Chapter XXXVIII. Which deals with the curious discourse Don Quixote made on arms and letters

Going on, Don Quixote said:

“Since in the student’s case we began with poverty and its parts, let us see whether the soldier is any richer. And we shall find that there is no one poorer in poverty itself, for he depends on the misery of his pay, which comes late or never, or on whatever he can lay his hands on, at no small risk to his life and his conscience. And sometimes his nakedness is so great that a slashed leather jerkin serves him for finery and shirt at once, and in the dead of winter, out in the open field, he commonly has nothing to shield him from the rigors of the sky but the breath of his mouth, which, since it comes out of an empty place, must surely come out cold, I am persuaded, against all nature. But wait, and see him wait, for night to fall, to make up for all these discomforts in the bed that awaits him, which, unless it is his own fault, will never err on the side of narrowness; for he may measure out on the ground as many feet as he likes and toss about on it to his heart’s content, with no fear of the sheets shrinking on him. Then, after all this, let the day and the hour come for him to receive the degree of his calling; let a day of battle come, for there they will set the tassel on his head, made of lint, to dress some bullet wound that has perhaps gone through his temples, or that will leave him crippled in an arm or a leg. And if that does not happen, and merciful heaven keeps him and preserves him alive and whole, it may be that he stays in the same poverty he was in before, and that there must come one skirmish after another, one battle after another, and he must come out of every one of them the victor, before he gets ahead in anything; but such miracles are seldom seen. But tell me, gentlemen, if you have ever looked into it: how much fewer are those whom war has rewarded than those who have perished in it? You will doubtless answer that there is no comparison, that the dead cannot be brought to any reckoning, and that the living who have been rewarded could be counted in three figures. With men of letters it is all the other way round; for, by the skirts of their gowns, not to say by their sleeves, every one of them has something to keep him going. So that, though the soldier’s labor is greater, his reward is far smaller. But to this it may be answered that it is easier to reward two thousand men of letters than thirty thousand soldiers, for the first are rewarded by being given posts, which must of necessity go to men of their profession, while the second can be rewarded only out of the very estate of the lord they serve; and this impossibility makes my argument stronger still. But let us leave this aside, for it is a labyrinth with a very difficult way out, and return to the pre-eminence of arms over letters, a matter that remains unsettled to this day, such are the reasons each side alleges in its own favor. And among those I have mentioned, letters say that without them arms could not stand, for war too has its laws and is subject to them, and laws come under the heading of letters and lettered men. To this arms answer that laws could not stand without them, for by arms commonwealths are defended, kingdoms preserved, cities guarded, roads made safe, and seas swept clean of corsairs; and, in short, were it not for arms, commonwealths, kingdoms, monarchies, cities, the ways by sea and by land would all lie open to the harshness and confusion that war brings with it for as long as it lasts and is free to use its privileges and its might. And it is an established truth that what costs most is esteemed, and ought to be esteemed, most highly. For a man to become eminent in letters costs him time, sleepless nights, hunger, nakedness, giddiness in the head, indigestion in the stomach, and other things that go along with these, some of which I have already mentioned; but for a man to become a good soldier by the proper steps costs him everything it costs the student, and in a degree so much greater that there is no comparison, for at every step he is on the verge of losing his life. And what fear of want and poverty can come upon the student, or wear him down, that comes anywhere near the fear of a soldier who, finding himself besieged in some stronghold and standing sentry, or on guard, on some ravelin or cavalier, hears the enemy digging a mine toward the spot where he stands, and may not leave that place on any account, nor run from the danger that threatens him so closely? All he can do is let his captain know what is happening, so that he may remedy it with some countermine, while he himself stays where he is, fearing and waiting for the moment when, without warning, he will fly up to the clouds without wings and come down into the depths against his will. And if this seems a small danger, let us see whether it is matched or outdone by that of two galleys ramming each other prow to prow in the middle of the open sea, which, once locked and grappled together, leave the soldier no more room than the two feet of plank the beak allows him; and yet, though he sees before him as many ministers of death threatening him as there are cannon aimed at him from the other side, not a lance’s length from his body, and sees that at the first false step he would go down to visit Neptune’s deep bosom, still, with a dauntless heart, carried on by the honor that spurs him, he offers himself as a mark for all that musketry and strives to cross by so narrow a way onto the enemy’s vessel. And what is most to be marveled at is this: that hardly has one man fallen where he cannot rise again until the end of the world, when another takes his very place; and if this one too falls into the sea, which waits for him like an enemy, another and another follows after him, not giving time to time between their deaths: the greatest valor and daring that can be found in all the trials of war. Happy were those blessed ages that knew nothing of the dreadful fury of these devilish engines of artillery, whose inventor, I am convinced, is being paid in hell the wages of his diabolical invention, by which he made it possible for some vile and cowardly arm to rob a valiant knight of his life, and for a stray bullet, without anyone knowing how or from where, to come in the very heat of the courage and spirit that fire and quicken brave hearts, shot by someone who perhaps took fright and ran at the flash of the accursed machine as it went off, and in a moment cut short and put an end to the thoughts and the life of one who deserved to enjoy it for ages to come. And so, considering this, I am ready to say that it grieves me to the soul to have taken up this calling of knight-errant in an age as detestable as the one we live in now; for though no danger puts fear into me, still it troubles me to think that powder and lead may rob me of the chance to make myself famous and renowned, by the valor of my arm and the edge of my sword, in all the known face of the earth. But let heaven do as it sees fit; for if I achieve what I aim at, I shall be all the more esteemed as I have faced greater dangers than the knights-errant of ages past ever faced.”

All this long preamble Don Quixote delivered while the others ate their supper, forgetting to put a bite in his own mouth, although Sancho Panza had told him more than once to eat, for there would be time enough afterward to say all he liked. Those who had been listening to him were moved to fresh pity at seeing that a man who, to all appearances, had a good mind and sound reasoning in everything he dealt with should have lost them so utterly the moment the talk turned to his black and peppery chivalry. The priest told him that he was quite right in everything he had said in favor of arms, and that he, a lettered man and a graduate though he was, held the very same view.

They finished their supper and the cloths were taken away; and while the innkeeper’s wife, her daughter, and Maritornes were getting ready the attic of Don Quixote of La Mancha, where it had been settled that the women alone should sleep that night, Don Fernando asked the captive to favor them with the account of his life, since it could not help being rare and delightful, to judge by the signs of it he had begun to give by arriving in Zoraida’s company. To this the captive replied that he would very gladly do as he was bidden, and that his only fear was that the tale would not be such as to give them the pleasure he could wish; but that, all the same, so as not to fail in obeying, he would tell it. The priest and all the rest thanked him and pressed him again; and he, seeing himself begged by so many, said that there was no need of pleading where a command carried such weight.

“And so let your graces be attentive, and you will hear a true story, which perhaps the lying ones, composed with careful and studied art, could not equal.”

With these words he made them all settle themselves and listen to him in deep silence; and he, seeing that they were now quiet and waiting for what he would say, began in a pleasant and unhurried voice to speak in this manner: