Michel de Montaigne Quotes - Page 5

• I want death to find me planting my cabbages, but careless of death, and still more of my unfinished garden.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Garden, Want, Cabbage

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.62, Stanford University Press

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• As soon as women become ours we are no longer theirs.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Possession

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• There is nothing more notable in Socrates than that he found time, when he was an old man, to learn music and dancing, and thought it time well spent.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Inspirational, Music, Dance

  Attributed to "Essais" by Michel de Montaigne, Book III, Ch. 13, 1595.

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• I would rather be an expert on me than on Cicero

  Michel de Montaigne

  Experts

  Michel de Montaigne (1991). “The essays of Michel de Montaigne”, Lane, Allen

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• In my opinion, the most fruitful and natural play of the mind is 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. The study of books is a drowsy and feeble exercise which does not warm you up.

  Michel de Montaigne

  War, Book, Exercise

  "The Autobiography of Michel de Montaigne".

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• My art and profession is to live.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Life, Art, Profession

  Michel de Montaigne (1967). “The Essays of Montaigne”

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• Whoever will be cured of ignorance, let him confess it.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Ignorance

  Michel de Montaigne (1946). “The essays”

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• Let us permit nature to have her way. She understands her business better than we do.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Nature, Rivers, Earth Day

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• If you have known how to compose your life, you have done a great deal more than the person who knows how to compose a book. You have done more than the one who has taken cities and empires.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Life, Book, Taken

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• Memory is a wonderfully useful tool, and without it judgement does its work with difficulty; it is entirely lacking in me.... Now,the more I distrust my memory, the more confused it becomes. It serves me better by chance encounter; I have to solicit it nonchalantly. For if I press it, it is stunned; and once it has begun to totter, the more I probe it, the more it gets mixed up and embarrassed. It serves me at its own time, not at mine.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Memories, Confused, Self

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• Wine is the benevolent god, who gives back gaiety to men and restores youth to the old.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Wine, Men, Giving

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• When I play with my cat, who knows whether she is not amusing herself with me more than I with her.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Funny, Humor, Cat

  Essais bk. 2, ch. 12 (1580)

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• Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Ignorance, Men, Pillow

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• We should rather examine, who is better learned, than who is more learned.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Should

  Michel de Montaigne (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Michel de Montaigne (Illustrated)”, p.333, Delphi Classics

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• Every movement reveals us.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Movement

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.219, Stanford University Press

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• A man has need of tough ears to hear himself fairly judged.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Men, Needs, Ears

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• And if nobody reads me, shall I have wasted my time, when I have beguiled so many idle hours with such pleasant and profitable reflections?

  Michel de Montaigne

  Book, Reading, Reflection

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• Every man has within himself the entire human condition

  Michel de Montaigne

  Men, Human Condition, Humans

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• Obstinacy and dogmatism are the surest signs of stupidity. Is there anything more confident, resolute, disdainful, grave and serious than an ass?

  Michel de Montaigne

  Stupidity, Serious, Ass

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• Learning is a good medicine: but no medicine is powerful enough to preserve itself from taint and corruption independently of defects in the jar that it is kept in. One man sees clearly but does not see straight: consequently he sees what is good but fails to follow it; he sees knowledge and does not use it.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Powerful, Educational, Men

  Michel de Montaigne (1991). “The essays of Michel de Montaigne”, Lane, Allen

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• We have no participation in Being, because all human nature is ever midway between being born and dying, giving off only a vague image and shadow of itself, and a weak and uncertain opinion. And if you chance to fix your thoughts on trying to grasp its essence, it would be neither more nor less than if your tried to clutch water.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Thinking, Thoughtful, Essence

  Michel de Montaigne (1946). “The essays”

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• If your doctor does not think it good for you to sleep, to drink wine, or to eat of a particular dish, do not worry; I will find you another who will not agree with him.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Food, Wine, Sleep

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• The least strained and most natural ways of the soul are the most beautiful; the best occupations are the least forced.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Happiness, Beautiful, Soul

  Michel de Montaigne (1958). “Complete Essays”, p.622, Stanford University Press

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• We do not correct the man we hang; we correct others by him.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Men, Punishment, He Man

  Michel de Montaigne (2015). “Essays of Montaigne”, p.1308, Xist Publishing

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• If others examined themselves attentively, as I do, they would find themselves, as I do, full of inanity and nonsense. Get rid of it I cannot without getting rid of myself.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Nonsense, Ifs

  Michel de Montaigne (2003). “The Complete Works: Essays, Travel Journal, Letters”, Everyman's Library

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