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All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice. I should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed.

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
Advice
Speak
Nothing
Way
Boldly
Discourse
Dues
Believed
Humility

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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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
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I have seen people rude by being over-polite.
Michel de Montaigne
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I am disgusted with innovation, in whatever guise, and with reason, for I have seen very harmful effects of it.
Michel de Montaigne
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We must not attach knowledge to the mind, we have to incorporate it there.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is some shadow of delight and delicacy which smiles upon and flatters us even in the very lap of melancholy.
Michel de Montaigne
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Malice sucks up the greatest part of its own venom, and poisons itself.
Michel de Montaigne
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We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade.
Michel de Montaigne
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One may be humble out of pride.
Michel de Montaigne
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Our great and glorious masterpiece is to live appropriately.
Michel de Montaigne
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If love and ambition should be in equal balance, and come to jostle with equal force, I make no doubt but that the last would win the prize.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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We judge a horse not only by its pace on a racecourse, but also by its walk, nay, when resting in its stable.
Michel de Montaigne
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Since I would rather make of him an able man than a learned man, I would also urge that care be taken to choose a guide with a well-made rather than a well-filled head.
Michel de Montaigne
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Every man bears the whole stamp of the human condition.
Michel de Montaigne
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We have so much ill fortune as inconstancy, or so much bad purpose as folly, we are not so full of evil as we are of inanity we are not so wretched as we are base
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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We may so seize on virtue, that if we embrace it with an overgreedy and violent desire, it may become vicious.
Michel de Montaigne
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It is for little souls, that truckle under the weight of affairs, not to know how clearly to disengage themselves, and not to know how to lay them aside and take them up again.
Michel de Montaigne
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To smell, though well, is to stink.
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