"The perpetual work of your life is but to lay the foundation of death."
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Quote collection
Michel de Montaigne quotes (page 35 of 49)
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"I aim here only at revealing myself, who will perhaps be different tomorrow, if I learn something new which changes me."
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"A little folly is desirable in him that will not be guilty of stupidity."
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"The continuous work of our life is to build death."
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"No man dies before his hour. The time you leave behind was no more yours, than that which was before your birth, and concerneth you no more."
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"The whole idea we have for their chastity is ridiculous. They would have to become numb and invisible to please us. I don't know whether the exploits of Alexander and Caesar really surpass the resolution of a beautiful young woman, bred up in the light and commerce of our society, who still keeps herself whole. There is no doing so hard as not doing."
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"When we see a man with bad shoes, we say it is no wonder, if he is a shoemaker."
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"[I]n my country, when they would say a man has no sense, they say, such an one has no memory; and when I complain of the defect of mine, they do not believe me, and reprove me, as though I accused myself for a fool: not discerning the difference betwixt memory and understanding, which is to make matters still worse for me. But they do me wrong; for experience, rather, daily shows us, on the contrary, that a strong memory is commonly coupled with infirm judgment."
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"To make judgements about great and lofty things, a soul of the same stature is needed; otherwise we ascribe to them that vice which is our own."
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"There is the name and the thing; the name is a sound which sets a mark on and denotes the thing. The name is no part of the thing nor of the substance; it is an extraneous piece added to the thing, and outside of it."
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"Necessity reconciles and brings men together; and this accidental connection afterward forms itself into laws."
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"Our speech has its weaknesses and its defects, like all the rest. Most of the occasions for the troubles of the world are grammatical."
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"He who would teach men to die would teach them to live."
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"Thus we should beware of clinging to vulgar opinions, and judge things by reason's way, not by popular say."
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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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"This notion [skepticism] is more clearly understood by asking "What do I know?""
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"No wonder, said an Ancient, that chance has so much power over us, since it is by chance that we live."
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"Virtue can have naught to do with ease. . . . It craves a steep and thorny path."
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"Now, of all the benefits that virtue confers upon us, the contempt of death is one of the greatest."
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"How many quarrels, and how important, has the doubt as to the meaning of this syllable "Hoc" produced for the world!"
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