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One Man May Have Some Special Knowledge At First-hand About The Character Of A River Or A Spring, Who Otherwise Knows Only What Everyone Else Knows. Yet To Give Currency To This Shred Of Information, He Will Undertake To Write On The Whole Science Of Physics. From This Fault Many Great Troubles Spring.

-Michel De Montaigne

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One Man May Have

Michel De Montaigne

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One Man May Have Some Special Knowledge At First-hand About The Character Of A River Or A Spring, Who Otherwise Knows Only What Everyone Else Knows. Yet To Give Currency To This Shred Of Information, He Will Undertake To Write On The Whole Science Of Physics. From This Fault Many Great Troubles Spring.

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All The Opinions In The World Point Out That Pleasure Is Our Aim.

All The World Knows Me In My Book, And My Book In Me.

Marriage Has, For Its Share, Usefulness, Justice, Honour, And Constancy; A Stale But More Durable Pleasure. Love Is Grounded On Pleasure Alone, And It Is Indeed More Gratifying To The Senses, Keener And More Acute; A Pleasure Stirred And Kept Alive By Difficulties. There Must Be A Sting And A Smart In It. It Ceases To Be Love If It Has No Shafts And No Fire.

It Is Easier To Write An Indifferent Poem Than To Understand A Good One.

There Is No Passion That So Much Transports Men From Their Right Judgments As Anger. No One Would Demur Upon Punishing A Judge With Death Who Should Condemn A Criminal Upon The Account Of His Own Choler; Why Then Should Fathers And Pedants Be Any More Allowed To Whip And Chastise Children In Their Anger? It Is Then No Longer Correction Bat Revenge. Chastisement Is Instead Of Physic To Children; And Should We Suffer A Physician Who Should Be Animated Against And Enraged At His Patient?

A Good Marriage Would Be Between A Blind Wife And A Deaf Husband.

We Easily Enough Confess In Others An Advantage Of Courage, Strength, Experience, Activity, And Beauty; But An Advantage In Judgment We Yield To None.

A Strong Imagination Begetteth Opportunity.

Everything Must Not Always Be Said, For That Would Be Folly.

The Plague Of Man Is Boasting Of His Knowledge.

Were I To Live My Life Over Again, I Should Live It Just As I Have Done. I Neither Complain Of The Past, Nor Do I Fear The Future.

No Pleasure Is Fully Delightful Without Communications, And No Delight Absolute Except Imparted.

Everyone Calls Barbarity What He Is Not Accustomed To.

I Have Never Seen A Greater Monster Or Miracle In The World Than Myself.

Most Of Our Occupations Are Low Comedy.... We Must Play Our Part Duly, But As The Part Of A Borrowed Character. Of The Mask And Appearance We Must Not Make A Real Essence, Nor Of What Is Foreign What Is Our Very Own.

And Obstinacy Is The Sister Of Constancy, At Least In Vigour And Stability.

I Would Rather Produce My Passions Than Brood Over Them At My Expense; They Grow Languid When They Have Vent And Expression. It Is Better That Their Point Should Operate Outwardly Than Be Turned Against Us.

We Are Neither Obstinately Nor Wilfully To Oppose Evils, Nor Truckle Under Them For Want Of Courage, But That We Are Naturally To Give Way To Them, According To Their Condition And Our Own, We Ought To Grant Free Passage To Diseases; And I Find They Stay Less With Me Who Let Them Alone. And I Have Lost Those Which Are Reputed The Most Tenacious And Obstinate Of Their Own Defervescence, Without Any Help Or Art, And Contrary To Their Rules. Let Us A Little Permit Nature To Take Her Own Way; She Better Understands Her Own Affairs Than We.

I Do Not Understand; I Pause; I Examine.

Obsession Is The Wellspring Of Genius And Madness.

The First Distinction Among Men, And The First Consideration That Gave One Precedence Over Another, Was Doubtless The Advantage Of Beauty.

It Is Far More Probable That Our Senses Should Deceive Us, Than That An Old Woman Should Be Carried Up A Chimney On A Broom Stick; And That It Is Far Less Astonishing That Witnesses Should Lie, Than That Witches Should Perform The Acts That Were Alleged.

..a Man May Live Long, Yet Live Very Little. Satisfaction In Life Depends Not On The Number Of Your Years, But On Your Will.

