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While Our Pulse Beats And We Feel Emotion, Let Us Put Off The Business. Things Will Truly Seem Different To Us When We Have Quieted And Cooled Down. It Is Passion That Is In Command At First, It Is Passion That Speaks, It Is Not We Ourselves.

-Michel De Montaigne

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While Our Pulse Beats

Michel De Montaigne

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While Our Pulse Beats And We Feel Emotion, Let Us Put Off The Business. Things Will Truly Seem Different To Us When We Have Quieted And Cooled Down. It Is Passion That Is In Command At First, It Is Passion That Speaks, It Is Not We Ourselves.

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There Is A Plague On Man, The Opinion That He Knows Something.

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.

As For Extraordinary Things, All The Provision In The World Would Not Suffice.

Extraordinary Things

Whatever I May Be, I Want To Be Elsewhere Than On Paper. My Art And My Industry Have Been Employed In Making Myself Good For Something; My Studies, In Teaching Me To Do, Not To Write. I Have Put All My Efforts Into Forming My Life. That Is My Trade And My Work.

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

Is There Anything So Grave And Serious As An Ass?

There Is Nothing So Noble And So Right As To Play Our Human Life Well And Fitly, Nor Anything So Difficult To Learn As How To Livethis Life Well And According To Nature.

Why Did I Love Her? Because It Was Her; Because It Was Me.

Covetousness Is Both The Beginning And The End Of The Devil's Alphabet - The First Vice In Corrupt Nature That Moves, And The Last Which Dies.

Now, Of All The Benefits That Virtue Confers Upon Us, The Contempt Of Death Is One Of The Greatest.

The Most Universal Quality Is Diversity.

It Is Setting A High Value Upon Our Opinions To Roast Men And Women Alive On Account Of Them.

He Whose Mouth Is Out Of Taste Says The Wine Is Flat.

To Die Is Not To Play A Part In Society; It Is The Act Of A Single Person. Let Us Live And Laugh Among Our Friends; Let Us Die And Sulk Among Strangers.

Confidence In Others' Honesty Is No Light Testimony Of One's Own Integrity.

What A Man Hates, He Takes Seriously.

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

Who So Hath His Mind On Taking, Hath It No More On What He Taketh.

To Say Less Of Yourself Than Is True Is Stupidity, Not Modesty. To Pay Yourself Less Than You Are Worth Is Cowardice And Pusillanimity.

Nothing Is So Firmly Believed As What We Least Know.

I Have Seen People Rude By Being Over-polite.

There Is No Pleasure To Me Without Communication: There Is Not So Much As A Sprightly Thought Comes Into My Mind That It Does Not Grieve Me To Have Produced Alone, And That I Have No One To Tell It To.

As Far As I Am Concerned, No Road That Would Lead Us To Health Is Either Arduous Or Expensive.

I Have Seen Books Made Of Things Neither Studied Nor Ever Understood ... The Author Contenting Himself For His Own Part, To Have Cast The Plot And Projected The Design Of It, And By His Industry To Have Bound Up The Fagot Of Unknown Provisions; At Least The Ink And Paper His Own. This May Be Said To Be A Buying Or Borrowing, And Not A Making Or Compiling Of A Book.

We Must Learn To Suffer What We Cannot Evade; Our Life, Like The Harmony Of The World, Is Composed Of Contrary Things, And One Part Is No Less Necessary Than The Other.

The Common Notions That We Find In Credit Around Us And Infused Into Our Souls By Our Fathers' Seed, These Seem To Be The Universal And Natural Ones. Whence It Comes To Pass That What Is Off The Hinges Of Custom, People Believe To Be Off The Hinges Of Reason.

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.

'tis The Sharpness Of Our Mind That Gives The Edge To Our Pains And Pleasures.

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

I Prefer The Company Of Peasants Because They Have Not Been Educated Sufficiently To Reason Incorrectly.

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

Every Period Of Life Has Its Peculiar Prejudices; Whoever Saw Old Age, That Did Not Applaud The Past, And Condemn The Present Times?

There Is No Knowledge So Hard To Acquire As The Knowledge Of How To Live This Life Well And Naturally.

