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Thus we should beware of clinging to vulgar opinions, and judge things by reason's way, not by popular say.

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
Reason
Popularity
Way
Vulgar
Things
Opinions
Popular
Judge
Thus
Judging
Clinging
Opinion
Beware

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I cruelly hate cruelty, both by nature and reason, as the worst of all the vices. But then I am so soft in this that I cannot seea chicken's neck wrung without distress, and cannot bear to hear the squealing of a hare between the teeth of my hounds.
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Obstinacy and heat in argument are surest proofs of folly. Is there anything so stubborn, obstinate, disdainful, contemplative, grave, or serious, as an ass?
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A good marriage ... is a sweet association in life: full of constancy, trust, and an infinite number of useful and solid services and mutual obligations.
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The great and glorious masterpiece of humanity is to know how to live with a purpose.
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The most ordinary things, the most common and familiar, if we could see them in their true light, would turn out to be the grandest miracles.
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One open way of speaking introduces another open way of speaking, and draws out discoveries, like wine and love.
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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.
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I know that the arms of friendship are long enough to reach from the one end of the world to the other
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It is far more probable that our senses should deceive us, than that an old woman should be carried up a chimney on a broom stick and that it is far less astonishing that witnesses should lie, than that witches should perform the acts that were alleged.
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Laws are often made by fools, and even more often by men who fail in equity because they hate equality: but always by men, vain authorities who can resolve nothing.
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A foreign war is a lot milder than a civil war.
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In true education, anything that comes to our hand is as good as a book: the prank of a page- boy, the blunder of a servant, a bit of table talk - they are all part of the curriculum.
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It is easier to sacrifice great than little things.
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I put forward formless and unresolved notions, as do those who publish doubtful questions to debate in the schools, not to establish the truth but to seek it.
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If a man should importune me to give a reason why I loved him, I find it could no otherwise be expressed, than by making answer: because it was he, because it was I.
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Friendship is a creature formed for a companionship not for a herd.
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Fie on the eloquence that leaves us craving itself, not things!
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It costs an unreasonable woman no more to pass over one reason than another they cherish themselves most where they are most wrong.
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Gentleness and repose are paramount to everything else in woman.
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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.
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