Proust takes me many time but I try to read other books. I wanted to re reread Montaigne but I begin by it. Short text but genius.
"À vrai dire, il est bien inutile de se demander si la liberté est naturelle, puisqu’on ne peut tenir aucun être en servitude sans lui faire tort : il n’y a rien au monde de plus contraire à la nature, toute raisonnable, que l’injustice. La liberté est donc naturelle ; c’est pourquoi, à mon avis, nous ne sommes pas seulement nés avec elle, mais aussi avec la passion de la défendre." In english :
"To tell the truth, it is very useless to wonder if the freedom is natural, because we can hold nobody in servitude without harming him: there is nothing to the world furthermore against nature, quite reasonable, than the injustice. Thus the freedom is natural; that is why, in my opinion, we were not only born with her, but also with the passion to defend her."
La Boetie is well known as the friend (boyfriend?) of Montaigne ("Because it was him, because it was me"). It is totally unjust. This text is a magnetic synthesis on Natural right in the line of Thomas d'Acquin ans spanish theologist (Las Casas, Suares...).
He was 18 when he wrote it. It was civil war in France between catholic and protestant. He was completely discouraged by the horrors of the war. We say that he died from it of sorrow. Montaigne desperate by his death, withdrew to write his essays. They will inspire the Edict of Nantes which ended the war.
The voluntary servitude, it is the acceptance of the unacceptable, no tyrant survives without the submission. The solution it is ours. This text is one of the most beautiful on the freedom.