Satisfaction In Life

Learning Must Not Only Lodge With Us: We Must Marry Her.

I Would Rather Be An Expert On Me Than On Cicero

All Permanent Decisions Are Made In A Temporary State Of Mind.

Not Only Does The Wind Of Accidents Stir Me According To Its Blowing, But I Am Also Stirred And Troubled By The Instability Of My Attitude.

The Worthiest Man To Be Known, And For A Pattern To Be Presented To The World, He Is The Man Of Whom We Have Most Certain Knowledge. He Hath Been Declared And Enlightened By The Most Clear-seeing Men That Ever Were; The Testimonies We Have Of Him Are In Faithfulness And Sufficiency Most Admirable.

Courtesy Is A Science Of The Highest Importance. It Is...opening A Door That We May Derive Instruction From The Example Of Others, And At The Same Time Enabling Us To Benefit Them By Our Example, If There Be Anything In Our Character Worthy Of Imitation.

Eloquence Is An Engine Invented To Manage And Wield At Will The Fierce Democracy, And, Like Medicine To The Sick, Is Only Employed In The Paroxysms Of A Disordered State.

All Passions That Suffer Themselves To Be Relished And Digested Are But Moderate.

It Was Truly Very Good Reason That We Should Be Beholden To God Only, And To The Favour Of His Grace, For The Truth Of So Noble A Belief, Since From His Sole Bounty We Receive The Fruit Of Immortality, Which Consists In The Enjoyment Of Eternal Beatitude.... The More We Give And Confess To Owe And Render To God, We Do It With The Greater Christianity.

It Is For Little Souls, That Truckle Under The Weight Of Affairs, Not To Know How Clearly To Disengage Themselves, And Not To Know How To Lay Them Aside And Take Them Up Again.

Whatever The Benefits Of Fortune Are , They Yet Require A Palate Fit To Relish And Taste Them; 'tis Fruition, And Not Possession, That Renders Us Happy.

I Do Not Speak The Minds Of Others Except To Speak My Own Mind Better.

I Consider Myself An Average Man, Except In The Fact That I Consider Myself An Average Man.

Whenever A New Discovery Is Reported To The World, They Say First, It Is Probably Not True, Then After, When The Truth Of The New Proposition Has Been Demonstrated Beyond Question, They Say, Yes, It May Be True, But It Is Not Important. Finally, When Sufficient Time Has Elapsed To Fully Evidence Its Importance, They Say, Yes, Surely It Is Important, But It Is No Longer New.

There Is A Sort Of Gratification In Doing Good Which Makes Us Rejoice In Ourselves.

Wise Men Have More To Learn Of Fools Than Fools Of Wise Men.

Lend Yourself To Others, But Give Yourself To Yourself.

I Admire The Assurance And Confidence Everyone Has In Himself, Whereas There Is Hardly Anything I Am Sure I Know Or That I Dare Give My Word I Can Do.

There Is No Passion So Contagious As That Of Fear.

We Call Comeliness A Mischance In The First Respect, Which Belongs Principally To The Face.

Nature Is A Gentle Guide, But Not More Sweet And Gentle Than Prudent And Just.

Men Are Tormented By The Opinions They Have Of Things, And Not The Things Themselves.

The Ceaseless Labour Of Your Life Is To Build The House Of Death.

We Have More Poets Than Judges And Interpreters Of Poetry. It Is Easier To Write An Indifferent Poem Than To Understand A Good One. There Is, Indeed, A Certain Low And Moderate Sort Of Poetry, That A Man May Well Enough Judge By Certain Rules Of Art; But The True, Supreme, And Divine Poesy Is Equally Above All Rules And Reason. And Whoever Discerns The Beauty Of It With The Most Assured And Most Steady Sight Sees No More Than The Quick Reflection Of A Flash Of Lightning.

Learning Is Not To Be Tacked To The Mind, But We Must Fuse And Blend Them Together, Not Merely Giving The Mind A Slight Tincture, But A Thorough And Perfect Dye. And If We Perceive No Evident Change And Improvement, It Would Be Better To Leave It Alone; Learning Is A Dangerous Weapon, And Apt To Wound Its Master If It Be Wielded By A Feeble Hand, And By One Not Well Acquainted With Its Use.

