Michel Eyquem de Montaigne Quotes (171 Quotes)

The mind is a dangerous weapon, even to the possessor, if he knows not discreetly how to use it.

From Obedience and submission comes all our virtues, and all sin is comes from self-opinion.

No matter that we may mount on stilts, we still must walk on our own legs. And on the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.

Lies Lying'He who has not a good memory should never take upon himself the trade of lying.

Experience teaches that a strong memory is generally joined to a weak judgment

It is an excellent means of gaining the heart of others to submit and trust in it

Poverty of goods is easily cured poverty of the mind is irreparable.

It is a common seen by experience that excellent memories do often accompany weak judgments.

Wisdom hath her excesses, and no less need of moderation than folly.

Wherever your life ends, it is all there. 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.

What harm cause not those huge draughts or pictures which wanton youth with chalk or coals draw in each passage, wall or stairs of our great houses, whence a cruel contempt of our natural store is bred in them

No one but yourself knows whether you are cowardly and cruel, or loyal and devout others do not see you they surmise you by uncertain conjectures they perceive not so much your nature as your art

It is very easy to accuse a government of imperfection, for all mortal things are full of it.

I want to be seen here in my simple, natural, ordinary fashion, without straining or artifice for it is myself that I portray.... I am myself the matter of my book.

I have seen no more evident monstrosity and miracle in the world than myself.

A learned person is not learned in everything but the capable person is capable in everything, even in what he is ignorant of

How many things served us but yesterday as articles of faith, which today we deem but fables

The worthiest man to be known, and for a pattern to be presented to the world, he is the man of whom we have most certain knowledge. He hath been declared and enlightened by the most clear-seeing men that ever were the testimonies we have of him are in faithfulness and sufficiency most admirable.

Nothing is so firmly believed as what is least known.

Have you known how to take rest You have done more than he who hath taken empires and cities.

The beauty of stature is the only beauty of men.

The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.

A man must be a little mad if he does not want to be even more stupid.

My trade and my art is living.

Live as long as you please, you will strike nothing off the time you will have to spend dead.

True it is that she who escapeth safe and unpolluted from out of the school of freedom, giveth more confidence of herself than she who cometh sound out of the school of severity and restraint.

It takes so much to be a king that he exists only as such. That extraneous glare that surrounds him hides him and conceals him from us our sight breaks and is dissipated by it being filled and arrested by this strong light.

It is a thorny undertaking, and more so than it seems, to follow a movement so wandering as that of our mind, to penetrate the opaque depths of its innermost folds, to pick out and immobilize the innumerable flutterings that agitate it.

The plainest sign of wisdom is a continual cheerfulness her state is like that of things in the regions above the moon, always clear and serene

Even those who argue against fame still want the books they write against it to bear their name in the title and hope to become famous for despising it.

I tell the truth, not as much as I would like to, but as much as I dare. I dare more and more as I grow older.

The sciences and arts are not cast in a mold, but formed and shaped little by little, by repeated handling and polishing, as bears lick their cubs into shape at leisure.

The finest lives in my opinion are the common model, without miracle and without extravagance.

It (marriage) happens as with cages the birds without despair to get in, and those within despair of getting out.

In the education of children there is nothing like alluring the interest and affection, otherwise you only make so many asses laden with books.

Example is a bright looking-glass, universal and for all shapes to look into.

But sure there is need of other remedies than dreaming, a weak contention of art against nature.

A man should ever be ready booted to take his journey.

Few men have been admired by their own households.

When all is summed up, a man never speaks of himself without loss his accusations of himself are always believed his praises never.

There are few men who dare to publish to the world the prayers they make to Almighty God.

In my opinion, the most fruitful and natural play of the mind is in conversation. I find it sweeter than any other action in life and if I were forced to choose, I think I would rather lose my sight than my hearing and voice.

Nothing is so firmly believed as that which we least know.

It should be noted that children's games are not merely games. One should regard them as their most serious activities.

Since I would rather make of him the child an able man than a learned man, I would also urge that care be taken to Choose a guide tutor with a well-made rather than a well-filled head.

The easy, gentle, and sloping path ... is not the path of true virtue. It demands a rough and thorny road.

Perhaps it is not without reason that we attribute facility in belief and conviction to simplicity and ignorance for it seems to me I once learned that belief was sort of an impression made on our mind, and that the softer it is the less resistant t.

I have never seen a greater monster or miracle than myself.

One may disavow and disclaim vices that surprise us, and whereto our passions transport us but those which by long habits are rooted in a strong and powerful will are not subject to contradiction. Repentance is but a denying of our will, and an opposition of our fantasies.

Those things that are dearest to us have cost us the most.