We Must Not Attach Knowledge To The Mind, We Have To Incorporate It There.

Custom Is A Violent And Treacherous School Mistress. She, By Little And Lithe, Slyly And Unperceived, Slips In The Foot Of Her Authority; But Having By This Gentle And Humble Beginning, With The Benefit Of Time, Fixed And Established It, She Then Unmasks A Furious And Tyrannic Countenance, Against Which We Have No More The Courage Or The Power So Much As To Lift Up Our Eyes.

We Judge A Horse Not Only By Its Pace On A Racecourse, But Also By Its Walk, Nay, When Resting In Its Stable.

.. 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.

A Wellborn Mind That Is Practiced In Dealing With People Makes Itself Thoroughly Agreeable By Itself. Art Is Nothing Else But Thelist And Record Of The Productions Of Such Minds.

A Man Is Not Hurt So Much By What Happens, As By His Opinion Of What Happens.

I Want To Be Seen Here In My Simple, Natural, Ordinary Fashion, Without Straining Or Artifice; For It Is Myself That I Portray... I Am Myself The Matter Of My Book.

When Socrates, After Being Relieved Of His Irons, Felt The Relish Of The Itching That Their Weight Had Caused In His Legs, He Rejoiced To Consider The Close Alliance Between Pain And Pleasure.

Let Us Permit Nature To Have Her Way. She Understands Her Business Better Than We Do.

The World Is But A Perpetual See-saw.

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.

Oh These Foolish Men! They Could Not Create So Much As A Worm, But They Create Gods By The Dozens.

It Is An Injustice That An Old, Broken, Half-dead Father Should Enjoy Alone, In A Corner Of His Hearth, Possessions That Would Suffice For The Advancement And Maintenance Of Many Children.

To Know Much Is Often The Cause Of Doubting More.

I Do Not Understand; I Pause; I Examine.

In My Youth I Studied For Ostentation; Later, A Little To Gain Wisdom; Now, For Recreation; Never For Gain.

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

Princes Give Mee Sufficiently, If They Take Nothing From Me, And Doe Me Much Good, If They Doe Me No Hurt: It Is All I Require Of Them.

How Many Condemnations I Have Witnessed More Criminal Than The Crime!

No Profession Or Occupation Is More Pleasing Than The Military; A Profession Or Exercise Both Noble In Execution (for The Strongest, Most Generous And Proudest Of All Virtues Is True Valor) And Noble In Its Cause. No Utility Either More Just Or Universal Than The Protection Of The Repose Or Defense Of The Greatness Of One's Country. The Company And Daily Conversation Of So Many Noble, Young And Active Men Cannot But Be Well-pleasing To You.

Valor Is Stability, Not Of Legs And Arms, But Of Courage And The Soul.

Don't Discuss Yourself, For You Are Bound To Lose; If You Belittle Yourself, You Are Believed; If You Praise Yourself, You Are Disbelieved.

Nature Should Have Been Pleased To Have Made This Age Miserable, Without Making It Also Ridiculous.

I Set Forth A Humble And Inglorious Life; That Does Not Matter. You Can Tie Up All Moral Philosophy With A Common And Private Life Just As Well As With A Life Of Richer Stuff. Each Man Bears The Entire Form Of Man's Estate.

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

Lying Is A Terrible Vice, It Testifies That One Despises God, But Fears Men.

[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.

The Religion Of My Doctor Or My Lawyer Cannot Matter. That Consideration Has Nothing In Common With The Functions Of The Friendship They Owe Me.

We Have The Pleasures Suitable To Our Lot; Let Us Not Usurp Those Of Greatness. Ours Are More Natural And All The More Solid And Sure For Being Humbler. Since We Will Not Do So Out Of Conscience, At Least Out Of Ambition Let Us Reject Ambition.

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

All Other Knowledge Is Hurtful To Him Who Has Not Honesty And Good-nature

A Strong Memory Is Commonly Coupled With Infirm Judgment.

The Soul That Has No Established Aim Loses Itself

The Man Who Thinks He Knows Does Not Yet Know What Knowing Is

'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.

