Quote

Knowledge is an excellent drug but no drug has virtue enough to preserve itself from corruption and decay, if the vessel be tainted and impure wherein it is put to keep.

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
Decay
Keep
Preserve
Enough
Preserves
Corruption
Excellent
Impure
Tainted
Drug
Wherein
Virtue
Vessel
Knowledge

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Rash and incessant scolding runs into custom and renders itself despised.
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Confidence in the goodness of another is good proof of one's own goodness.
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To know much is often the cause of doubting more.
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The common notions that we find in credit around us and infused into our souls by our fathers' seed, these seem to be the universal and natural ones. Whence it comes to pass that what is off the hinges of custom, people believe to be off the hinges of reason.
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Whatever the Benefits of Fortune are , they yet require a Palate fit to relish and taste them 'Tis Fruition, and not Possession, that renders us Happy.
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I love those historians that are either very simple or most excellent. Such as are between both (which is the most common fashion), it is they that spoil all they will needs chew our meat for us and take upon them a law to judge, and by consequence to square and incline the story according to their fantasy.
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Courtesy is a science of the highest importance. It is...opening a door that we may derive instruction from the example of others, and at the same time enabling us to benefit them by our example, if there be anything in our character worthy of imitation.
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As far as I am concerned, no road that would lead us to health is either arduous or expensive.
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A wise man never loses anything, if he has himself.
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Words repeated again have as another sound, so another sense.
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My art and profession is to live.
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Ceremony forbids us to express by words things that are lawful and natural, and we obey it reason forbids us to do things unlawful and ill, and nobody obeys it.
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Meditation is a rich and powerful method of study for anyone who knows how to examine his mind.
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My library is my kingdom, and here I try to make my rule absolute-shutting off this single nook from wife, daughter and society. Elsewhere I have only a verbal authority, and vague. Unhappy is the man, in my opinion, who has no spot at home where he can be at home to himself-to court himself and hide away.
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For table-talk, I prefer the pleasant and witty before the learned and the grave in bed, beauty before goodness.
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Glory and repose are things that cannot possibly inhabit in one and the same place.
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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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It's not victory if it doesn't end the war.
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As by some might be saide of me: that here I have but gathered a nosegay of strange floures, and have put nothing of mine unto it, but the thred to binde them. Certes, I have given unto publike opinion, that these borrowed ornaments accompany me but I meane not they should cover or hide me.
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The oldest and best known evil was ever more supportable than one that was new and untried.
Michel de Montaigne