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I honor most those to whom I show least honor and where my soul moves with great alacrity, I forget the proper steps of ceremony.

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
Great
Steps
Least
Forget
Show
Alacrity
Moving
Ceremony
Shows
Moves
Soul
Proper
Self
Honor

More quotes by 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.
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A wise man never loses anything, if he has himself.
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He who fears he will suffer, already suffers from his fear.
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The most unhappy and frail creatures are men and yet they are the proudest.
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Presumption is our natural and original malady. The most vulnerable and frail of all creatures is man, and at the same time the most arrogant.
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It has never occurred to me to wish for empire or royalty, nor for the eminence of those high and commanding fortunes. My aim lies not in that direction I love myself too well.
Michel de Montaigne
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Every one's true worship was that which he found in use in the place where he chanced to be.
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I go out of my way, but rather by license than carelessness.... It is the inattentive reader who loses my subject, not I. Some word about it will always be found off in a corner, which will not fail to be sufficient, though it takes little room.
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Every day I hear stupid people say things that are not stupid.
Michel de Montaigne
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I am much afraid that we shall have very greatly hastened the decline and ruin of the New World by our contagion, and that we willhave sold it our opinions and our arts very dear.
Michel de Montaigne
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The knowledge of courtesy and good manners is a very necessary study. It is like grace and beauty, that which begets liking and an inclination to love one another at the first sight.
Michel de Montaigne
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The beginnings of all things are weak and tender. We must therefore be clear-sighted in the beginnings, for, as in their budding we discern not the danger, so in their full growth we perceive not the remedy.
Michel de Montaigne
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Laws are often made by fools, and even more often by men who fail in equity because they hate equality: but always by men, vain authorities who can resolve nothing.
Michel de Montaigne
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Order a purge for your brain, it will there be much better employed than upon your stomach.
Michel de Montaigne
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No wonder, said an Ancient, that chance has so much power over us, since it is by chance that we live.
Michel de Montaigne
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We are born to inquire after truth it belongs to a greater power to possess it. It is not, as Democritus said, hid in the bottom of the deeps, but rather elevated to an infinite height in the divine knowledge.
Michel de Montaigne
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The strength of any plan depends on the time. Circumstances and things eternally shift and change.
Michel de Montaigne
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To behave rightly, we ourselves should never lay a hand on our servants as long as our anger lasts. Things will seem different to us when we have quieted and cooled down.
Michel de Montaigne
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We are nearer neighbors to ourselves than the whiteness of snow or the weight of stones are to us: if man does not know himself, how should he know his functions and powers?
Michel de Montaigne
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Age imprints more wrinkles a in the mind, than it does in the face, and souls are never, or very rarely seen, that in growing old do not smell sour and musty. Man moves all together, both towards his perfection and decay.
Michel de Montaigne