Essays of Michel de Montaigne - 106

How many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment
“I have done nothing to-day.”--“What? have you not lived?”
If it be a delicious medicine, take it
Intelligence is required to be able to know that a man knows not
Intemperance is the pest of pleasure
Language: obscure and unintelligible in wills and contracts
Last death will kill but a half or a quarter of a man
Law: breeder of altercation and division
Laws keep up their credit, not for being just--but as laws
Lay the fault on the voices of those who speak to me.
Learn my own debility and the treachery of my understanding
Life of Caesar has no greater example for us than our own
Long sittings at table both trouble me and do me harm
Made all medicinal conclusions largely give way to my pleasure
Man after who held out his pulse to a physician was a fool
Man must learn that he is nothing but a fool
More ado to interpret interpretations
More books upon books than upon any other subject
Never did two men make the same judgment of the same thing
None that less keep their promise (than physicians)
Nor get children but before I sleep, nor get them standing
Nothing so grossly, nor so ordinarily faulty, as the laws
Our justice presents to us but one hand
Perpetual scolding of his wife (of Socrates)
Physician: pass through all the diseases he pretends to cure
Plato angry at excess of sleeping than at excess of drinking
Plato: lawyers and physicians are bad institutions of a country
Prolong your misery an hour or two
Put us into a way of extending and diversifying difficulties
Resolved to bring nothing to it but expectation and patience
Scratching is one of nature’s sweetest gratifications
Seek the quadrature of the circle, even when on their wives
So weak and languishing, as not to have even wishing left to him
Soft, easy, and wholesome pillow is ignorance and incuriosity
Study makes me sensible how much I have to learn
Style wherewith men establish religions and laws
Subdividing these subtilties we teach men to increase their doub
That we may live, we cease to live
The mean is best
There is none of us who would not be worse than kings
Thinking nothing done, if anything remained to be done
Thinks nothing profitable that is not painful
Thou diest because thou art living
Tis so I melt and steal away from myself
Truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times
Truth, that for being older it is none the wiser
We must learn to suffer what we cannot evade
We ought to grant free passage to diseases
Whoever will call to mind the excess of his past anger
Why do we not imitate the Roman architecture?
Wrangling arrogance, wholly believing and trusting in itself
Yet do we find any end of the need of interpretating?



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A child should not be brought up in his mother’s lap
A gallant man does not give over his pursuit for being refused
A generous heart ought not to belie its own thoughts
A hundred more escape us than ever come to our knowledge
A lady could not boast of her chastity who was never tempted
A little cheese when a mind to make a feast
A little thing will turn and divert us
A man may always study, but he must not always go to school
A man may govern himself well who cannot govern others so
A man may play the fool in everything else, but not in poetry
A man must either imitate the vicious or hate them
A man must have courage to fear
A man never speaks of himself without loss
A man should abhor lawsuits as much as he may
A man should diffuse joy, but, as much as he can, smother grief
A man’s accusations of himself are always believed
A parrot would say as much as that
A person’s look is but a feeble warranty
A well-bred man is a compound man
A well-governed stomach is a great part of liberty
A word ill taken obliterates ten years’ merit
Abhorrence of the patient are necessary circumstances
Abominate that incidental repentance which old age brings
Accept all things we are not able to refute
Accommodated my subject to my strength
Accursed be thou, as he that arms himself for fear of death
Accusing all others of ignorance and imposition
Acquiesce and submit to truth
Acquire by his writings an immortal life
Addict thyself to the study of letters
Addresses his voyage to no certain, port
Admiration is the foundation of all philosophy
Advantageous, too, a little to recede from one’s right
Advise to choose weapons of the shortest sort
Affect words that are not of current use
Affection towards their husbands, (not) until they have lost them
Affirmation and obstinacy are express signs of want of wit
Affright people with the very mention of death
Against my trifles you could say no more than I myself have said
Age imprints more wrinkles in the mind than it does on the face
Agesilaus, what he thought most proper for boys to learn?