Obstinacy And Contention Are Common Qualities, Most Appearing In, And Best Becoming, A Mean And Illiterate Soul.

The Lack Of Wealth Is Easily Repaired But The Poverty Of The Soul Is Irreplaceable.

Any Person Of Honor Chooses Rather To Lose His Honor Than To Lose His Conscience.

A Man Must Learn To Endure Patiently What He Cannot Avoid Conveniently.

But As Nature Is The Best Guide, Teaching Must Be The Development Of Natural Inclinations, For Which Purpose The Teacher Must Watch His Pupil And Listen To Him, Not Continually Bawl Words Into His Ears As If Pouring Water Into A Funnel. Good Teaching Will Come From A Mind Well Made Rather Than Well Filled.

We Are All Patchwork, And So Shapeless And Diverse In Composition That Each Bit, Each Moment, Plays Its Own Game.

What A Wonderful Thing It Is That Drop Of Seed, From Which We Are Produced, Bears In Itself The Impressions, Not Only Of The Bodily Shape, But Of The Thoughts And Inclinations Of Our Fathers!

A Well-bred Man Is Always Sociable And Complaisant.

A Young Man Ought To Cross His Own Rules, To Awake His Vigor, And To Keep It From Growing Faint And Rusty. And There Is No Course Of Life So Weak And Sottish As That Which Is Carried On By Rule And Discipline.

Confidence In The Goodness Of Another Is Good Proof Of One's Own Goodness.

Life In Itself Is Neither Good Nor Evil, It Is The Place Of Good And Evil, According To What You Make It.

Law Of Attraction

It Is A Stupid Presumption To Go About Despising And Condemning As False Anything That Seems To Us Improbable; This Is A Common Fault In Those Who Think They Have More Intelligence Than The Crowd.

There Is No More Expensive Thing Than A Free Gift.

There Is Nothing Of Evil In Life For Him Who Rightly Comprehends That Death Is No Evil; To Know How To Die Delivers Us From All Subjection And Constraint.

The General Order Of Things That Takes Care Of Fleas And Moles Also Takes Care Of Men, If They Will Have The Same Patience That Fleas And Moles Have, To Leave It To Itself.

It Is In The Enjoyment And Not In Mere Possession That Makes For Happiness.

I Have Never Observed Other Effects Of Whipping Than To Render Boys More Cowardly, Or More Willfully Obstinate.

An Ancient Father Says That A Dog We Know Is Better Company Than A Man Whose Language We Do Not Understand.

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

In His Commerce With Men I Mean Him To Include- And That Principally- Those Who Live Only In The Memory Of Books. By Means Of History He Will Frequent Those Great Souls Of Former Years. 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.

My Business Is Only To Keep Myself In Motion, Whilst Motion Pleases Me; I Only Walk For The Walk's Sake.

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

There Is Not One Of Us That Would Not Be Worse Than Kings, If So Continually Corrupted As They Are With A Sort Of Vermin Called Flatterers.

Wonder Is The Foundation Of All Philosophy; Research, The Progress; Ignorance, The End. There Is, By Heavens, A Strong And Generous Kind Of Ignorance That Yields Nothing, For Honour And Courage, To Knowledge: An Ignorance To Conceive Which Needs No Less Knowledge Than To Conceive Knowledge.

All I Say Is By Way Of Discourse, And Nothing By Way Of Advice. I Should Not Speak So Boldly If It Were My Due To Be Believed.

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

O Human Creature,you Are The Investigator Without Knowledge, The Magistrate Without Jurisdiction, And All In All, The Fool Of The Farce.

Repentance Is No Other Than A Recanting Of The Will, And Opposition To Our Fancies, Which Lead Us Which Way They Please.

A Foreign War Is A Lot Milder Than A Civil War.

It Is The Part Of Cowardliness, And Not Of Virtue, To Seek To Squat Itself In Some Hollow Lurking Hole, Or To Hide Herself Under Some Massive Tomb, Thereby To Shun The Strokes Of Fortune.

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.

