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Lend yourself to others, but give yourself to yourself.

Michel de Montaigne

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Michel de Montaigne
Age: 59 †
Born: 1533
Born: February 28
Died: 1592
Died: September 13
Autobiographer
Essayist
French Moralist
Jurist
Philosopher
Poet Lawyer
Politician
Translator
Writer
Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
Miquèu Eiquèm de Montanha
Miqueu Eiquem de Montanha
Confidence
Others
Give
Giving
Chakra
Lend

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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Our great and glorious masterpiece is to live appropriately.
Michel de Montaigne
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The daughter-in-law of Pythagoras said that a woman who goes to bed with a man ought to lay aside her modesty with her skirt, and put it on again with her petticoat
Michel de Montaigne
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'As a man who knows how to make his education into a rule of life not a means of showing off who can control himself and obey his own principles.' The true mirror of our discourse is the course of our lives.
Michel de Montaigne
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And I loathe people who find it harder to put up with a gown askew than with a soul askew and who judge a man by his bow, his bearing and his boots.
Michel de Montaigne
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Wisdom has its excesses, and has no less need of moderation than folly.
Michel de Montaigne
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I do not correct my first imaginings by my second--well, yes, perhaps a word or so, but only to vary, not to delete. I want to represent the course of my humors and I want people to see each part at its birth.
Michel de Montaigne
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Nothing is so firmly believed as what we least know.
Michel de Montaigne
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Is it not a noble farce, wherein kings, republics, and emperors have for so many ages played their parts, and to which the whole vast universe serves for a theatre?
Michel de Montaigne
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A man should ever, as much as in him lieth, be ready booted to take his journey, and above all things look he have then nothing to do but with himself.
Michel de Montaigne
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If I am to serve as an instrument of deceit, at least let it be with a clear conscience. I do not want to be considered either so affectionate or so loyal a servant as to be found fit to betray anyone.
Michel de Montaigne
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If not for that of conscience, yet at least for ambition's sake, let us reject ambition, let us disdain that thirst of honor and renown, so low and mendicant that it makes us beg it of all sorts of people.
Michel de Montaigne
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The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.
Michel de Montaigne
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Great authors, when they write about causes, adduce not only those they think are true but also those they do not believe in, provided they have some originality and beauty. They speak truly and usefully enough if they speak ingeniously.
Michel de Montaigne
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I am one of those who hold that poetry is never so blithe as in a wanton and irregular subject.
Michel de Montaigne
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Our zeal works wonders, whenever it supports our inclination toward hatred, cruelty, ambition.
Michel de Montaigne
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My trade and art is to live.
Michel de Montaigne
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Amongst so many borrowed things, am glad if I can steal one, disguising and altering it for some new service.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head.
Michel de Montaigne
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We are nearer neighbors to ourselves than the whiteness of snow or the weight of stones are to us: if man does not know himself, how should he know his functions and powers?
Michel de Montaigne