Quote

And if nobody reads me, shall I have wasted my time, when I have beguiled so many idle hours with such pleasant and profitable reflections?

Michel de Montaigne

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Hours
Reads
Reading
Profitable
Book
Wasted
Many
Idle
Time
Pleasant
Reflection
Nobody
Beguiled
Shall
Reflections

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

Image
A man must either imitate the vicious or hate them.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
The confidence in another man's virtue is no light evidence of a man's own, and God willingly favors such a confidence.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Repentance is no other than a recanting of the will, and opposition to our fancies, which lead us which way they please.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
I must use these great men's virtues as a cloak for my weakness.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
The virtue of the soul does not consist in flying high, but in walking orderly.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
My art and profession is to live.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
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
Image
No man dies before his hour. The time you leave behind was no more yours, than that which was before your birth, and concerneth you no more.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
In my youth I studied for ostentation later, a little to gain wisdom now, for recreation never for gain.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Virtue shuns ease as a companion. It demands a rough and thorny path.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
My errors are by now natural and incorrigible but the good that worthy men do the public by making themselves imitable, I shall perhaps do by making myself evitable.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Silence and modesty are very valuable qualities in conversation.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Some, either from being glued to vice by a natural attachment, or from long habit, no longer recognize its ugliness.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Socrates and then Archesilaus used to make their pupils speak first they spoke afterwards. 'Obest plerumque iss discere volunt authoritas eorum qui docent.' [For those who want to learn, the obstacle can often be the authority of those who teach]
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Eloquence is an engine invented to manage and wield at will the fierce democracy, and, like medicine to the sick, is only employed in the paroxysms of a disordered state.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Of all our infirmities, the most savage is to despise our being.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
A man has need of tough ears to hear himself fairly judged.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
Ignorance is the softest pillow on which a man can rest his head.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
There is a plague on Man, the opinion that he knows something.
Michel de Montaigne
Image
There are few men who dare to publish to the world the prayers they make to Almighty God.
Michel de Montaigne