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We need to interpret interpretations more than to interpret things.

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
Interpretation
Need
Needs
Things
Interpretations
Interpret

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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Those that will combat use and custom by the strict rules of grammar do but jest
Michel de Montaigne
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We took advantage of [the Indians'] ignorance and inexperience to incline them the more easily toward treachery, lewdness, avarice, and every sort of inhumanity and cruelty, after the example and pattern of our ways.
Michel de Montaigne
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Once you have decided to keep a certain pile, it is no longer yours for you can't spend it.
Michel de Montaigne
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I seek in the reading of books, only to please myself, by an honest diversion.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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The height and value of true virtue consists in the facility, utility, and pleasure of its exercise so far from difficulty, that boys, as well as men, and the innocent as well as the subtle, may make it their own and it is by order and good conduct, and not by force, that it is to be acquired.
Michel de Montaigne
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As by some might be saide of me: that here I have but gathered a nosegay of strange floures, and have put nothing of mine unto it, but the thred to binde them. Certes, I have given unto publike opinion, that these borrowed ornaments accompany me but I meane not they should cover or hide me.
Michel de Montaigne
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To divert myself from a troublesome fancy, it is but to run to my books they presently fix me to them, and drive the other out of my thoughts, and do not mutiny to see that I have only recourse to them for want of other more, real, natural, and lively conveniences they always receive me with the same kindness.
Michel de Montaigne
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We wake sleeping, and sleep waking. I do not see so clearly in my sleep but as to my being awake, I never found it clear enough and free from clouds.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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Meditation is a rich and powerful method of study for anyone who knows how to examine his mind.
Michel de Montaigne
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It is a sign of contraction of the mind when it is content, or of weariness.
Michel de Montaigne
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The great and glorious masterpiece of men is to live to the point. All other things-to reign, to hoard, to build-are, at most, but inconsiderable props and appendages.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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I had rather complain of ill-fortune than be ashamed of victory.
Michel de Montaigne
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The shortest way to arrive at glory should be to do that for conscience which we do for glory. And the virtue of Alexander appears to me with much less vigor in his theater than that of Socrates in his mean and obscure. I can easily conceive Socrates in the place of Alexander, but Alexander in that of Socrates I cannot.
Michel de Montaigne
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Nobody is exempt from saying stupid things, the harm is to do it presumptuously.
Michel de Montaigne
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The body enjoys a great share in our being, and has an eminent place in it. Its structure and composition, therefore, are worthy of proper consideration.
Michel de Montaigne
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Disappointment and feebleness imprint upon us a cowardly and valetudinarian virtue.
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