“ because men that are free, well-born, well-bred, and conversant in honest companies, have naturally an instinct and spur that prompteth them unto virtuous actions, and withdraws them from vice, which is called honour. ”
François Rabelais, Gargantua and Pantagruel (1534). copy citation
| Author | François Rabelais |
|---|---|
| Source | Gargantua and Pantagruel |
| Topic | action vice |
| Date | 1534 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Sir Thomas Urquhart of Cromarty and Peter Antony Motteux |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1200/1200-h/1200-h.htm |
Context
“None did awake them, none did offer to constrain them to eat, drink, nor to do any other thing; for so had Gargantua established it. In all their rule and strictest tie of their order there was but this one clause to be observed,
Do What Thou Wilt;
because men that are free, well-born, well-bred, and conversant in honest companies, have naturally an instinct and spur that prompteth them unto virtuous actions, and withdraws them from vice, which is called honour. Those same men, when by base subjection and constraint they are brought under and kept down, turn aside from that noble disposition by which they formerly were inclined to virtue, to shake off and break that bond of servitude wherein they are so tyrannously enslaved;”
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