening the doors which led to his cell,

and I soon became satisfied that he had quietly gone to bed.

 

“You may,” said the Prior, “fancy my state after this terrible

apparition; I trembled at the danger I had escaped, and gave

thanks to Providence. My emotion, however, was so great that

during the balance of the night I could not sleep.

 

“On the next day I sent for the somnambulist and asked him what he

had dreamed of during the preceding night.

 

“When I asked the question he became troubled. ‘Father,’ said he,

‘I had so strange a dream that it really annoys me; I fear almost

to tell you for I am sure the devil has had his hand in it.’ ‘I

order you to tell me,’ said I, ‘dreams are involuntary and this

may only be an illusion. Speak sincerely to me.’ ‘Father,’ said

he,’ I had scarcely gone to sleep when I dreamed that you had

killed my mother, and when her bloody shadow appeared to demand

vengeance, I hurried into your cell, and as I thought stabbed you.

Not long after I arose, covered with perspiration, and thanked God

that I had not committed the crime I had meditated.’ ‘It has been

more nearly committed,’ said I, with a kind voice, ‘than you

think.’

 

“I then told him what had passed, and pointed out to him the blows

he had aimed at me.

 

“He cast himself at my feet, and all in tears wept over the

involuntary crime he had thought to commit, and besought me to

inflict any penance I might think fit.

 

“‘No,’ said I, ‘I will not punish you for an involuntary act.

Henceforth, though I excuse you from the service of the night, I

inform you that your cell will be locked on the outside and never

be opened except to permit you to attend to the first mass.’”

 

If in this instance, from which a miracle only saved him, the

Prior had been killed, the monk would not have suffered, for he

would have committed a homicide not a murder.

 

TIME OF REST.

 

The general laws of the globe we inhabit have an influence on the

human race. The alternatives of day and night are felt with

certain varieties over the whole globe, but the result of all this

is the indication of a season of quiet and repose. Probably we

would not have been the same persons had we lived all our lives

without any change of day or night.

 

Be this as it may, when one has enjoyed for a certain length of

time a plentitude of life a time comes when he can enjoy nothing;

his impressibility gradually decreases, and the effects on each of

his senses are badly arranged. The organs are dull and the soul

becomes obtuse.

 

It is easy to see that we have had social man under consideration,

surrounded by all the attractions of civilization. The necessity

of this is peculiarly evident to all who are buried either in the

studio, travel, as soldiers, or in any other manner.

 

In repose our mother nature especially luxuriates. The man who

really reposes, enjoys a happiness which is as general as it is

indefinable; his arms sink by their own weight, his fibres

distend, his brain becomes refreshed, his senses become calm, and

his sensations obtuse. He wishes for nothing, he does not reflect,

a veil of gauze is spread before his eyes, and in a few moments he

will sink to sleep.

 

MEDITATION XVIII.

 

SLEEP.

 

THOUGH some men be organized that they may be said not to sleep,

yet the great necessity of the want of sleep is well defined as is

hunger or thirst. The advanced sentinels of the army used often to

sleep though they filled their eyes with snuff.

 

DEFINITION.

 

Sleep is a physical condition, during which man separates himself

from external objects by the inactivity of his senses, and has

only a mechanical life.

 

Sleep, like night, is preceded and followed by two twilights. The

one leads to inertion, the other to activity.

 

Let us seek to elucidate these phenomena.

 

When sleep begins, the organs of the senses fall almost into

inactivity. Taste first disappears, then the sight and smell. The

ear still is on the alert, and touch never slumbers. It ever warns

us of danger to which the body is liable.

 

Sleep is always preceded by a more or less voluptuous sensation.

The body yields to it with pleasure, being certain of a prompt

restoration. The soul gives up to it with confidence, hoping that

its means of fiction will he retempered.

 

From the fact of their not appreciating this sensation, savants of

high rank have compared sleep to death, which all living beings

resist as much as possible, and which even animals show a horror

of.

 

Like all pleasures, sleep becomes a passion. Persons have been

known to sleep away three-quarters of their life. Like all other

passions it then exerts the worst influences, producing idleness,

indolence, sloth and death.

 

The school of Salernum granted only seven hours to sleep without

distinction to sex or age. This maxim was too severe, for more

time is needed by children, and more should, from complaisance, be

granted to women. Though whenever more than ten hours is passed in

bed there is abuse.

 

In the early hours of crepuscular sleep, will yet exists. We can

rouse ourselves, and the eye has not yet lost all its power. Non

omnibus dormio, said Mecenes, and in this state more than one

husband has acquired a sad certainty. Some ideas yet originate but

are incoherent. There are doubtful lights, and see indistinct

forms flit around. This condition does not last long, for sleep

soon becomes absolute.

 

What does the soul do in the interim? It lives in itself, and like

a pilot in a calm, like a mirror at night, a lute that no one

touches, awakes new excitement.

 

Some psycologists, among others the count of Redern, say that the

soul always acts. The evidence is, that a man aroused from sleep

always preserves a memory of his dreams.

 

There is something in this observation, which deserves

verification.

 

This state of annihilation, however, is of brief duration, never

exceeding more than five or six hours: losses are gradually

repaired, an obscure sense of existence manifests itself, and the

sleeper passes into the empire of dreams.

 

MEDITATION XIX.

 

DREAMS.

 

Dreams are material impressions on the soul, without the

intervention of external objects.

 

These phenomena, so common in ordinary times, are yet little

known.

 

The fault resides with the savants who did not allow us a

sufficiently great number of instances. Time will however remedy

this, and the double nature of man will be better known.

 

In the present state of science, it must be taken for granted that

there exists a fluid, subtle as it is powerful, which transmits to

the brain the impressions received by the senses. This excitement

is the cause of ideas.

 

Absolute sleep is the deperdition or inertia of this fluid.

 

We must believe that the labors of digestion and assimulation do

not cease during sleep, but repair losses so that there is a time

when the individual having already all the necessities of action

is not excited by external objects.

 

Thus the nervous fluid—movable from its nature, passes