The Most Beautiful Lives, To My Mind, Are Those That Conform To The Common Human Pattern, With Order, But Without Miracle And Without Eccentricity.

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.

Lying Is A Disgraceful Vice, And One That Plutarch Paints In Most Disgraceful Colors, When He Says That It Is "affording Testimony That One First Despises God, And Then Fears Men." It Is Not Possible More Happily To Describe Its Horrible, Disgusting, And Abandoned Nature; For Can We Imagine Anything More Vile Than To Be Cowards With Regard To Men, And Brave With Regard To God.

Behold The Hands, How They Promise, Conjure, Appeal, Menace, Pray, Supplicate, Refuse, Beckon, Interrogate, Admire, Confess, Cringe, Instruct, Command, Mock And What Not Besides, With A Variation And Multiplication Of Variation Which Makes The Tongue Envious.

No-one Is Exempt From Speaking Nonsense – The Only Misfortune Is To Do It Solemnly.

As Far As Physicians Go, Chance Is More Valuable Than Knowledge.

Laws Are Maintained In Credit, Not Because They Are Essentially Just, But Because They Are Laws. It Is The Mystical Foundation Of Their Authority; They Have None Other.

It Is A Small Soul, Buried Beneath The Weight Of Affairs, That Does Not Know How To Get Clean Away From Them, That Cannot Put Them Aside And Pick Them Up Again.

Fear Sometimes Adds Wings To The Heels, And Sometimes Nails Them To The Ground, And Fetters Them From Moving.

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.

I Have Gathered A Posy Of Other Mens Flowers And Only The Thread That Bonds Them Is My Own.

I Was Not Long Since In A Company Where I Was Not Who Of My Fraternity Brought News Of A Kind Of Pills, By True Account, Composed Of A Hundred And Odd Several Ingredients; Whereat We Laughed Very Heartily, And Made Ourselves Good Sport; For What Rock So Hard Were Able To Resist The Shock Or Withstand The Force Of So Thick And Numerous A Battery?

If These Essays Were Worthy Of Being Judged, It Might Fall Out, In My Opinion, That They Would Not Find Much Favour, Either With Common And Vulgar Minds, Or With Uncommon And Eminent Ones: The Former Would Not Find Enough In Them, The Latter Would Find Too Much; They Might Manage To Live Somewhere In The Middle Region.

Whether The Events In Our Life Are Good Or Bad, Greatly Depends On The Way We Perceive Them.

Law Of Attraction

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

Every Man Has Within Himself The Entire Human Condition

Human Condition

When A Roman Was Returning From A Trip, He Used To Send Someone Ahead To Let His Wife Know, So As Not To Surprise Her In The Act.

If I Were A Maker Of Books I Should Compile A Register, With Comments, Of Different Deaths. He Who Should Teach People To Die, Would Teach Them To Live.

The Profit We Possess After Study Is To Have Become Better And Wiser.

Habit Is A Second Nature.

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.

And To Bring In A New Word By The Head And Shoulders, They Leave Out The Old One.

People Of Our Time Are So Formed For Agitation And Ostentation That Goodness, Moderation, Equability, Constancy, And Such Quiet And Obscure Qualities Are No Longer Felt.

Meditation Is A Rich And Powerful Method Of Study For Anyone Who Knows How To Examine His Mind.

Learning Is A Good Medicine: But No Medicine Is Powerful Enough To Preserve Itself From Taint And Corruption Independently Of Defects In The Jar That It Is Kept In. One Man Sees Clearly But Does Not See Straight: Consequently He Sees What Is Good But Fails To Follow It; He Sees Knowledge And Does Not Use It.

Kings And Philosophers Defecate, And So Do Ladies.

Laws Are Often Made By Fools, And Even More Often By Men Who Fail In Equity Because They Hate Equality: But Always By Men, Vain Authorities Who Can Resolve Nothing.

Friendship Is A Creature Formed For A Companionship Not For A Herd.

The Diversity Of Physical Arguments And Opinions Embraces All Sorts Of Methods.

"ultimately The Bond Of All Companionship, Whether In Marriage Or In Friendship, Is Conversation." -if You Press Me To Say Why I Loved Him, I Can Say No More Than It Was Because He Was He And I Was I.