Agitated betwixt hope and fear
Agitation has usurped the place of reason
Alexander said, that the end of his labour was to labour
All actions equally become and equally honour a wise man
All apprentices when we come to it (death)
All defence shows a face of war
All I aim at is, to pass my time at my ease
All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice
All judgments in gross are weak and imperfect
All over-nice solicitude about riches smells of avarice
All things have their seasons, even good ones
All think he has yet twenty good years to come
All those who have authority to be angry in my family
Almanacs
Always be parading their pedantic science
Always complaining is the way never to be lamented
Always the perfect religion
Am as jealous of my repose as of my authority
An advantage in judgment we yield to none
“An emperor,” said he, “must die standing”
An ignorance that knowledge creates and begets
Ancient Romans kept their youth always standing at school
And hate him so as you were one day to love him
And we suffer the ills of a long peace
Anger and hatred are beyond the duty of justice
Any argument if it be carried on with method
Any old government better than change and alteration
Any one may deprive us of life; no one can deprive us of death
Anything appears greatest to him that never knew a greater
Anything becomes foul when commended by the multitude
Anything of value in him, let him make it appear in his conduct
Appetite comes to me in eating
Appetite is more sharp than one already half-glutted by the eyes
Appetite runs after that it has not
Appetite to read more, than glutted with that we have
Applaud his judgment than commend his knowledge
Apprenticeship and a resemblance of death
Apprenticeships that are to be served beforehand
Apt to promise something less than what I am able to do
Archer that shoots over, misses as much as he that falls short
Armed parties (the true school of treason, inhumanity, robbery)
Arrogant ignorance
Art that could come to the knowledge of but few persons
“Art thou not ashamed,” said he to him, “to sing so well?”
Arts of persuasion, to insinuate it into our minds
As great a benefit to be without (children)
As if anything were so common as ignorance
As if impatience were of itself a better remedy than patience
As we were formerly by crimes, so we are now overburdened by law
Ashamed to lay out as much thought and study upon it
Assurance they give us of the certainty of their drugs
At least, if they do no good, they will do no harm
At the most, but patch you up, and prop you a little
Attribute facility of belief to simplicity and ignorance
Attribute to itself; all the happy successes that happen
Authority of the number and antiquity of the witnesses
Authority to be dissected by the vain fancies of men
Authority which a graceful presence and a majestic mien beget
Avoid all magnificences that will in a short time be forgotten
Away with that eloquence that enchants us with itself
Away with this violence! away with this compulsion!
Bashfulness is an ornament to youth, but a reproach to old age
Be not angry to no purpose
Be on which side you will, you have as fair a game to play
Bears well a changed fortune, acting both parts equally well
Beast of company, as the ancient said, but not of the herd
Beauty of stature is the only beauty of men
Because the people know so well how to obey
Become a fool by too much wisdom
Being as impatient of commanding as of being commanded
Being dead they were then by one day happier than he
Being over-studious, we impair our health and spoil our humour
Belief compared to the impression of a seal upon the soul
Believing Heaven concerned at our ordinary actions
Best part of a captain to know how to make use of occasions
Best test of truth is the multitude of believers in a crowd
Best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice
Better at speaking than writing--Motion and action animate word
better have none at all than to have them in so prodigious a num
Better to be alone than in foolish and troublesome company
Blemishes of the great naturally appear greater
Books go side by side with me in my whole course
Books have many charming qualities to such as know how to choose
Books have not so much served me for instruction as exercise
Books I read over again, still smile upon me with fresh novelty
Books of things that were never either studied or understood
Both himself and his posterity declared ignoble, taxable
Both kings and philosophers go to stool
Burnt and roasted for opinions taken upon trust from others
Business to-morrow
But ill proves the honour and beauty of an action by its utility
But it is not enough that our education does not spoil us
By resenting the lie we acquit ourselves of the fault
By suspecting them, have given them a title to do ill
“By the gods,” said he, “if I was not angry, I would execute you”
By the misery of this life, aiming at bliss in another
Caesar: he would be thought an excellent engineer to boot
Caesar’s choice of death: “the shortest”
Can neither keep nor enjoy anything with a good grace
Cannot stand the liberty of a friend’s advice
Carnal appetites only supported by use and exercise
Cato said: So many servants, so many enemies
