Quote

To compose our character is our duty, not to compose books, and to win, not battles and provinces, but order and tranquillity in our conduct.

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
Book
Conduct
Self
Behavior
Battle
Duty
Books
Tranquillity
Winning
Compose
Order
Provinces
Character
Battles

More quotes by Michel de Montaigne

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Ambition sufficiently plagues her proselytes, by keeping themselves always in show, like the statue of a public place.
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We took advantage of [the Indians'] ignorance and inexperience to incline them the more easily toward treachery, lewdness, avarice, and every sort of inhumanity and cruelty, after the example and pattern of our ways.
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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?
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The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.
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All the opinions in the world point out that pleasure is our aim.
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In plain Truth, it is no Want, but rather Abundance that creates Avarice.
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I must use these great men's virtues as a cloak for my weakness.
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A straight oar looks bent in the water. It matters not merely that we see a thing, but how we see it.
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He that I am reading seems always to have the most force.
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If your doctor does not think it good for you to sleep, to drink wine, or to eat of a particular dish, do not worry I will find you another who will not agree with him.
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There is some shadow of delight and delicacy which smiles upon and flatters us even in the very lap of melancholy.
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How many valiant men we have seen to survive their own reputation!
Michel de Montaigne
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Of all our infirmities, the most savage is to despise our being.
Michel de Montaigne
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Ambition is not a vice of little people.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is, nevertheless, a certain respect and a general duty of humanity that ties us, not only to beasts that have life and sense, but even to trees and plants.
Michel de Montaigne
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There is no so wretched and coarse a soul wherein some particular faculty is not seen to shine.
Michel de Montaigne
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My home...It is my retreat and resting place from wars, I try to keep this corner as a haven against the tempest outside, as I do another corner in my soul.
Michel de Montaigne
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The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.
Michel de Montaigne
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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
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Virtue can have naught to do with ease. . . . It craves a steep and thorny path.
Michel de Montaigne