[THEIR COLD AND SILVER]

                                          Thomas More; biography

For these reasons,' therefore, they have accumulated a vast treasure, but
they do not keep it like a treasure. I'm really quite ashamed to tell you how
they do keep it, because you probably won't believe me. I would not have believed it
myself if someone had just told me about it; but I was there, and saw it with my own
eyes. As a general rule, the more different anything is from what people are used to,
the harder it is to accept. But considering that all their other customs are so unlike
ours, a sensible man will not be surprised that they treat gold and silver quite
differently from the way we do. After all, they never do use money among
themselves, but keep it only for a contingency that may or may not actually
arise. So in the meanwhile they take care that no one shall overvalue gold and
silver, of which money is made, beyond what the metals themselves deserve.
Anyone can see, for example, that iron is far superior to either-, men could not live
without iron, by heaven, any more than without fire or water. But gold and
silver have, by nature, no function with which we cannot easily dispense.
Human folly has made them precious because they are rare. But in fact nature,
like a most indulgent mother, has placed her best gifts out in the open, like
air, water, and the earth itself; vain and unprofitable things she has hidden
away in remote places.

If in Utopia gold and silver were kept locked up in some tower, foolish heads
among the common people might concoct a story that the prince and senate
were out to cheat ordinary folk and get some advantage for themselves. Of course,
the gold and silver might be put into beautiful plate-ware and such rich handiwork,
but then in case of necessity the people would not want to give up such articles, on
which they had begun to fix their hearts--only to melt them down for soldiers' pay.
To avoid these problems they thought of a plan which conforms with their institutions
as clearly as it contrasts with our own. Unless one has actually seen it working, their
plan may seem incredible, because we prize gold so highly and are so careful about
guarding it. With them it's just the other way. While they eat from earthenware dishes
and drink from glass cups, finely made but inexpensive, their chamber pots and all their
humblest vessels, for use , in common halls and even in private homes, are made of gold
and silver. The chains and heavy fetters of slaves are also made of these metals. Finally,
criminals who are to bear the mark of some disgraceful act are forced to wear golden rings
in their ears and on their fingers, golden chains around their necks, even gold crowns on their
heads. Thus they hold up gold and silver to scorn in every conceivable way. As a result, if
they had to part with their entire supply ofthese metals which other people give up with as
much agony as if they were being disemboweled, the Utopians feel it no more than the loss
of a penny. The pick up pearls by the seashore, diamonds and garnets in certain cliffs, but
never go out of set purpose to look for them. If they happen to find some, they polish them
and give them to the children, who feel proud and pleased with such gaudy decorations when
they are small. But after, when they grow a bit older and notice that only babies like such toys,
they lay them aside. The parents don't have to say anything, they simply put these trifles away
out of a shamefaced sense that they're no longer suitable, just as our children, when they grow
up, put away their marbles, rattles, and dolls. Different customs, different feelings: I never saw
the adage better illustrated than in the case of the Anemolian ambassadors, who came to Amaurot
while I was there. Because they came to discuss important business, the senate had assembled
ahead of time, three citizens from each city. The ambassadors from nearby nations, who had
visited Utopia before and knew the local customs, realized that fine clothing was not much
respected in that land, silk was despised, and gold a badge of contempt; therefore they always
came in the very plainest of their clothes. But the Anemolians, who lived farther off and had
had fewer dealings with the Utopians, had heard only that they all dressed alike and very simply;
so they took for granted that their hosts had nothing to wear that they didn't put on. Being themselves
rather more proud than wise, they decided to dress as splendidly as the very gods, and dazzle the
eyes of the poor Utopians with their gaudy garb.Consequently the three ambassadors made
a grand entry with a suite of a hundred attendants, all in clothing of many colors, and most
in silk. Being noblemen at home, the ambassadors were arrayed in cloth of gold, with heavy
gold chains round their necks, gold jewels at their ears and on their fingers, and sparkling
strings of pearls and gems on their caps. In fact, they were decked out in all the articles
which in Utopia are used to punish slaves, shame wrongdoers, or pacify infants. It was a sight
to see how they strutted when they compared their finery with the dress of the Utopians who
had poured out into the street to see them pass. But it was just as funny to see how wide they
fell ofthe mark, and how far they were from getting the consideration they expected. Except
for a very few Utopians who for some special reason had visited foreign countries, all the
onlookers considered this splendid pomp a mark of disgrace. I'hey therefore bowed to the
humblest servants as lords, and took the ambassadors, because of their golden chains, to be
slaves, passing them by without any reverence at all. You might have seen children, who had
themselves thrown away their pearls and gems, nudge their mothers when they saw the
ambassadors' jeweled caps, and say: "Look at that big ]out, mother, who's still wearing pearls
and jewels as if he were a little kid!" But the mother, in all seriousness, would answer, "Quiet,
son, I think he is one of the ambassadors' fools."Others found fault with the golden chains as
useless because they were so flimsy any slave could break them, and so loose that he could
easily shake them off and run away whenever he wanted.

