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A straight oar looks bent in the water. It matters not merely that we see a thing, but how we see it.
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
Thing
Oar
Bent
Straight
Matters
Merely
Water
Matter
Looks
More quotes by Michel de Montaigne
I love those historians that are either very simple or most excellent. Such as are between both (which is the most common fashion), it is they that spoil all they will needs chew our meat for us and take upon them a law to judge, and by consequence to square and incline the story according to their fantasy.
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
I may indeed very well happen to contradict myself but truth, as Demades said, I do not contradict.
Michel de Montaigne
Beauty is the true prerogative of women, and so peculiarly their own, that our sex, though naturally requiring another sort of feature, is never in its lustre but when puerile and beardless, confused and mixed with theirs.
Michel de Montaigne
He whose mouth is out of taste says the wine is flat.
Michel de Montaigne
Each person calls barbarism whatever is not his or her own practice.... We may call Cannibals barbarians, in respect to the rulesof reason, but not in respect to ourselves, who surpass them in every kind of barbarity.
Michel de Montaigne
God defend me from being an honest man according to the description which every day I see made by each man to his own glorification
Michel de Montaigne
A little of everything and nothing thoroughly, after the French fashion.
Michel de Montaigne
To say less of yourself than is true is stupidity, not modesty. To pay yourself less than you are worth is cowardice and pusillanimity.
Michel de Montaigne
The only good histories are those that have been written by the persons themselves who commanded in the affairs whereof they write.
Michel de Montaigne
The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.
Michel de Montaigne
Rash and incessant scolding runs into custom and renders itself despised.
Michel de Montaigne
Scratching is one of nature's sweetest gratifications, and nearest at hand.
Michel de Montaigne
A foreign war is a lot milder than a civil war.
Michel de Montaigne
We are more solicitous that men speak of us, than how they speak.
Michel de Montaigne
The plague of man is the opinion of knowledge. That is why ignorance is so recommended by our religion as a quality suitable to belief and obedience.
Michel de Montaigne
He who is not sure of his memory, should not undertake the trade of lying.
Michel de Montaigne
A lady could not boast of her chastity who was never tempted.
Michel de Montaigne
I know well what I am fleeing from but not what I am in search of.
Michel de Montaigne
Men are tormented by the opinions they have of things, and not the things themselves.
Michel de Montaigne
