Authority Quotes by Michel de Montaigne

9 Authority quotes by Michel de Montaigne

All Authority quotes Michel de Montaigne’s page

Montaigne’s reflective essays on power condense into nine short thoughts, giving a quick, philosophical glimpse of his stance on authority.

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And truly Philosophy is but sophisticated poetry. Whence do those ancient writers derive all their authority but from the poets?

Michel de Montaigne

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Almost all the opinions we have are taken on authority and on credit.

Michel de Montaigne

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Laws are maintained in credit, not because they are essentially just, but because they are laws. It is the mystical foundation of…

Michel de Montaigne

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Socrates and then Archesilaus used to make their pupils speak first; they spoke afterwards. 'Obest plerumque iss discere volunt authoritas eorum qui…

Michel de Montaigne

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Laws are often made by fools, and even more often by men who fail in equity because they hate equality: but always…

Michel de Montaigne

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The laws keep up their credit, not by being just, but because they are laws; 'tis the mystic foundation of their authority;…

Michel de Montaigne

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My library is my kingdom, and here I try to make my rule absolute-shutting off this single nook from wife, daughter and…

Michel de Montaigne

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Custom is a violent and treacherous school mistress. She, by little and lithe, slyly and unperceived, slips in the foot of her…

Michel de Montaigne

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Laws gain their authority from actual possession and custom: it is perilous to go back to their origins; laws, like our rivers,…

Michel de Montaigne

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More by Michel de Montaigne

No man is exempt from saying silly things; the mischief is to say them deliberately.

Michel de Montaigne

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The laws keep up their credit, not by being just, but because they are laws; 'tis the mystic foundation of their authority; they have…

Michel de Montaigne

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Every one rushes elsewhere and into the future, because no one wants to face one's own inner self.

Michel de Montaigne

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Beauty is the true prerogative of women, and so peculiarly their own, that our sex, though naturally requiring another sort of feature, is never…

Michel de Montaigne

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The height and value of true virtue consists in the facility, utility, and pleasure of its exercise; so far from difficulty, that boys, as…

Michel de Montaigne

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Fie on the eloquence that leaves us craving itself, not things!

Michel de Montaigne

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The plainest sign of wisdom is a continual cheerfulness: her state is like that of things in the regions above the moon, always clear…

Michel De Montaigne

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The corruption of the age is made up by the particular contribution of every individual man; some contribute treachery, others injustice, atheism, tyranny, avarice,…

Michel de Montaigne

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If people must be talking about me, I would have it to be truthfully and justly. I would willingly return from the next world…

Michel de Montaigne

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Most pleasures embrace us but to strangle.

Michel de Montaigne

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In true friendship, in which I am expert, I give myself to my friend more than I draw him to me. I not only…

Michel de Montaigne

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There are as many and innumerable degrees of wit, as there are cubits between this and heaven.

Michel de Montaigne

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A man has need of tough ears to hear himself fairly judged.

Michel de Montaigne

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Lucius Arruntius killed himself, he said, to escape both the future and the past.

Michel de Montaigne

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I have a vocabulary all my own. I pass the time when itis wet and disagreeable. Whenit is fine I do not wish to…

Michel de Montaigne

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