Arts And Sciences Are Not Cast In A Mould, But Are Found And Perfected By Degrees, By Often Handling And Polishing.

There Are Truths On This Side Of The Pyrenees Which Are Falsehoods On The Other

Love Is Like Playing The Piano. First You Must Learn To Play By The Rules, Then You Must Forget The Rules And Play From Your Heart. If I Were Pressed To Say Why I Loved Him, I Feel That My Only Reply Could Be: Because It Was He, Because It Was I.

Ignorance Is The Softest Pillow On Which A Man Can Rest His Head.

It Is The Rule Of Rules, And The General Law Of All Laws, That Every Person Should Observe Those Of The Place Where He Is.

Men Do Not Know The Natural Infirmity Of Their Mind: It Does Nothing But Ferret And Quest, And Keeps Incessantly Whirling Around, Building Up And Becoming Entangled In Its Own Work, Like Silkworms, And Is Suffocated In It. A Mouse In A Pitch Barrel...thinks It Notices From A Distance Some Sort Of Glimmer Of Imaginary Light And Truth; But While Running Toward It, It Is Crossed By So Many Difficulties And Obstacles, And Diverted By So Many New Quests, That It Strays From The Road, Bewildered.

We Perceive No Charms That Are Not Sharpened, Puffed Out, And Inflated By Artifice. Those Which Glide Along Naturally And Simply Easily Escape A Sight So Gross As Ours.

I Have Here Only Made A Nosegay Of Culled Flowers, And Have Brought Nothing Of My Own But The Thread That Tied Them Together.

There Are No Truths, Only Moments Of Claryty Passing For Answers.

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

I Want Death To Find Me Planting My Cabbages, But Careless Of Death, And Still More Of My Unfinished Garden.

The First Lessons With Which We Should Irrigate His Mind Should Be Those Which Teach Him To Know Himself, And To Know How To Die ... And To Live.

The Customs And Practices Of Life In Society Sweep Us Along.

The Easy, Gentle, And Sloping Path . . . Is Not The Path Of True Virtue. It Demands A Rough And Thorny Road.

The Confidence In Another Man's Virtue Is No Light Evidence Of A Man's Own, And God Willingly Favors Such A Confidence.

It Is A Disaster That Wisdom Forbids You To Be Satisfied With Yourself And Always Sends You Away Dissatisfied And Fearful, Whereas Stubbornness And Foolhardiness Fill Their Hosts With Joy And Assurance.

He Who Falls Obstinate In His Courage, If He Falls He Fights From His Knees.

A Man Never Speaks Of Himself Without Losing Something. What He Says In His Disfavor Is Always Beleived, But When He Commends Himself, He Arouses Mistrust.

A Man Must Either Imitate The Vicious Or Hate Them.

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

Lay A Beam Between These Two Towers Of Such Width As We Need To Walk On: There Is No Philosophical Wisdom Of Such Great Firmness That It Can Give Us Courage To Walk On It As We Should If It Were On The Ground.

Virtue Can Have Naught To Do With Ease. . . . It Craves A Steep And Thorny Path.

If To Take Up Books Were To Take Them In, And If To See Them Were To Consider Them, And To Run Through Them Were To Grasp Them, I Should Be Wrong To Make Myself Out Quite As Ignorant As I Say I Am.

Let [children] Be Able To Do All Things, And Love To Do Only The Good.

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.

Though We May Be Learned By Another's Knowledge, We Can Never Be Wise But By Our Own Experience.

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

It Is Only Certain That There Is Nothing Certain, And That Nothing Is More Miserable Or More Proud Than Man.

Judgement Can Do Without Knowledge: But Not Knowledge Without Judgement.

The Soul Which Has No Fixed Purpose In Life Is Lost; To Be Everywhere, Is To Be Nowhere.

Lost Friendship

He Who Lives Not To Others, Lives Little To Himself.

It Makes Me Hate Accepting Things That Are Probable When They Are Held Up Before Me As Infallibly True. I Prefer These Words Which Tone Down And Modify The Hastiness Of Our Propositions: "perhaps, In Some Sort, Some, They Say, I Think," And The Like.

