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Quotes from Essais — Michel de Montaigne

1533–1592 France

← All quotes by Michel de Montaigne

142 quotes

Live as long as you please, you will strike nothing off the time you will have to spend dead.

Essais (1571)

It is not without good reason said, that he who has not a good memory should never take upon him the trade of lying.

Essais (1571)

Every other knowledge is harmful to him who does not have knowledge of goodness.

Essais (1571)

Accustom him to every thing, that he may not be a Sir Paris, a carpet-knight, but a sinewy, hardy, and vigorous young man.

Essais (1571)

Man is forming thousands of ridiculous relations between himself and God.

Essais (1571)

I have never seen a greater monster or miracle in the world than myself.

Essais (1571)

There is no man so good, who, were he to submit all his thoughts and actions to the laws, would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.

Essais (1571)

A wise man never loses anything, if he has himself.

Essais (1571)

The plague of man is boasting of his knowledge.

Essais (1571)

Every rich man is avaricious, in my opinion.

Essais (1571)

I have gathered a posy of other men’s flowers, and nothing but the thread that binds them is mine own.

Essais (1571)

I speak the truth, not my fill of it, but as much as I dare speak; and I dare to do so a little more as I grow old.

Essais (1571)

Physicians have this advantage: the sun lights their success and the earth covers their failures.

Essais (1571)

Non pudeat dicere, quod non pudet sentire: "Let no man be ashamed to speak what he is not ashamed to think."

Essais (1571)

Apollo said that every one's true worship was that which he found in use in the place where he chanced to be.

Essais (1571)

When I play with my cat, who knows whether I do not make her more sport than she makes me?

Essais (1571)

Saturninus said, "Comrades, you have lost a good captain to make him an ill general."

Essais (1571)

For truth itself has not the privilege to be spoken at all times and in all sorts.

Essais (1571)

I have seen no more evident monstrosity and miracle in the world than myself.

Essais (1571)

All the opinions of the world agree in this, that pleasure is our end.

Essais (1571)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Michel de Montaigne (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.