Ceremony forbids us to express by words things that are lawful
Certain other things that people hide only to show them
Change is to be feared
Change of fashions
Change only gives form to injustice and tyranny
Cherish themselves most where they are most wrong
Chess: this idle and childish game
Chiefly knew himself to be mortal by this act
Childish ignorance of many very ordinary things
Children are amused with toys and men with words
Cicero: on fame
Civil innocence is measured according to times and places
Cleave to the side that stood most in need of her
cloak on one shoulder, my cap on one side, a stocking disordered
College: a real house of correction of imprisoned youth
Coming out of the same hole
Commit themselves to the common fortune
Common consolation, discourages and softens me
Common friendships will admit of division
Conclude the depth of my sense by its obscurity
Concluding no beauty can be greater than what they see
Condemn all violence in the education of a tender soul
Condemn the opposite affirmation equally
Condemnations have I seen more criminal than the crimes
Condemning wine, because some people will be drunk
Confession enervates reproach and disarms slander
Confidence in another man’s virtue
Conscience makes us betray, accuse, and fight against ourselves
Conscience, which we pretend to be derived from nature
Consent, and complacency in giving a man’s self up to melancholy
Consoles himself upon the utility and eternity of his writings
Content: more easily found in want than in abundance
Counterfeit condolings of pretenders
Courageous in death, not because his soul is immortal--Socrates
Courtesy and good manners is a very necessary study
Crafty humility that springs from presumption
Crates did worse, who threw himself into the liberty of poverty
Cruelty is the very extreme of all vices
Culling out of several books the sentences that best please me
Curiosity and of that eager passion for news
Curiosity of knowing things has been given to man for a scourge
“Custom,” replied Plato, “is no little thing”
Customs and laws make justice
Dangerous man you have deprived of all means to escape
Dangers do, in truth, little or nothing hasten our end
Dearness is a good sauce to meat
Death can, whenever we please, cut short inconveniences
Death conduces more to birth and augmentation than to loss
Death discharges us of all our obligations
Death has us every moment by the throat
Death is a part of you
Death is terrible to Cicero, coveted by Cato
Death of old age the most rare and very seldom seen
Deceit maintains and supplies most men’s employment
Decree that says, “The court understands nothing of the matter”
Defence allures attempt, and defiance provokes an enemy
Defend most the defects with which we are most tainted
Defer my revenge to another and better time
Deformity of the first cruelty makes me abhor all imitation
Delivered into our own custody the keys of life
Denying all solicitation, both of hand and mind
Depend as much upon fortune as anything else we do
Desire of riches is more sharpened by their use than by the need
Desire of travel
Desires, that still increase as they are fulfilled
Detest in others the defects which are more manifest in us
Did my discourses came only from my mouth or from my heart
Did not approve all sorts of means to obtain a victory
Die well--that is, patiently and tranquilly
Difference betwixt memory and understanding
Difficulty gives all things their estimation
Dignify our fopperies when we commit them to the press
Diogenes, esteeming us no better than flies or bladders
Discover what there is of good and clean in the bottom of the po
Disdainful, contemplative, serious and grave as the ass
Disease had arrived at its period or an effect of chance?
Disgorge what we eat in the same condition it was swallowed
Disguise, by their abridgments and at their own choice
Dissentient and tumultuary drugs
Diversity of medical arguments and opinions embraces all
Diverting the opinions and conjectures of the people
Do not much blame them for making their advantage of our folly
Do not to pray that all things may go as we would have them
Do not, nevertheless, always believe myself
Do thine own work, and know thyself
Doctors: more felicity and duration in their own lives?
Doctrine much more intricate and fantastic than the thing itself
Dost thou, then, old man, collect food for others’ ears?
Doubt whether those (old writings) we have be not the worst
Doubtful ills plague us worst
Downright and sincere obedience
Drugs being in its own nature an enemy to our health
Drunkeness a true and certain trial of every one’s nature
Dying appears to him a natural and indifferent accident
Each amongst you has made somebody cuckold
Eat your bread with the sauce of a more pleasing imagination
Education
Education ought to be carried on with a severe sweetness
Effect and performance are not at all in our power
Either tranquil life, or happy death
Eloquence prejudices the subject it would advance
Emperor Julian, surnamed the Apostate
Endeavouring to be brief, I become obscure
Engaged in the avenues of old age, being already past forty
Enough to do to comfort myself, without having to console others
Enslave our own contentment to the power of another?
