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Obstinacy and contention are common qualities, most appearing in, and best becoming, a mean and illiterate soul.

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
Best
Obstinacy
Soul
Contention
Mean
Illiterate
Appearing
Qualities
Becoming
Quality
Common

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Children's plays are not sports, and should be deemed as their most serious actions.
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I have gathered a posy of other men’s flowers and only the thread that bonds them is my own.
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Not because Socrates said so, but because it is in truth my own disposition — and perchance to some excess — I look upon all men as my compatriots, and embrace a Pole as a Frenchman, making less account of the national than of the universal and common bond.
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I love a friendship that flatters itself in the sharpness and vigor of its communications.
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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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The soul which has no fixed purpose in life is lost to be everywhere, is to be nowhere.
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Men are most apt to believe what they least understand.
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All the opinions in the world point out that pleasure is our aim.
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I aim here only at revealing myself, who will perhaps be different tomorrow, if I learn something new which changes me.
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A man has need of tough ears to hear himself fairly judged.
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All of the days go toward death and the last one arrives there.
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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.
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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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No spiritual mind remains within itself it is always aspiring and going beyond its own strength.
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Learned we may be with another man's learning: we can only be wise with wisdom of our own.
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A learned man is not learned in all things but a sufficient man is sufficient throughout, even to ignorance itself.
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There is nothing which so poisons princes as flattery, nor anything whereby wicked men more easily obtain credit and favor with them.
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Men of simple understanding, little inquisitive and little instructed, make good Christians.
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The honor we receive from those that fear us, is not honor those respects are paid to royalty and not to me.
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Example is a bright looking-glass, universal and for all shapes to look into.
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