I Had Rather Fashion My Mind Than Furnish It.

My Opinion Is That We Must Lend Ourselves To Others And Give Ourselves Only To Ourselves. If My Will Happened To Be Prone To Mortgage And Attach Itself, I Would Not Last: I Am Too Tender, Both By Nature And By Practice.

An Orator Of Past Times Declared That His Calling Was To Make Small Things Appear To Be Grand.

Cowardice Is The Mother Of Cruelty.

But Sure There Is Need Of Other Remedies Than Dreaming, A Weak Contention Of Art Against Nature.

It's Not Victory If It Doesn't End The War.

Perhaps It Is Not Without Reason That We Attribute Facility In Belief And Conviction To Simplicity And Ignorance; For It Seems To Me I Once Learned That Belief Was Sort Of An Impression Made On Our Mind, And That The Softer It Is The Less Resistant T.

We Seem Ambitious God's Whole Work To Undo. ...with New Diseases On Ourselves We War, And With New Physic, A Worse Engine Far.

I Speak The Truth, Not My Fill Of It, But As Much As I Dare Speak; And I Dare To Do So A Little More As I Grow Old.

Experience Stands On Its Own Dunghill In Medicine, And Reason Yields It Place. Medicine Has Always Professed Experience To Be The Touchstone Of Its Operations.

Obstinacy And Heat In Argument Are Surest Proofs Of Folly. Is There Anything So Stubborn, Obstinate, Disdainful, Contemplative, Grave, Or Serious, As An Ass?

Of The Opinions Of Philosophy I Most Gladly Embrace Those That Are Most Solid, That Is To Say, Most Human And Most Our Own; My Opinions, In Conformity With My Conduct, Are Low And Humble.

The Most Unhappy And Frail Creatures Are Men And Yet They Are The Proudest.

Marriage Is Like A Cage; One Sees The Birds Outside Desperate To Get In, And Those Inside Equally Desperate To Get Out.

A Man Must Either Imitate The Vicious Or Hate Them.

Happiness Involves Working Toward Meaningful Goals.

To Know How To Live Is My Trade And My Art.

How Many Worthy Men Have We Known To Survive Their Own Reputation, Who Have Seen And Suffered The Honor And Glory Most Justly Acquired In Their Youth, Extinguished In Their Own Presence?

Make Your Educational Laws Strict And Your Criminal Ones Can Be Gentle; But If You Leave Youth Its Liberty You Will Have To Dig Dungeons For Ages.

Nothing Else But An Insatiate Thirst Of Enjoying A Greedily Desired Object.

There Is No Wish More Natural Than The Wish To Know.

When We See A Man With Bad Shoes, We Say It Is No Wonder, If He Is A Shoemaker.

All Opinions In The World Agree In This, That Pleasure Is Our End, Although They Differ As To The Means Of Attaining It.

There Is Not Much Less Vexation In The Government Of A Private Family Than In The Managing Of An Entire State.

The Memory Represents To Us Not What We Choose But What It Pleases.

Laws Gain Their Authority From Actual Possession And Custom: It Is Perilous To Go Back To Their Origins; Laws, Like Our Rivers, Get Greater And Nobler As They Roll Along: Follow Them Back Upstream To Their Sources And All You Find Is A Tiny Spring, Hardly Recognizable; As Time Goes By It Swells With Pride And Grows In Strength.

Order A Purge For Your Brain, It Will There Be Much Better Employed Than Upon Your Stomach.

It Is Much More Easy To Accuse The One Sex Than To Excuse The Other.

I Write To Keep From Going Mad From The Contradictions I Find Among Mankind - And To Work Some Of Those Contradictions Out For Myself.

I Would Rather Be Old For A Shorter Time Than Be Old Before My Time.

Each Man Calls Barbarism Whatever Is Not His Own Practice; For Indeed It Seems We Have No Other Test Of Truth And Reason Than The Example And Pattern Of The Opinions And Customs Of The Country We Live In

My Trade And My Art Is Living. He Who Forbids Me To Speak About It According To My Sense, Experience, And Practice, Let Him Orderthe Architect To Speak Of Buildings Not According To Himself But According To His Neighbor; According To Another Man's Knowledge, Not According To His Own.

The World Is But A School Of Inquisition; It Is Not Who Shall Enter The Ring, But Who Shall Run The Best Courses.