Enters lightly into a quarrel is apt to go as lightly out of it
Entertain us with fables: astrologers and physicians
Epicurus
Establish this proposition by authority and huffing
Evade this tormenting and unprofitable knowledge
Even the very promises of physic are incredible in themselves
Events are a very poor testimony of our worth and parts
Every abridgment of a good book is a foolish abridgment
Every day travels towards death; the last only arrives at it
Every government has a god at the head of it
Every man thinks himself sufficiently intelligent
Every place of retirement requires a walk
Everything has many faces and several aspects
Examine, who is better learned, than who is more learned
Excel above the common rate in frivolous things
Excuse myself from knowing anything which enslaves me to others
Executions rather whet than dull the edge of vices
Expresses more contempt and condemnation than the other
Extend their anger and hatred beyond the dispute in question
Extremity of philosophy is hurtful
Fabric goes forming and piling itself up from hand to hand
Fame: an echo, a dream, nay, the shadow of a dream
Fancy that others cannot believe otherwise than as he does
Fantastic gibberish of the prophetic canting
Far more easy and pleasant to follow than to lead
Fathers conceal their affection from their children
Fault not to discern how far a man’s worth extends
Fault will be theirs for having consulted me
Fear and distrust invite and draw on offence
Fear is more importunate and insupportable than death itself
Fear of the fall more fevers me than the fall itself
Fear to lose a thing, which being lost, cannot be lamented?
Fear was not that I should do ill, but that I should do nothing
Fear: begets a terrible astonishment and confusion
Feared, lest disgrace should make such delinquents desperate
Feminine polity has a mysterious procedure
Few men have been admired by their own domestics
Few men have made a wife of a mistress, who have not repented it
First informed who were to be the other guests
First thing to be considered in love matters: a fitting time
Flatterer in your old age or in your sickness
Follies do not make me laugh, it is our wisdom which does
Folly and absurdity are not to be cured by bare admonition
Folly of gaping after future things
Folly satisfied with itself than any reason can reasonably be
Folly than to be moved and angry at the follies of the world
Folly to hazard that upon the uncertainty of augmenting it
Folly to put out their own light and shine by a borrowed lustre
For fear of the laws and report of men
For who ever thought he wanted sense?
Fortune heaped up five or six such-like incidents
Fortune rules in all things
Fortune sometimes seems to delight in taking us at our word
Fortune will still be mistress of events
Fox, who found fault with what he could not obtain
Friend, it is not now time to play with your nails
Friend, the hook will not stick in such soft cheese
Friendships that the law and natural obligation impose upon us
Fruits of public commotion are seldom enjoyed
Gain to change an ill condition for one that is uncertain
Gave them new and more plausible names for their excuse
Gentleman would play the fool to make a show of defence
Gently to bear the inconstancy of a lover
Gewgaw to hang in a cabinet or at the end of the tongue
Give but the rind of my attention
Give me time to recover my strength and health
Give the ladies a cruel contempt of our natural furniture
Give these young wenches the things they long for
Give us history, more as they receive it than as they believe it
Giving is an ambitious and authoritative quality
Glory and curiosity are the scourges of the soul
Go out of ourselves, because we know not how there to reside
Good does not necessarily succeed evil; another evil may succeed
Good to be certain and finite, and evil, infinite and uncertain
Got up but an inch upon the shoulders of the last, but one
Gradations above and below pleasure
Gratify the gods and nature by massacre and murder
Great presumption to be so fond of one’s own opinions
Greatest apprehensions, from things unseen, concealed
Greatest talkers, for the most part, do nothing to purpose
Greedy humour of new and unknown things
Grief provokes itself
Gross impostures of religions
Guess at our meaning under general and doubtful terms
Happen to do anything commendable, I attribute it to fortune
Hard to resolve a man’s judgment against the common opinions
Haste trips up its own heels, fetters, and stops itself
Hate all sorts of obligation and restraint
Hate remedies that are more troublesome than the disease itself
Have ever had a great respect for her I loved
Have more wherewith to defray my journey, than I have way to go
Have no other title left me to these things but by the ears
Have you ever found any who have been dissatisfied with dying?
