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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
Becoming
Quality
Common
Best
Obstinacy
Soul
Contention
Mean
Illiterate
Appearing
Qualities

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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He that had never seen a river imagined the first he met to be the sea and the greatest things that have fallen within our knowledge we conclude the extremes that nature makes of the kind.
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It would be better to have no laws at all, than to have too many.
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Fie on the eloquence that leaves us craving itself, not things!
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The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.
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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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Is it reasonable that even the arts should take advantage of and profit by our natural stupidity and feebleness of mind?
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Our skin is provided as adequately as theirs with endurance against the assaults of the weather: witness so many nations who have not yet tried the use of any clothes. Our ancient Gauls wore hardly any clothes nor do the Irish, our neighbors, under so cold a sky.
Michel de Montaigne
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Teach him a certain refinement in sorting out and selecting his arguments, with an affection for relevance and so for brevity. Above all let him be taught to throw down his arms and surrender to truth as soon as he perceives it, whether the truth is born at his rival's doing or within himself from some change in his ideas.
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Health is a precious thing, and the only one, in truth, meriting that a man should lay out not only his time, sweat, labor and goods, but also life itself to obtain it.
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Life in itself is neither good nor evil, it is the place of good and evil, according to what you make it.
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An orator of past times declared that his calling was to make small things appear to be grand.
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If you don't know how to die, don't worry Nature will tell you what to do on the spot, fully and adequately. She will do this job perfectly for you don't bother your head about it.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is a sort of gratification in doing good which makes us rejoice in ourselves.
Michel de Montaigne
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I seek in the reading of books, only to please myself, by an honest diversion.
Michel de Montaigne
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Love to his soul gave eyes he knew things are not as they seem. The dream is his real life the world around him is the dream.
Michel de Montaigne
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Every abridgement of a good book is a fool abridged.
Michel de Montaigne
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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.
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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'As a man who knows how to make his education into a rule of life not a means of showing off who can control himself and obey his own principles.' The true mirror of our discourse is the course of our lives.
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It is a disaster that wisdom forbids you to be satisfied with yourself and always sends you away dissatisfied and fearful, whereas stubbornness and foolhardiness fill their hosts with joy and assurance.
Michel de Montaigne