I find that the best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Virtue shuns ease as a companion. It demands a rough and thorny path. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The strangest, most generous, and proudest of all virtues is true courage. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Virtue can have naught to do with ease. . . . It craves a steep and thorny path. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The lack of wealth is easily repaired but the poverty of the soul is irreplaceable. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Virtue rejects facility to be her companion. She requires a craggy, rough and thorny way. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
From Obedience and submission comes all our virtues, and all sin is comes from self-opinion. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Now, of all the benefits that virtue confers upon us, the contempt of death is one of the greatest. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Virtue cannot be followed but for herself, and if one sometimes borrows her mask to some other purpose, she presently pulls it… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
To compose our character is our duty, not to compose books, and to win, not battles and provinces, but order and tranquillity… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
We owe subjection and obedience to all our kings, whether good or bad, alike, for that has respect unto their office; but… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
It is a monstrous thing that I will say, but I will say it all the same: I find in many things… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Those sciences which govern the morals of mankind, such as Theology and Philosophy, make everything their concern: no activity is so private… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
If virtue cannot shine bright, but by the conflict of contrary appetites, shall we then say that she cannot subsist without the… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Most of our occupations are low comedy.... We must play our part duly, but as the part of a borrowed character. Of… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Who is only good that others may know it, and that he may be the better esteemed when 'tis known, who will… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
To compose our character is our duty, not to compose books, and to win, not battles and provinces, but order and tranquility… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The height and value of true virtue consists in the facility, utility, and pleasure of its exercise; so far from difficulty, that… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
One man may have some special knowledge at first-hand about the character of a river or a spring, who otherwise knows only… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
“when Dandamys the Wise heard accounts of the lives of Socrates, Pythagoras and Diogenes, he said that they were in every way… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
No profession or occupation is more pleasing than the military; a profession or exercise both noble in execution (for the strongest, most… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
“The other two are rich and noble; examples of virtue rarely make their home among people like that.” — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The easy, gentle, and sloping path . . . is not the path of true virtue. It demands a rough and thorny road. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
We may so seize on virtue, that if we embrace it with an overgreedy and violent desire, it may become vicious. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
In truth, the care and expense of our fathers aims only at furnishing our heads with knowledge; of judgement and virtue, little… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
There is no virtue which does not rejoice a well-descended nature; there is a kind of I know not what congratulation in… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The recognition of virtue is not less valuable from the lips of the man who hates it, since truth forces him to… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Courtesy is a science of the highest importance. It is... opening a door that we may derive instruction from the example of… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Any time and any place can be used to study: his room, a garden, is table, his bed; when alone or in… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
No man is exempt from saying silly things; the mischief is to say them deliberately. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
Every one rushes elsewhere and into the future, because no one wants to face one's own inner self. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
Fie on the eloquence that leaves us craving itself, not things! — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
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 Copy Share Image
There are as many and innumerable degrees of wit, as there are cubits between this and heaven. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