A Little Of Everything And Nothing Thoroughly, After The French Fashion.

Tis So Much To Be A King, That He Only Is So By Being So.

Men ... Are Not Agreed About Any One Thing, Not Even That Heaven Is Over Our Heads.

Business In A Certain Sort Of Men Is A Mark Of Understanding, And They Are Honored For It. Their Souls Seek Repose In Agitation, As Children Do By Being Rocked In A Cradle. They May Pronounce Themselves As Serviceable To Their Friends As Troublesome To Themselves. No One Distributes His Money To Others, But Every One Therein Distributes His Time And His Life. There Is Nothing Of Which We Are So Prodigal As Of Those Two Things, Of Which To Be Thrifty Would Be Both Commendable And Useful.

We May So Seize On Virtue, That If We Embrace It With An Overgreedy And Violent Desire, It May Become Vicious.

No Man Is So Exquisitely Honest Or Upright In Living, But That Ten Times In His Life He Might Not Lawfully Be Hanged.

In True Education, Anything That Comes To Our Hand Is As Good As A Book: The Prank Of A Page- Boy, The Blunder Of A Servant, A Bit Of Table Talk - They Are All Part Of The Curriculum.

It Is Not Necessity But Abundance Which Produces Greed.

We Cannot Do Without It, And Yet We Disgrace And Vilify The Same. It May Be Compared To A Cage, The Birds Without Despair To Get In, And Those Within Despair To Get Out.

Water, Earth, Air, Fire, And The Other Parts Of This Structure Of Mine Are No More Instruments Of Your Life Than Instruments Of Your Death. Why Do You Fear Your Last Day? It Contributes No More To Your Death Than Each Of The Others. The Last Step Does Not Cause The Fatigue, But Reveals It. All Days Travel Toward Death, The Last One Reaches It.

The Pleasure We Hold In Esteem For The Course Of Our Lives Ought To Have A Greater Share Of Our Time Dedicated To It; We Should Refuse No Occasion Nor Omit Any Opportunity Of Drinking, And Always Have It In Our Minds.

Since Philosophy Is The Art Which Teaches Us How To Live, And Since Children Need To Learn It As Much As We Do At Other Ages, Why Do We Not Instruct Them In It?

Greatness Of Soul Consists Not So Much In Soaring High And In Pressing Forward, As In Knowing How To Adapt And Limit Oneself.

If I Were Of The Trade, I Should Naturalize Art As Much As They "artialize" Nature.

My Library Is My Kingdom, And Here I Try To Make My Rule Absolute-shutting Off This Single Nook From Wife, Daughter And Society. Elsewhere I Have Only A Verbal Authority, And Vague. Unhappy Is The Man, In My Opinion, Who Has No Spot At Home Where He Can Be At Home To Himself-to Court Himself And Hide Away.

A Hair Shirt Does Not Always Render Those Chaste Who Wear It.

He Who Would Teach Men To Die Would Teach Them To Live.

The Share We Have In The Knowledge Of Truth, Such As It Is, Has Not Been Acquired By Our Own Powers. God Has Taught Ushis Wonderful Secrets; Our Faith Is Not Of Our Acquiring, It Is Purely The Gift Of Another's Bounty.

Death Pays All Debts.

The Clatter Of Arms Drowns Out The Voice Of Law.

I Have Ever Loved To Repose Myself, Whether Sitting Or Lying, With My Heels As High Or Higher Than My Head.

We Are More Unhappy To See People Ahead Of Us Than Happy To See People Behind Us.

I Must Use These Great Men's Virtues As A Cloak For My Weakness.

Other Passions Have Objects To Flatter Them, And Seem To Content And Satisfy Them For A While; There Is Power In Ambition, Pleasure In Luxury, And Pelf In Covetousness; But Envy Can Gain Nothing But Vexation.

Travelling Through The World Produces A Marvellous Clarity In The Judgment Of Men. We Are All Of Us Confined And Enclosed Within Ourselves, And See No Farther Than The End Of Our Nose.

If You Want It To Be So, History Can Be A Waste Of Time; It Can Also Be, If You Want It To Be So, A Study Bearing Fruit Beyond Price.

Words Of Wisdom

I Am One Of Those Who Hold That Poetry Is Never So Blithe As In A Wanton And Irregular Subject.

