The English were not born philosophers; they did not like to speculate about being, truth and the cosmos. When they picked up a book they wanted anecdotes, odd characters, witty sallies, and a touch of fantasy. As Virginia Woolf said à propos Sir Thomas Browne, one of many English authors who wrote in a Montaignean vein, ‘The English mind2 is naturally prone to take its ease and pleasure in the loosest whimsies and humours.’
