Quote

In his commerce with men I mean him to include- and that principally- those who live only in the memory of books. By means of history he will frequent those great souls of former years. If you want it to be so, history can be a waste of time it can also be, if you want it to be so, a study bearing fruit beyond price.

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
Years
History
Price
Principally
Men
Means
Fruit
Frequent
Time
Also
Memory
Bearing
Soul
Waste
Include
Live
Beyond
Commerce
Book
Memories
Educational
Mean
Study
Former
Great
Books
Souls

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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The continuous work of our life is to build death.
Michel de Montaigne
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He who lives not to others, lives little to himself.
Michel de Montaigne
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The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.
Michel de Montaigne
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Since philosophy is the art which teaches us how to live, and since children need to learn it as much as we do at other ages, why do we not instruct them in it?
Michel de Montaigne
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Nothing else but an insatiate thirst of enjoying a greedily desired object.
Michel de Montaigne
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In the examples that I here bring in of what I have [read], heard, done or said, I have refrained from daring to alter even the smallest and most indifferent circumstances. My conscience falsifies not an iota for my knowledge I cannot answer.
Michel de Montaigne
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It is in the enjoyment and not in mere possession that makes for happiness.
Michel de Montaigne
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Princes give mee sufficiently, if they take nothing from me, and doe me much good, if they doe me no hurt: it is all I require of them.
Michel de Montaigne
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Every movement reveals us.
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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There is nothing so extreme that is not allowed by the custom of some nation or other.
Michel de Montaigne
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If these Essays were worthy of being judged, it might fall out, in my opinion, that they would not find much favour, either with common and vulgar minds, or with uncommon and eminent ones: the former would not find enough in them, the latter would find too much they might manage to live somewhere in the middle region.
Michel de Montaigne
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Example is a bright looking-glass, universal and for all shapes to look into.
Michel de Montaigne
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The virtue of the soul does not consist in flying high, but in walking orderly.
Michel de Montaigne
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Order a purge for your brain, it will there be much better employed than upon your stomach.
Michel de Montaigne
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Intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not.
Michel de Montaigne
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That is why Bias jested with those who were going through the perils of a great storm with him and calling on the gods for help: Shut up, he said, so that they do not realize that you are here with me.
Michel de Montaigne
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[Marriage] happens as with cages: the birds without despair to get in, and those within despair of getting out.
Michel de Montaigne
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Everyone calls barbarity what he is not accustomed to.
Michel de Montaigne
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Age imprints more wrinkles in the mind than it does on the face.
Michel de Montaigne