Michel de Montaigne Quotes

588 Sourced Quotes

To how many blockheads of my time has a cold and taciturn demeanor procured the credit of prudence and capacity!

Michel de Montaigne
We perceive no charms that are not sharpened, puffed out, and inflated by artifice. Those which glide along naturally and simply easily escape a sight so gross as ours.

Michel de Montaigne
Aesop, that great man, saw his master making water as he walked. "What!" he said, "Must we void ourselves as we run?" Use our timeas best we may, yet a great part of it will still be idly and ill spent.

Michel de Montaigne
Tis faith alone that vividly and certainly comprehends the deep mysteries of our religion.

Michel de Montaigne
If your physician does not think it good for you to sleep, to drink wine, or to eat such and such meats, never trouble yourself; I will find you another that shall not be of that opinion.

Michel de Montaigne
I, who am king of the matter I treat, and who owe an accounting for it to no one, do not for all that believe myself in all I write. I often hazard sallies of my mind which I mistrust.

Michel de Montaigne
It is an injustice that an old, broken, half-dead father should enjoy alone, in a corner of his hearth, possessions that would suffice for the advancement and maintenance of many children.

Michel de Montaigne
This idea is more surely understood by interrogation; WHAT DO I KNOW? which I bear as my motto with the emblem of a pair of scales.

Michel de Montaigne
Oh, what a valiant faculty is hope, that in a mortal subject, and in a moment, makes nothing of usurping infinity, immensity, eternity, and of supplying its masters indigence, at its pleasure, with all things he can imagine or desire!

Michel de Montaigne
We easily enough confess in others an advantage of courage, strength, experience, activity, and beauty; but an advantage in judgment we yield to none.

Michel de Montaigne
I seek in books only to give myself pleasure by honest amusement; or if I study, I seek only the learning that treats of the knowledge of myself and instructs me in how to die well and live well.

Michel de Montaigne
There is nothing on which men are commonly more intent than on making a way for their opinions.

Michel de Montaigne
The good, supreme, divine poetry is above the rules and reason. Whoever discerns its beauty with a firm, sedate gaze does not see it, any more than he sees the splendor of a lightning flash. It does not persuade our judgement, it ravishes and overwhelms it.

Michel de Montaigne
I leaf through books, I do not study them. What I retain of them is something I no longer recognize as anyone else's.

Michel de Montaigne
It has never occurred to me to wish for empire or royalty, nor for the eminence of those high and commanding fortunes. My aim lies not in that direction; I love myself too well.

Michel de Montaigne
I am disgusted with innovation, in whatever guise, and with reason, for I have seen very harmful effects of it.

Michel de Montaigne
After mature deliberation of counsel, the good Queen to establish a rule and immutable example unto all posterity, for the moderation and required modesty in a lawful marriage, ordained the number of six times a day as a lawful, necessary and competent limit.

Michel de Montaigne
We have the pleasures suitable to our lot; let us not usurp those of greatness. Ours are more natural and all the more solid and sure for being humbler. Since we will not do so out of conscience, at least out of ambition let us reject ambition.

Michel de Montaigne
When Socrates, after being relieved of his irons, felt the relish of the itching that their weight had caused in his legs, he rejoiced to consider the close alliance between pain and pleasure.

Michel de Montaigne
A learned man is not learned in all things; but a sufficient man is sufficient throughout, even to ignorance itself.

Michel de Montaigne
Women are not altogether in the wrong when they refuse the rules of life prescribed to the World, for men only have established them and without their consent.

Michel de Montaigne
The thing in the world I am most afraid of is fear, and with good reason; that passion alone, in the trouble of it, exceeding all other accidents

Michel de Montaigne
An ancient father says that a dog we know is better company than a man whose language we do not understand.

Michel de Montaigne
Decency, not to dare to do that in public which it is decent enough to do in private.

Michel de Montaigne
A man must live in the world and make the best of it, such as it is.

Michel de Montaigne
To make a crooked stick straight, we bend it the contrary way.

Michel de Montaigne
We owe subjection and obedience to all our kings, whether good or bad, alike, for that has respect unto their office; but as to esteem and affection, these are only due to their virtue.

Michel de Montaigne
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
The premeditation of death is the premeditation of liberty; he who has learnt to die has forgot to serve.

Michel de Montaigne
The share we have in the knowledge of truth, such as it is, has not been acquired by our own powers. God has taught ushis wonderful secrets; our faith is not of our acquiring, it is purely the gift of another's bounty.

Michel de Montaigne