Having too good an opinion of our own worth
He cannot be good, seeing he is not evil even to the wicked
He did not think mankind worthy of a wise man’s concern
He felt a pleasure and delight in so noble an action
He judged other men by himself
He may employ his passion, who can make no use of his reason
He may well go a foot, they say, who leads his horse in his hand
He must fool it a little who would not be deemed wholly a fool
He should discern in himself, as well as in others
He took himself along with him
He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears
He who is only a good man that men may know it
He who lays the cloth is ever at the charge of the feast
He who lives everywhere, lives nowhere
He who provides for all, provides for nothing
He who stops not the start will never be able to stop the course
He will choose to be alone
Headache should come before drunkenness
Health depends upon the vanity and falsity of their promises
Health is altered and corrupted by their frequent prescriptions
Health to be worth purchasing by all the most painful cauteries
Hearing a philosopher talk of military affairs
Heat and stir up their imagination, and then we find fault
Help: no other effect than that of lengthening my suffering
High time to die when there is more ill than good in living
Hoary head and rivelled face of ancient usage
Hobbes said that if he Had been at college as long as others--
Hold a stiff rein upon suspicion
Home anxieties and a mind enslaved by wearing complaints
Homer: The only words that have motion and action
Honour of valour consists in fighting, not in subduing
How infirm and decaying material this fabric of ours is
How many and many times he has been mistaken in his own judgment
How many more have died before they arrived at thy age
How many several ways has death to surprise us?
“How many things,” said he, “I do not desire!”
How many worthy men have we known to survive their reputation
How much easier is it not to enter in than it is to get out
How much it costs him to do no worse
How much more insupportable and painful an immortal life
How uncertain duration these accidental conveniences are
Humble out of pride
Husbands hate their wives only because they themselves do wrong
I always find superfluity superfluous
I am a little tenderly distrustful of things that I wish
I am apt to dream that I dream
I am disgusted with the world I frequent
I am hard to be got out, but being once upon the road
I am no longer in condition for any great change
I am not to be cuffed into belief
I am plain and heavy, and stick to the solid and the probable
I am very glad to find the way beaten before me by others
I am very willing to quit the government of my house
I bequeath to Areteus the maintenance of my mother
I can more hardly believe a man’s constancy than any virtue
I cannot well refuse to play with my dog
I content myself with enjoying the world without bustle
I dare not promise but that I may one day be so much a fool
I do not consider what it is now, but what it was then
I do not judge opinions by years
I do not much lament the dead, and should envy them rather
I do not say that ‘tis well said, but well thought
I do not willingly alight when I am once on horseback
I enter into confidence with dying
I ever justly feared to raise my head too high
I every day hear fools say things that are not foolish
I find myself here fettered by the laws of ceremony
I find no quality so easy to counterfeit as devotion
I for my part always went the plain way to work
I grudge nothing but care and trouble
I had much rather die than live upon charity
I had rather be old a brief time, than be old before old age
I hail and caress truth in what quarter soever I find it
I hate all sorts of tyranny, both in word and deed
I hate poverty equally with pain
I have a great aversion from a novelty
“I have done nothing to-day”--“What? have you not lived?”
I have lived longer by this one day than I should have done
I have no mind to die, but I have no objection to be dead
I have not a wit supple enough to evade a sudden question
I have nothing of my own that satisfies my judgment
I honour those most to whom I show the least honour
I lay no great stress upon my opinions; or of others
I look upon death carelessly when I look upon it universally
I love stout expressions amongst gentle men
I love temperate and moderate natures
I need not seek a fool from afar; I can laugh at myself
I owe it rather to my fortune than my reason
I receive but little advice, I also give but little
I scorn to mend myself by halves
I see no people so soon sick as those who take physic
I speak truth, not so much as I would, but as much as I dare
I take hold of, as little glorious and exemplary as you will
I understand my men even by their silence and smiles
I was always superstitiously afraid of giving offence
I was too frightened to be ill
“I wish you good health”--“No health to thee” replied the other
I would as willingly be lucky as wise
I would be rich of myself, and not by borrowing
I write my book for few men and for few years
Idleness is to me a very painful labour
Idleness, the mother of corruption
If a passion once prepossess and seize me, it carries me away
If I am talking my best, whoever interrupts me, stops me