Top 988 Quotes & Sayings by Michel de Montaigne - Page 3

There is no more expensive thing than a free gift.

It is not necessity but abundance which produces greed.

A man is not hurt so much by what happens, as by his opinion of what happens.

Men are tormented by the opinions they have of things, and not the things themselves.

Though we may be learned by another's knowledge, we can never be wise but by our own experience.

Wise men have more to learn of fools than fools of wise men.

We should rather examine, who is better learned, than who is more learned.

We are more unhappy to see people ahead of us than happy to see people behind us.

It takes strong ears indeed to hear ourselves judged frankly, and because there are few who can endure criticism without being stung by it, those who venture to criticize us perform a remarkable act of friendship. For it is a healthy love that will risk wounding or offending in order to profer a benefit.

I know that the arms of friendship are long enough to reach from the one end of the world to the other

A man must become wise at his own expense.

Lying is a terrible vice, it testifies that one despises God, but fears men.

The plague of man is the opinion of knowledge. That is why ignorance is so recommended by our religion as a quality suitable to belief and obedience.

Our great and glorious masterpiece is to live appropriately.

We are all of us richer than we think we are; but we are taught to borrow and to beg, and brought up more to make use of what is another's than of our own.

On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.

To begin depriving death of its greatest advantage over us, let us adopt a way clean contrary to that common one; let us deprive death of its strangeness, let us frequent it, let us get used to it; let us have nothing more often in mind than death... We do not know where death awaits us: so let us wait for it everywhere." "To practice death is to practice freedom. A man who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave.

I neither complain of the past, nor do I fear the future.

A man must keep a little back shop where he can be himself without reserve. In solitude alone can he know true freedom.

Men are most apt to believe what they least understand.

When I quote others I do so in order to express my own ideas more clearly.

We find our energies are actually cramped when we are overanxious to succeed.

Happiness involves working toward meaningful goals.

I do not teach. I relate.

Truly it is reasonable to make a great distinction between the faults that come from our weakness and those that come from our wickedness.

God might grant us riches, honours, life, and even health, to our own hurt; for every thing that is pleasing to us is not always good for us. If he sends us death, or an increase of sickness, instead of a cure, Vvrga tua et baculus, tuus ipsa me consolata sunt. "Thy rod and thy staff have comforted me," he does it by the rule of his providence, which better and more certainly discerns what is proper for us than we can do; and we ought to take it in good part, as coming from a wise and most friendly hand.

Love is like playing the piano. First you must learn to play by the rules, then you must forget the rules and play from your heart. If I were pressed to say why I loved him, I feel that my only reply could be: Because it was he, because it was I.

It is easier to sacrifice great than little things.

As soon as women become ours we are no longer theirs.

Experience has taught me this, that we undo ourselves by impatience. Misfortunes have their life and their limits, their sickness and their health.

No-one is exempt from speaking nonsense – the only misfortune is to do it solemnly.

True freedom is to have power over oneself for everything.

We need to interpret interpretations more than to interpret things.

The conduct of our lives is the true mirror of our doctrine.

I would rather be old for a shorter time than be old before my time.

To compose our character is our duty, not to compose books, and to win, not battles and provinces, but order and tranquility in our conduct. Our great and glorious masterpiece is to live appropriately. All other things, ruling, hoarding, building, are only little appendages and props, at most.

We trouble our life by thoughts about death, and our death by thoughts about life.

Don't be afraid to say what you are not afraid to think

Honesty is a question of right and wrong, not a matter of policy

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.

He who does not live in some degree for others, hardly lives for himself.

We can be knowledgeable with other men's knowledge, but we cannot be wise with other men's wisdom.

Whenever a new finding is reported to the world people say - It is probably not true. Later on, when the reliability of a new finding has been fully confirmed, people say - OK, it may be true but it has no real significance. At last, when even the significance of the finding is obvious to everybody, people say - Well, it might have some significance, but the idea is not new.

Laws are often made by fools, and even more often by men who fail in equity because they hate equality: but always by men, vain authorities who can resolve nothing.

The wise man lives as long as he ought, not so long as he can.

Other people do not see you at all, but guess at you by uncertain conjectures.

When we have got it, we want something else.

I would rather be an expert on me than on Cicero

If you have known how to compose your life, you have done a great deal more than the person who knows how to compose a book. You have done more than the one who has taken cities and empires.

There is nothing of evil in life for him who rightly comprehends that death is no evil; to know how to die delivers us from all subjection and constraint.

I consider myself an average man, except in the fact that I consider myself an average man.

Life itself is neither a good nor an evil: life is where good or evil find a place, depending on how you make it for them.

I want death to find me planting my cabbages, but careless of death, and still more of my unfinished garden.

A strong imagination begetteth opportunity.

No one but yourself knows whether you are cowardly and cruel, or loyal and devout; others do not see you; they surmise you by uncertain conjectures; they perceive not so much your nature as your art.

The man who thinks he knows does not yet know what knowing is

The most fruitful and natural exercise for our minds is, in my opinion, conversation.

Not being able to govern events, I govern myself, and apply myself to them if they will not apply themselves to me.

If falsehood, like truth, had but one face, we would be more on equal terms. For we would consider the contrary of what the liar said to be certain. But the opposite of truth has a hundred thousand faces and an infinite field.

Obstinacy and dogmatism are the surest signs of stupidity. Is there anything more confident, resolute, disdainful, grave and serious than an ass?