Truly Man Is A Marvelously Vain, Diverse, And Undulating Object. It Is Hard To Found Any Constant And Uniform Judgment On Him.

A Lady Could Not Boast Of Her Chastity Who Was Never Tempted.

Those Sciences Which Govern The Morals Of Mankind, Such As Theology And Philosophy, Make Everything Their Concern: No Activity Is So Private Or So Secret As To Escape Their Attention Or Their Jurisdiction.

Even From Their Infancy We Frame Them To The Sports Of Love: Their Instruction, Behavior, Attire, Grace, Learning And All Their Words Azimuth Only At Love, Respects Only Affection. Their Nurses And Their Keepers Imprint No Other Thing In Them.

Hath God Obliged Himself Not To Exceed The Bounds Of Our Knowledge?

Intemperance Is The Plaque Of Sensuality, And Temperance Is Not Its Bane But Its Seasoning.

Example Is A Bright Looking-glass, Universal And For All Shapes To Look Into.

Oh, A Friend! How True Is That Old Saying, That The Enjoyment Of One Is Sweeter And More Necessary Than That Of The Elements Of Water And Fire!

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.

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.

And Therefore, Reader, I Myself Am The Subject Of My Book: It Is Not Reasonable That You Should Employ Your Leisure On A Topic So Frivolous And So Vain. Therefore, Farewell.

For Table-talk, I Prefer The Pleasant And Witty Before The Learned And The Grave; In Bed, Beauty Before Goodness.

A Man Should Not So Much Respect What He Eats, As With Whom He Eats.

Adrian, The Emperor, Exclaimed Incessantly, When Dying, "that The Crowd Of Physicians Had Killed Him."

.. Since It Was True That Study, Even When Done Properly, Can Only Teach Us What Wisdom, Right Conduct And Determination Consist In, They Wanted To Put Their Children Directly In Touch With Actual Cases, Teaching Them Not By Hearsay But By Actively Assaying Them, Vigorously Molding And Forming Them Not Merely By Word And Precept But Chiefly By Deeds And Examples, So That Wisdom Should Not Be Something Which The Soul Knows But The Soul's Very Essence And Temperament, Not Something Acquired But A Natural Property.

After They Had Accustomed Themselves At Rome To The Spectacles Of The Slaughter Of Animals, They Proceeded To Those Of The Slaughter Of Men, To The Gladiators.

A Wise Man Sees As Much As He Ought, Not As Much As He Can.

Fortune, To Show Us Her Power In All Things, And To Abate Our Presumption, Seeing She Could Not Make Fools Wise, Has Made Them Fortunate.

Man Is Forming Thousands Of Ridiculous Relations Between Himself And God.

Books Are Pleasant, But If By Being Over-studious We Impair Our Health And Spoil Our Good Humour, Two Of The Best Things We Have, Let Us Give It Over. I, For My Part, Am One Of Those Who Think No Fruit Derived From Them Can Recompense So Great A Loss.

Scratching Is One Of Nature's Sweetest Gratifications, And Nearest At Hand.

Whatever Can Be Done Another Day Can Be Done Today.

Might I Have Had My Own Will, I Would Not Have Married Wisdom Herself, If She Would Have Had Me.

Every Day I Hear Stupid People Say Things That Are Not Stupid.

An Untempted Woman Cannot Boast Of Her Chastity.

The Archer Who Overshoots His Mark Does No Better Than He Who Falls Short Of It.

The Beginnings Of All Things Are Weak And Tender. We Must Therefore Be Clear-sighted In The Beginnings, For, As In Their Budding We Discern Not The Danger, So In Their Full Growth We Perceive Not The Remedy.

I Consider It Equal Injustice To Set Our Heart Against Natural Pleasures And To Set Our Heart Too Much On Them. We Should Neither Pursue Them, Nor Flee Them; We Should Accept Them.

Only He Can Judge Of Matters Great And High Whose Soul Is Likewise.

The Premeditation Of Death Is The Premeditation Of Liberty; He Who Has Learnt To Die Has Forgot To Serve.

~the Value Of Life Lies Not In The Length Of Days, But In The Use We Make Of Them ~

Satisfaction In Life

I Never Met A Man Who Thought His Thinking Was Faulty.

