Source: The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
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Famous Michel de Montaigne Quotes
Source: Complete Essays
Source: Selections from the Essays
Source: The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
“Philosophical discussions habitually make men happy and joyful not frowning and sad.”
Source: The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
“Our wisdom and deliberation for the most part follow the lead of chance.”
Source: Complete Essays
“The finest lives in my opinion are the common model, without miracle and without extravagance.”
Source: The Complete Essays of Montaigne
“Why did I love her? Because it was her; because it was me.”
“Only he can judge of matters great and high whose soul is likewise.”
Source: Works, Comprising His Essays, Letters, and Journey Through Germany and Italy: With Notes from All the Commentators, Biographical and Bibliographical Notices &c., &c
“Report followeth not all goodness, except difficulty and rarity be joined thereto.”
Source: Essays of Montaigne
Source: Delphi Complete Works of Michel de Montaigne (Illustrated)
“Honesty is a question of right and wrong, not a matter of policy”
“The memory represents to us not what we choose but what it pleases.”
Source: Apology for Raymond Sebond
“There is no passion so much transports the sincerity of judgment as doth anger”
“Nothing else but an insatiate thirst of enjoying a greedily desired object.”
“A woman is no sooner ours than we are no longer hers.”
Source: The Autobiography of Michel de Montaigne: Comprising the Life of the Wisest Man of His Times : His Childhood, Youth, and Prime : His Adventures in Love and Marriage, at Court, and in Office, War, Revolution, and Plague : His Travels at Home and Abroad : His Habits, Tastes, Whims, and Opinions
“Indeed, there is no such thing as an altogether ugly woman — or altogether beautiful.”
“There is power in ambition, pleasure in luxury...but envy can gain nothing but vexation.”
“A man is not hurt so much by what happens, as by his opinion of what happens.”
Source: Complete Essays
“Children's plays are not sports, and should be deemed as their most serious actions.”
“It is setting a high value upon our opinions to roast men and women alive on account of them.”
“I would rather be an expert on me than on Cicero”
Source: The Essays of Michel de Montaigne
“The soul that has no established aim loses itself”
Source: Annotated Essays of Michel de Montaigne with English Grammar Exercises: by Michel de Montaigne (Author), Robert Powell (Editor)
“A man should not so much respect what he eats, as with whom he eats.”
“We must not attach knowledge to the mind, we have to incorporate it there.”
“When I play with my cat, who knows whether I do not make her more sport than she makes me?”
“I will follow the right side even to the fire, but excluding the fire if I can.”
Source: Michel de Montaigne: Selected Essays
“Who does not in some sort live to others, does not live much to himself.”
Source: All the Essays of Michael Seigneur de Montaigne
“Miracles arise from our ignorance of nature, not from nature itself.”
Source: Autobiography: Comprising the Life of the Wisest Man of His Times ...
Source: Complete Essays
“I have never known a greater miracle, or monster, than myself.”