Quote

Petty vexations may at times be petty, but still they are vexations. The smallest and most inconsiderable annoyances are the most piercing. As small letters weary the eye most, so the smallest affairs disturb us most.

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
Still
Affairs
Vexations
May
Affair
Piercing
Letters
Vexation
Trouble
Annoyance
Small
Disturb
Eye
Petty
Times
Weary
Inconsiderable
Stills
Smallest
Annoyances

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In his commerce with men I mean him to include- and that principally- those who live only in the memory of books. By means of history he will frequent those great souls of former years. If you want it to be so, history can be a waste of time it can also be, if you want it to be so, a study bearing fruit beyond price.
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Philosophical discussions habitually make men happy and joyful not frowning and sad.
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For among other things he had been counseled to bring me to love knowledge and duty by my own choice, without forcing my will, and to educate my soul entirely through gentleness and freedom.
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There were many terrible things in my life and most of them never happened.
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He that first likened glory to a shadow did better than he was aware of. They are both of them things excellently vain. Glory also, like a shadow, goes sometimes before the body, and sometimes in length infinitely exceeds it.
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Once you have decided to keep a certain pile, it is no longer yours for you can't spend it.
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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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A woman is no sooner ours than we are no longer hers.
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Life in itself is neither good nor evil, it is the place of good and evil, according to what you make it.
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Scratching is one of nature's sweetest gratifications, and nearest at hand.
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It's not victory if it doesn't end the war.
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Women are not altogether in the wrong when they refuse the rules of life prescribed to the World, for men only have established them and without their consent.
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The most universal quality is diversity.
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The receipts of cookery are swelled to a volume, but a good stomach excels them all to which nothing contributes more than industry and temperance.
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How often, being moved under a false cause, if the person offending makes a good defense and presents us with a just excuse, are we angry against truth and innocence itself?
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Behold the hands, how they promise, conjure, appeal, menace, pray, supplicate, refuse, beckon, interrogate, admire, confess, cringe, instruct, command, mock and what not besides, with a variation and multiplication of variation which makes the tongue envious.
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Let us permit nature to have her way. She understands her business better than we do.
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The pleasantest things in the world are pleasant thoughts, and the great art of life is to have as many of them as possible.
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Meditation is a powerful and full study as can effectually taste and employ themselves.
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... whoever believes anything esteems that it is a work of charity to persuade another of it.
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