Indeed, There Is No Such Thing As An Altogether Ugly Woman — Or Altogether Beautiful.

Vexations May Be Petty, But They Are Vexations Still.

Poverty Of Goods Is Easily Cured; Poverty Of Soul, Impossible.

Seeing That The Senses Cannot Decide Our Dispute, Being Themselves Full Of Uncertainty, We Must Have Recourse To Reason; There Is No Reason But Must Be Built Upon Another Reason: So Here We Are Retreating Backwards To Infinity.

Sometimes It Is A Good Choice Not To Choose At All.

A Man Must Keep A Little Back Shop Where He Can Be Himself Without Reserve. In Solitude Alone Can He Know True Freedom.

The Most Useful And Honorable Science And Occupation For A Woman Is The Science Of Housekeeping. I Know Some That Are Miserly, Very Few That Are Good Managers.

Getting Married Is Very Much Like Going To A Restaurant With Friends. You Order What You Want Then When You See What The Other Person Has, You Wish You Had Ordered That.

Whatever Is Preached To Us, And Whatever We Learn, We Should Still Remember That It Is Man That Gives, And Man That Receives; It Is A Mortal Hand That Presents It To Us, It Is A Mortal Hand That Accepts It.

In My Opinion, The Most Fruitful And Natural Play Of The Mind Is Conversation. I Find It Sweeter Than Any Other Action In Life; And If I Were Forced To Choose, I Think I Would Rather Lose My Sight Than My Hearing And Voice. The Study Of Books Is A Drowsy And Feeble Exercise Which Does Not Warm You Up.

My Reason Is Not Framed To Bend Or Stoop: My Knees Are.

The Most Fruitful And Natural Exercise For Our Minds Is, In My Opinion, Conversation.

My Home...it Is My Retreat And Resting Place From Wars, I Try To Keep This Corner As A Haven Against The Tempest Outside, As I Do Another Corner In My Soul.

Marriage Can Be Compared To A Cage: Birds Outside It Despair To Enter, And Birds Within, To Escape.

There Is No More Expensive Thing Than A Free Gift.

The Recognition Of Virtue Is Not Less Valuable From The Lips Of The Man Who Hates It, Since Truth Forces Him To Acknowledge It; And Though He May Be Unwilling To Take It Into His Inmost Soul, He At Least Decks Himself Out In Its Trappings.

The Shortest Way To Arrive At Glory Should Be To Do That For Conscience Which We Do For Glory. And The Virtue Of Alexander Appears To Me With Much Less Vigor In His Theater Than That Of Socrates In His Mean And Obscure. I Can Easily Conceive Socrates In The Place Of Alexander, But Alexander In That Of Socrates I Cannot.

'as A Man Who Knows How To Make His Education Into A Rule Of Life Not A Means Of Showing Off; Who Can Control Himself And Obey His Own Principles.' The True Mirror Of Our Discourse Is The Course Of Our Lives.

A Well-bred Man Is Always Sociable And Complaisant.

Now There Cannot Be First Principles For Men, Unless The Divinity Has Revealed Them; All The Rest--beginning, Middle, And End--isnothing But Dreams And Smoke.

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.

Philosophical Discussions Habitually Make Men Happy And Joyful Not Frowning And Sad.

Words Of Wisdom

It Is Indeed The Boundary Of Life, Beyond Which We Are Not To Pass; Which The Law Of Nature Has Pitched For A Limit Not To Be Exceeded.

A Man Must Become Wise At His Own Expense.

True It Is That She Who Escapeth Safe And Unpolluted From Out The School Of Freedom, Giveth More Confidence Of Herself Than She Who Comet Sound Out Of The School Of Severity And Restraint.

Self Confidence

Few Men Have Been Admired Of Their Familiars.

A Learned Man Is Not Learned In All Things; But A Sufficient Man Is Sufficient Throughout, Even To Ignorance Itself.

A Man Should Keep For Himself A Little Back Shop, All His Own, Quite Unadulterated, In Which He Establishes His True Freedom And Chief Place Of Seclusion And Solitude.

There Is Perhaps No More Obvious Vanity Than To Write Of It So Vainly.

The Only Good Histories Are Those Written By Those Who Had Command In The Events They Describe.

