The Strength of Imagination

While reading Montaigne's On the Power of Imagination and Diderot's The Indiscreet Jewels, two points stood out to me that were present in both essays.

The first point is that "there is [not] one single part of our body which does not often refuse to function when we want it to, yet does so when we want it not to" (Montaigne, 115). This is the idea that our body parts act as if they have a mind of their own, for example, the sight of a desirable object can increase our pulse and give us a rush of adrenaline without our controlling it. Also, on the other hand, our body does not function when we want it to too. When some of us have an oral presentation, but have the fear of public speaking, our tongue may not work the way we want it to, causing us to stutter or even be at a loss of words. This concept was seen in The Indiscreet Jewels when the jewels of the select women started talking due to the sultan's ring. From the women's point of view, their "jewel" started functioning when they did not want it to, like it had a mind of its own. And in the short story, the women's jewels, when given the chance, did have a mind and "mouth" of its own, and there was little that the women could do to stop their jewels from talking.

The other concept that stood out to me was the extent of imagination. In Montaigne's essay, the idea that "the imagination should sometimes act not merely on its own body but on someone else's" (Montaigne, 118) is brought forth. This idea is can also be applied to Diderot's The Indiscreet Jewels. The sultan's imagination could be the thing that fuels and powers the whole story, not the ring that the genie gives. For all we know, the ring could not have powers, and if the idea found in Montaigne's essay is true, all the events that had occurred in The Indiscreet Jewels could have happened because of the sultan's imagination. The sultan's imagination could have acted on the women he had selected and caused their jewels to start talking. In this context, the ring can be seen as the sultan's imagination. The dial on the ring that points to the woman of the sultan's desire, could symbolize the sultan's focus of imagination, and the things that the jewels say would be what the sultan imagines the women's jewels to say if they were to talk.