We Must Learn To Endure What We Cannot Avoid. Our Life Is Composed, Like The Harmony Of The World, Of Contrary Things, Also Of Different Tones, Sweet And Harsh, Sharp And Flat, Soft And Loud. If A Musician Liked Only One Kind, What Would He Have To Say?

We Must Learn To Suffer What We Cannot Evade.

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.

Since We Cannot Match It Let Us Take Our Revenge By Abusing It.

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

And Not To Serve For A Table-talk.

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.

There Is Nothing On Which Men Are Commonly More Intent Than On Making A Way For Their Opinions.

The Sage Says That All That Is Under Heaven Incurs The Same Law And The Same Fate.

Socrates Thought And So Do I That The Wisest Theory About The Gods Is No Theory At All.

Speech Belongs Half To The Speaker, Half To The Listener. The Latter Must Prepare To Receive It According To The Motion It Takes.

The Entire Lower World Was Created In The Likeness Of The Higher World. All That Exists In The Higher World Appears Like An Image In This Lower World; Yet All This Is But One.

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

Once Conform, Once Do What Others Do Because They Do It, And A Kind Of Lethargy Steals Over All The Finer Senses Of The Soul.

We Must Reserve A Back Shop All Our Own Entirely Free, In Which To Establish Our Real Liberty And Our Principal Retreat And Solitude.

The Continuous Work Of Our Life Is To Build Death.

I Enter Into Discussion And Argument With Great Freedom And Ease, Inasmuch As Opinion Finds Me In A Bad Soil To Penetrate And Take Deep Root In. No Propositions Astonish Me, No Belief Offends Me, Whatever Contrast It Offers To My Own. There Is No Fancy So Frivolous And So Extravagant That It Does Not Seem To Me Quite Suitable To The Production Of The Human Mind.

Speaking Is Half His That Speaks, And Half His That Hears.

The Strength Of Any Plan Depends On The Time. Circumstances And Things Eternally Shift And Change.

Amongst All Other Vices There Is None I Hate More Than Cruelty, Both By Nature And Judgment, As The Extremest Of All Vices.

The Concern That Some Women Show At The Absence Of Their Husbands, Does Not Arise From Their Not Seeing Them And Being With Them, But From Their Apprehension That Their Husbands Are Enjoying Pleasures In Which They Do Not Participate, And Which, From Their Being At A Distance, They Have Not The Power Of Interrupting.

How Often Our Involuntary Facial Motions Testify To The Thoughts We Were Keeping Secret, And Betray Us To Those Around!

Keeping Secrets

One Should Be Ever Booted And Spurred And Ready To Depart.

Death And Dying

Certainly, If He Still Has Himself, A Man Of Understanding Has Lost Nothing.

When I Express My Opinions It Is So As To Reveal The Measure Of My Sight Not The Measure Of The Thing.

Pleasure Itself Is Painful At The Bottom.

Don't Be Afraid To Say What You Are Not Afraid To Think

No Wonder, Said An Ancient, That Chance Has So Much Power Over Us, Since It Is By Chance That We Live.

Wisdom Has Its Excesses, And Has No Less Need Of Moderation Than Folly.

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.

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.

God Defend Me From Being An Honest Man According To The Description Which Every Day I See Made By Each Man To His Own Glorification

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

Nature Has Made Us A Present Of A Broad Capacity For Entertaining Ourselves Apart, And Often Calls Us To Do So, To Teach Us That We Owe Ourselves In Part To Society, But In The Best Part To Ourselves.

I Study Myself More Than Any Other Subject. That Is My Metaphysics, That Is My Physics.

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

Socrates, Who Was A Perfect Model In All Great Qualities, ... Hit On A Body And Face So Ugly And So Incongruous With The Beauty Of His Soul, He Who Was So Madly In Love With Beauty.

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

There Is, Nevertheless, A Certain Respect And A General Duty Of Humanity That Ties Us, Not Only To Beasts That Have Life And Sense, But Even To Trees And Plants.

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