The laws of conscience, though we ascribe them to nature, actually come from custom. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
“I know not what quintessence of all this mixture, which, seizing my whole will, carried it to plunge and lose itself in… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Even from their infancy we frame them to the sports of love: their instruction, behavior, attire, grace, learning and all their words… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Courtesy, like grace and beauty, that which begets liking and inclination to love one another at the first sight, and in the… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
In the education of children there is nothing like alluring the interest and affection; otherwise you only make so many asses laden… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
We should rather examine, who is better learned, than who is more learned. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Who does not in some sort live to others, does not live much to himself. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Nothing else but an insatiate thirst of enjoying a greedily desired object. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Like the watermen who advance forward while they look backward. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Disappointment and feebleness imprint upon us a cowardly and valetudinarian virtue. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
I find that the best virtue I have has in it some tincture of vice. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Once you have decided to keep a certain pile, it is no longer yours; for you can't spend it. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
There is nothing so extreme that is not allowed by the custom of some nation or other. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
The strength of any plan depends on the time. Circumstances and things eternally shift and change. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
I love a friendship that flatters itself in the sharpness and vigor of its communications. — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
Poetry reproduces an indefinable mood that is more amorous than love itself. Venus is not so beautiful all naked, alive, and panting,… — Michel de Montaigne Copy Share Image
If a man should importune me to give a reason why I loved him, I find it could no otherwise be expressed,… — 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
