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Great authors, when they write about causes, adduce not only those they think are true but also those they do not believe in, provided they have some originality and beauty. They speak truly and usefully enough if they speak ingeniously.

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
Enough
Truly
Great
Causes
Writing
Beauty
Ingeniously
Believe
Speak
Usefully
Think
Write
Causality
Thinking
True
Authors
Truth
Originality
Also
Provided

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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A hair shirt does not always render those chaste who wear it.
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Oh senseless man, who cannot possibly make a worm or a flea and yet will create Gods by the dozen!
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Now, of all the benefits that virtue confers upon us, the contempt of death is one of the greatest.
Michel de Montaigne
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Stupidity and wisdom meet in the same centre of sentiment and resolution, in the suffering of human accidents.
Michel de Montaigne
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The plague of man is the opinion of knowledge. That is why ignorance is so recommended by our religion as a quality suitable to belief and obedience.
Michel de Montaigne
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Oh, what a valiant faculty is hope.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is no wish more natural than the wish to know.
Michel de Montaigne
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A young man ought to cross his own rules, to awake his vigor, and to keep it from growing faint and rusty. And there is no course of life so weak and sottish as that which is carried on by rule and discipline.
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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To divert myself from a troublesome fancy, it is but to run to my books they presently fix me to them, and drive the other out of my thoughts, and do not mutiny to see that I have only recourse to them for want of other more, real, natural, and lively conveniences they always receive me with the same kindness.
Michel de Montaigne
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It is probable that the principal credit of miracles, visions, enchantments, and such extraordinary occurrences comes from the power of imagination, acting principally upon the minds of the common people, which are softer.
Michel de Montaigne
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The beautiful souls are they that are universal, open, and ready for all things.
Michel de Montaigne
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Reason has so many forms that we do not know which to choose-Experiment has no fewer.
Michel de Montaigne
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Can anything be imagined so ridiculous that this miserable and wretched creature, who is not so much as master of himself, but subject to the injuries of all things, should call himself master and emperor of the world, of which he has not power to know the least part, much less to command the whole?
Michel de Montaigne
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The thing in the world I am most afraid of is fear, and with good reason that passion alone, in the trouble of it, exceeding all other accidents
Michel de Montaigne
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The archer who overshoots his mark does no better than he who falls short of it.
Michel de Montaigne
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In my opinion, every rich man is a miser.
Michel de Montaigne
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It is the part of cowardice, not of courage, to go and crouch in a hole under a massive tomb, to avoid the blows of fortune.
Michel de Montaigne
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Every movement reveals us.
Michel de Montaigne
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We owe subjection and obedience to all our kings, whether good or bad, alike, for that has respect unto their office but as to esteem and affection, these are only due to their virtue.
Michel de Montaigne