The 128 most classic philosophical essays in the world

Chapter 56: On Luxury

[French] Voltaire

The first thing to understand is that luxury can enrich a great country, though it can ruin a small one.

Luxury has been attacked eloquently in poetry for 2000 years, but it has always been loved.

The first Romans ravaged and destroyed the poor villages of the Volscians and Samnites, plundering their harvests to increase the wealth of their own poor villages.Everyone can tell a lot about these robbers.They are selfless, moral people!They did not steal gold, silver and jewels, for they did not exist where they looted.Their groves and swamps are free of partridges and grouse, and their temperance is commended!

When they gradually plundered everything from the farthest reaches of the Adriatic to the Euphrates, and had enough sense to enjoy the fruits of their plunder for seven or eight hundred years; When such pleasures are brought upon even conquered peoples to taste them, they are said to cease to be wise and upright.

All these attacks are nothing more than to prove the truth that a thief cannot eat his stolen food, wear his stolen clothes, or put on his stolen ring.It is said that if a thief wants to be an honest man, he should throw all these into the river.It would be better to say that one should not steal.Condemn robbers when they rob, but don't call them mad when they enjoy their loot.Honestly, were the British sailors doing the wrong thing when they took Pondicherry and Havana and made their fortunes, and later enjoyed their hard work in Asia and Africa in London?

In fact, the bombast simply wants to bury the wealth accumulated through war, agriculture, trade, and industry.They cited the example of Restymonde.Why don't they cite the example of the Republic of San Marino?What use was Sparta to Greece?

Did Sparta have Demosthenes, Sophocles, Apelles, or Phidias? The luxury of Athens produced all kinds of people.Sparta had some military strategists, but even fewer military strategists than other city-states.So be it!Let a small republic like Restymond retain its poverty.No matter whether you have nothing or enjoy all the wonderful things in life, no one can escape death anyway.A Canadian savage can live to old age like a British citizen with an income of fifty thousand guineas (old British gold coins) a year.But no one compares the country of the Iroquois with England.

Let the Republic of Ragusa and the County of Zug enact laws against extravagance, waste, they are right, it is necessary that the poor cannot live beyond their means, but I read somewhere: "First understand that luxury will make A great country is rich, though it can ruin a small country."

If you think extravagance is excess, everyone knows that any excess, whether it be excessive abstinence, gluttony, frugality, or generosity, is harmful.I don't know how this happened to my village: the land is barren, the taxes are heavy, and the ban on exporting the wheat we grow is intolerable.Yet nearly every farmer has good clothes of cloth and feels well fed.It must be the greatest and most inappropriate luxury of the peasantry, when he tills his fields, painted and painted, his hair curled, and his fine clothes of white linen.But the townspeople of Paris or London go to the theatre, dressed like peasants, and that is the wildest, most absurd miserliness.

"Everything has a measure and a limit. Virtue can neither exceed nor fall short."

Scissors are certainly not the oldest thing.When it was invented, when the nails were cut and part of the hair that hung down the nose was cut off, people blamed it, and what was not said?They will no doubt be called dandies and libertines, paying a high price for a useless instrument to destroy the labors of the Creator.What a sin to cut short the horny keratin which God has caused it to grow on our fingertips!This is an insult to God.Things got worse when shirts and socks were invented.We know how old magistrates, who have never worn socks and shirts, raged in rage against young magistrates who succumbed to this fatal luxury.

Heart mark notes
The aversion to luxury and the longing for luxury are complex, strange and contradictory emotions intertwined in people's hearts.Luxury does not necessarily mean extravagance and extravagance. It can be a living right of the poor or the rich, and a pursuit of quality.Necessary frugality is a virtue, but moderate luxury is the driving force of social development.

Different people live at different levels of life, and it is not a bad thing to find a lifestyle that suits you, proper enjoyment, and proper luxury.

(End of this chapter)