Most Men Are Rich In Borrowed Sufficiency: A Man May Very Well Say A Good Thing, Give A Good Answer, Cite A Good Sentence, Without At All Seeing The Force Of Either The One Or The Other.

Honesty Is A Question Of Right And Wrong, Not A Matter Of Policy

We Are Nearer Neighbours To Ourselves Than Whiteness To Snow, Or Weight To Stones.

In My Opinion It Is The Happy Living, And Not, As Antisthenes Said, The Happy Lying, In Which Human Happiness Consists.

The Day Of Your Birth Leads You To Death As Well As To Life.

The Finest Souls Are Those That Have The Most Variety And Suppleness.

There Is Little Less Trouble In Governing A Private Family Than A Whole Kingdom.

And I Loathe People Who Find It Harder To Put Up With A Gown Askew Than With A Soul Askew And Who Judge A Man By His Bow, His Bearing And His Boots.

The Laws Of Conscience, Though We Ascribe Them To Nature, Actually Come From Custom.

All We Do Is To Look After The Opinions And Learning Of Others: We Ought To Make Them Our Own.

Other People Do Not See You At All, But Guess At You By Uncertain Conjectures.

Rash And Incessant Scolding Runs Into Custom And Renders Itself Despised.

Old Age Is A Lease Nature Only Signs As A Particular Favor, And It May Be, To One, Only In The Space Of Two Or Three Ages; And Then With A Pass To Boot, To Carry Him Through, All The Traverses And Difficulties She Has Strewed In The Way Of His Long Career.

Why Do People Respect The Package Rather Than The Man?

The Smallest Annoyances, Disturb Us The Most.

The Daughter-in-law Of Pythagoras Said That A Woman Who Goes To Bed With A Man Ought To Lay Aside Her Modesty With Her Skirt, And Put It On Again With Her Petticoat

Intoxication Is Calculated To Put Heart Into The Elderly And Give Them Delight In Dancing.

In Love, 'tis No Other Than Frantic Desire For That Which Flies From Us.

It Needs Good Management To Enjoy Life. I Enjoy It Twice As Much As Others, For The Measure Of Enjoyment Depends On The Greater Or Less Attention That We Give To It...the Shorter My Possession Of Life The Deeper And Fuller I Must Make It.

The Pleasantest Things In The World Are Pleasant Thoughts, And The Great Art Of Life Is To Have As Many Of Them As Possible.

Inspirational Life

Nature Has With A Motherly Tenderness Observed This, That The Action She Has Enjoyned Us For Our Necessity Should Be Also Pleasant To Us, And Invites Us To Them, Not Only By Reason, But Also By Appetite: And tis Injustice To Infringe Her Laws.

In Truth, Knowledge Is A Great And Very Useful Quality; Those Who Despise It Give Evidence Enough Of Their Stupidity. Yet I Do Not Set Its Value At That Extreme Measure That Some Attribute To It.

Every Man Bears The Whole Stamp Of The Human Condition.

Men Of Simple Understanding, Little Inquisitive And Little Instructed, Make Good Christians.

Glory Consists Of Two Parts: The One In Setting Too Great A Value Upon Ourselves, And The Other In Setting Too Little A Value Upon Others.

To Behave Rightly, We Ourselves Should Never Lay A Hand On Our Servants As Long As Our Anger Lasts. Things Will Seem Different To Us When We Have Quieted And Cooled Down.

I Would Like To Suggest That Our Minds Are Swamped By Too Much Study And By Too Much Matter Just As Plants Are Swamped By Too Much Water Or Lamps By Too Much Oil; That Our Minds, Held Fast And Encumbered By So Many Diverse Preoccupations, May Well Lose The Means Of Struggling Free, Remaining Bowed And Bent Under The Load; Except That It Is Quite Otherwise: The More Our Souls Are Filled, The More They Expand; Examples Drawn From Far-off Times Show, On The Contrary, That Great Soldiers Ad Statesmen Were Also Great Scholars.

He Was Doubtless An Understanding Fellow That Said, There Was No Happy Marriage But Betwixt A Blind Wife And A Deaf Husband.

It Is Not A Mind, It Is Not A Body That We Educate, But It Is A Man, And We Must Not Make Two Parts Of Him.

It Is Very Easy To Accuse A Government Of Imperfection, For All Mortal Things Are Full Of It.

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