Whatever I shall say upon this subject, I am of necessity to invade some of the bounds of custom, so careful has she been to shut up all the avenues.  I was disputing with myself in this shivering season, whether the fashion of going naked in those nations lately discovered is imposed upon them by the hot temperature of the air, as we say of the Indians and Moors, or whether it be the original fashion of mankind.  Men of understanding, forasmuch as all things under the sun, as the Holy Writ declares, are subject to the same laws, were wont in such considerations as these, where we are to distinguish the natural laws from those which have been imposed by man’s invention, to have recourse to the general polity of the world, where there can be nothing counterfeit.  Now, all other creatures being sufficiently furnished with all things necessary for the support of their being—­[Montaigne’s expression is, “with needle and thread.”—­W.C.H.]—­it is not to be imagined that we only are brought into the world in a defective and indigent condition, and in such a state as cannot subsist without external aid.  Therefore it is that I believe, that as plants, trees, and animals, and all things that have life, are seen to be by nature sufficiently clothed and covered, to defend them from the injuries of weather: 

         “Proptereaque fere res omnes ant corio sunt,
          Aut seta, ant conchis, ant callo, ant cortice tectae,”

["And that for this reason nearly all things are clothed with skin,
or hair, or shells, or bark, or some such thing.” 
—­Lucretius, iv. 936.]

so were we:  but as those who by artificial light put out that of day, so we by borrowed forms and fashions have destroyed our own.  And ’tis plain enough to be seen, that ’tis custom only which renders that impossible that otherwise is nothing so; for of those nations who have no manner of knowledge of clothing, some are situated under the same temperature that we are, and some in much colder climates.  And besides, our most tender parts are always exposed to the air, as the eyes, mouth, nose, and ears; and our country labourers, like our ancestors in former times, go with their breasts and bellies open.  Had we been born with a necessity upon us of wearing petticoats and breeches, there is no doubt but nature would have fortified those parts she intended should be exposed to the fury of the seasons with a thicker skin, as she has done the finger-ends and the soles of the feet.  And why should this seem hard to believe?  I observe much greater distance betwixt my habit and that of one of our country boors, than betwixt his and that of a man who has no other covering but his skin.  How many men, especially in Turkey, go naked upon the account of devotion?  Some one asked a beggar, whom he saw in his shirt in the depth of winter, as brisk and frolic as he who goes muffled up to the ears in furs, how he was able to endure to go so?  “Why, sir,” he