     But after the ambassadors had spent a couple of days among the Utopians, they learned of
the immense amounts of gold which were as thoroughly despise there as they were prized at home.
They saw too that more gold and silver went into making chains and fetters for a single runaway
slave than into costuming all three of them. Somewhat crestfallen, then, they put away all the
finery in which they had strutted so arrogantly; but they saw the wisdom of doing so after they
had talked with the Utopians enough to learn their customs and opinions.

[MARRIAGE CUSTOMS]

Women do not marry till they are eighteen, nor men till they are twenty-two. Clandestine
premaritalintercourse, if discovered and proved, brings severe punishment on both man
and woman; and the guilty parties are forbidden to marry for their whole lives, unless
the prince by his pardon mitigates the sentence. Also both the father and mother of the
household where the offense occurred suffer public disgrace for having been remiss
in their duty. The reason they punish this offense so severely is that they suppose few
people would join in married love-with confinement to a single partner and all the petty
annoyances that married life involves-unless they were strictly restrained from promiscuity.
In choosing marriage partners they solemnly and seriously follow a custom which seemed
to us foolish and absurd in the extreme. Whether she be widow or virgin, the bride- to-be
is shown naked to the groom by a responsible and respectable matron; and similarly, some
respectable man presents the groom naked to his prospective bride.' We laughed at this
custom, and called it absurd; but they were just as amazed at the folly of all other peoples.
When men go to buy a colt, where they are risking only a little money, they are so cautious
that, though the animal is almost bare, they won't close the deal until saddle and blanket have
been taken off, lest there be a hidden sore underneath. Yet in the choice of a mate, which may
cause either delight or disgust for the rest of their lives, men are so careless that they leave
all the rest of the woman's body covered up with clothes and estimate her attractiveness
from a mere handsbreadth of her person, the face, which is all they can see. And so they marry,
running great risk of bitter discord, if something in either's person should offend the other.
Not all people are so wise as to concern themselves solely with character; even the wise
appreciate physical beauty as a supplement to a good disposition. There's no doubt that
a deformity may lurk under clothing, serious enough to make a man hate his wife when
it's too late to be separated from her. If some disfiguring accident takes place after marriage,
each person must bear his own fate; but the Utopians think everyone should be legally protected
from deception beforehand. There is extra reason for them to be careful, because in that part
of the world, they are the only people who practice monogamy, and because their marriages
are seldom terminated except by death, though they do allow divorce for adultery or for
intolerably offensive behavior. A husband or wife who is an aggrieved party to such a divorce
is granted leave by the senate to take a new mate, but the guilty party suffers disgrace and is
permanently forbidden to remarry. They absolutely forbid a husband to put away his wife
against her will and without any fault on her part, just because of some bodily misfortune;
they think it cruel that a person should be abandoned when most in need of comfort; and they
add that old age, since it not only entails disease but is a disease itself, needs more than a
precarious fidelity.

It happens occasionally that a married couple cannot get along, and have both found other persons
with whom they hope to live more harmoniously. After getting approval of the senate, they may
then separate by mutual consent and contract new marriages. But such divorces are allowed only
after the senators and their wives have-carefully investigated the case. Divorce is deliberately made
difficult because they know that couples will have a hard time settling down if each has in mind
that another new relation is easily available.

They punish adulterers with the strictest form of slavery. If both parties were married, both are
divorced, and the injured parties may marry one another if they want, or someone else. But if
one of the injured parties continues to love such an undeserving spouse, the marriage may go
on, provided the innocent person chooses to share in the labor to which every slave is condemned.
And sometimes it happens that the repentance of the guilty and the devotion of the innocent party
so move the prince to pity that he restores both to freedom. But a second conviction of adultery is
punished by death.