Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15
1580
Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15
1580
Translated by Charles Cotton
In 1572, a French nobleman abandoned public life to read in his library and think. What he produced there changed literature forever: the personal essay, a form that bears his name. Montaigne wrote to discover what he thought by writing it down, and in doing so, he revealed the contradictions, fears, and small pleasures that make us human. He reflects on friendship, mortality, religion, and the violence of his era with a questioning honesty that feels startlingly contemporary. Montaigne offers no certainties, only the inexhaustible pleasure of watching a curious mind work. Five centuries later, he reads less like a philosopher and more like a brilliant friend talking late into the night about what matters.
Editions
X-Ray
“On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“I quote others only in order the better to express myself.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“When I am attacked by gloomy thoughts, nothing helps me so much as running to my books. They quickly absorb me and banish the clouds from my mind.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“If I speak of myself in different ways, that is because I look at myself in different ways.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“Learned we may be with another man's learning: we can only be wise with wisdom of our own.””
— Michel de Montaigne
“I am afraid that our eyes are bigger than our stomachs, and that we have more curiosity than understanding. We grasp at everything, but catch nothing except wind.””
— Michel de Montaigne
Link to this book
Add a free, dofollow link to Lex on your blog, forum, syllabus, or reading list.
<a href="https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3"><img src="https://lex-books.com/badges/read-on-lex.svg" alt="Read Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15 by Michel de Montaigne free on Lex" width="160" height="40"></a>[](https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3)[url=https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3][img]https://lex-books.com/badges/read-on-lex.svg[/img][/url]Read Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15 by Michel de Montaigne free on Lex: https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3Cite this book
Reading this edition for a paper or guide? Copy a citation.
Montaigne, Michel de. Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15. Lex, lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3.Montaigne, M. D. (1580). Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3Montaigne, Michel de. Essays of Michel De Montaigne — Volume 15. Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/essays-of-michel-de-montaigne-volume-15-287e070b-6af4-40db-8201-cd1c84dcb4c3.
