QUOTES by Michel Montaigne
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“A man is not hurt so much by what happens, as by his opinion of what happens.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“No spirited mind remains within itself; it is always aspiring and going beyond its strength; it has impulses beyond its power of achievement.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“~The value of life lies not in the length of days, but in the use we make of them ~”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“When I play with my cat, how do I know that she is not playing with me rather than I with her?”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“It is putting a very high price on one's conjectures to have someone roasted alive on their account.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“We must learn to suffer whatever we cannot avoid. Our life is composed, like the harmony of the world, of dischords as well as different tones, sweet and harsh, sharp and flat, soft and loud. If a musician liked only some of them, what could he sing? He has got to know how to use all of them and blend them together. So too must we with good and ill, which are of one substance with our life.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“The beautiful souls are they that are unniversal, open, and ready for all things.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“The reverse side of truth has a hundred thousand shapes and no defined limits.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Our zeal works wonders, whenever it supports our inclination toward hatred, cruelty, ambition.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“How many things were articles of faith to us yesterday that are fables to us today?”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“There is indeed a certain sense of gratification when we do a good deed that gives us inward satisfaction, and a generous pride that accompanies a good conscience…These testimonies of a good conscience are pleasant; and such a natural pleasure is very beneficial to us; it is the only payment that can never fail. “On Repentance”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“It is a small soul, buried beneath the weight of affairs, that does not know how to get clean away from them, that cannot put them aside and pick them up again.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“There is more ado to interpret interpretations than to interpret things, and more books upon books than upon any other subject; we do nothing but comment upon one another. Every place swarms with commentaries; of authors there is great scarcity.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“We must not attach knowledge to the mind, we have to incorporate it there.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“All we do is to look after the opinions and learning of others: we ought to make them our own.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Women are not entirely wrong when they reject the moral rules proclaimed in society, since it is we men alone who have made them.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“My life has been filled with terrible misfortune; most of which never happened.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“If you don't know how to die, don't worry; Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you; don't bother your head about it.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“It is not reasonable that art should win the place of honor over our great and powerful mother Nature. We have so overloaded the beauty and richness of her works by our inventions that we have quite smothered her.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“My business is only to keep myself in motion, whilst motion pleases me; I only walk for the walk's sake.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“We need very strong ears to hear ourselves judged frankly, and because there are few who can endure frank criticism without being stung by it, those who venture to criticize us perform a remarkable act of friendship, for to undertake to wound or offend a man for his own good is to have a healthy love for him.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“And therefore, Reader, I myself am the subject of my book: it is not reasonable that you should employ your leisure on a topic so frivolous and so vain.
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Stupidity and wisdom meet in the same centre of sentiment and resolution, in the suffering of human accidents.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Certainly, if he still has himself, a man of understanding has lost nothing.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Man (in good earnest) is a marvellous vain, fickle, and unstable subject, and on whom it is very hard to form any certain and uniform judgment.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
I prefer the first humor; not because it is pleasanter to laugh than to weep, but because it is more disdainful, and condemns us more than the other; and it seems to me that we can never be despised as much as we deserve. Pity and commiseration are mingled with some esteem for the thing we pity; the things we laugh at we consider worthless. I do not think there is as much unhappiness in us as vanity, nor as much malice as stupidity. We are not so full of evil as of inanity; we are not as wretched as we are worthless.
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Democritus and Heraclitus were two philosophers, of whom the first, finding the condition of man vain and ridiculous, never went out in public but with a mocking and laughing face; whereas Heraclitus, having pity and compassion on this same condition of ours, wore a face perpetually sad, and eyes filled with tears.
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“The soul in which philosophy dwells should by its health make even the body healthy. It should make its tranquillity and gladness shine out from within; should form in its own mold the outward demeanor, and consequently arm it with a graceful pride, an active and joyous bearing, and a contented and good-natured countenance. The surest sign of wisdom is constant cheerfulness.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“The souls of emperors and cobblers are cast in the same mold. The same reason that makes us wrangle with a neighbor creates a war betwixt princes.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Every other knowledge is harmful to him who does not have knowledge of goodness.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“Experience has further taught me this, that we ruin ourselves by impatience.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“The advantage of living is not measured by length, but by use; some men have lived long, and lived little; attend to it while you are in it. It lies in your will, not in the number of years, for you to have lived enough.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne
“One must be a little foolish if one does not want to be even more stupid.”
Quote by -Michel Montaigne