Quote

Difficulty is a coin the learned make use of like jugglers, to conceal the inanity of their art.

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
Difficulty
Learned
Use
Inanity
Art
Jugglers
Make
Conceal
Like
Coin
Scholarship
Coins

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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Friendship that possesses the whole soul, and there rules and sways with an absolute sovereignty, can admit of no rival.
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The public weal requires that men should betray, and lie, and massacre.
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Rejoice in the things that are present all else is beyond thee.
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People of our time are so formed for agitation and ostentation that goodness, moderation, equability, constancy, and such quiet and obscure qualities are no longer felt.
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The corruption of the age is made up by the particular contribution of every individual man some contribute treachery, others injustice, atheism, tyranny, avarice, cruelty, according to their power.
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Presumption is our natural and original malady. The most vulnerable and frail of all creatures is man, and at the same time the most arrogant.
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Marriage can be compared to a cage: birds outside it despair to enter, and birds within, to escape.
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Why dost thou complain of this world? It detains thee not thy own cowardice is the cause, if thou livest in pain.
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Nothing prints more lively in our minds than something we wish to forget.
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We are more solicitous that men speak of us, than how they speak.
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For table-talk, I prefer the pleasant and witty before the learned and the grave in bed, beauty before goodness.
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The memory represents to us not what we choose but what it pleases.
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Every one rushes elsewhere and into the future, because no one wants to face one's own inner self.
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The most universal quality is diversity.
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Amongst all other vices there is none I hate more than cruelty, both by nature and judgment, as the extremest of all vices.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is little less trouble in governing a private family than a whole kingdom.
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Speaking is half his that speaks, and half his that hears.
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Water, earth, air, fire, and the other parts of this structure of mine are no more instruments of your life than instruments of your death. Why do you fear your last day? It contributes no more to your death than each of the others. The last step does not cause the fatigue, but reveals it. All days travel toward death, the last one reaches it.
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I must accommodate my history to the hour: I may presently change, not only by fortune, but also by intention.
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Virtue can have naught to do with ease. . . . It craves a steep and thorny path.
Michel de Montaigne