Michel de Montaigne

“ Verily the daily care and continuall charges of our fathers aymeth at nothing so much as to store our heads with knowledge and-learning; as for judgement and virtue, that is never spoken of. If a man passe by, crie out to our people: Oh what a wise man goeth yonder! And of another: Oh what a good man is yonder! he will not faile to cast his eyes and respect toward the former. A third crier were needfull, to say, Oh what blocke-heads are those! We are ever readie to aske, Hath he any skill in the Greeke and Latine tongue? can he write well? ”

“ So they, if at any time they have been put to the triall of any action, they have been seen to flie so high a pitch, and with so lofty a flight, that men might apparently see their minds and spirits were through the intelligence of things become wonderfully rich and great. ”

“ Learning nought worth doth lie, Be not discretion by. Whereto serveth learning, if understanding be not joined to it? Oh would to God, that for the good of our justice, the societies of lawyers were as well stored with judgement, discretion and conscience, as they are with learning and wit. Non vitæ, sed scholæ discimus: (SEN. Epist. cvi. f.) We learne not for our life, but for the schoole. It is not enough to joyne learning and knowledge to the minde, it should be incorporated into it: it must not be inckled, but dyed with it ”

“ We may imagine that Lucullus, whom learning made and framed so great a captaine without experience, would have taken it after our manner? We relie so much upon other mens armes, that we disanull our owne strength. Will I arme my selfe against the fear of death? it is at Seneca's cost: will I draw comfort either for my selfe, or any other? I borrow the same of Cicero. I would have taken it in my selfe, had I been exercised unto it: I love not this relative and begd-for sufficiencie. Suppose we may be learned by other mens learning. Sure I am we can never be wise but by our owne wisdome. ”

“ I find Rome to have beene most valiant when it was least learned. The most warlike nations of our daies are the rudest and most ignorant. The Scithians, the Parthians and Tamburlane, serve to verifie my saying. When the Gothes over-ran and ravaged Greece; that which saved all their Libraries from the fire was, that one among them scattered this opinion, that such trash of bookes and papers must be untoucht and whole for their enemies, as the only meane and proper instrument to divert them from all militarie exercises, and ammuse them to idle, secure, and sedentarie occupations. ”

“ And I naturally hate our people, that will more hardly endure a long robe uncuriously worne, than a crosse skittish mind: and that observe what leg, or reverence he makes, note his garbe or demeanor, view his boots or his hat, and marke what manner of man he is. ”

“ Nature, to shew that nothing is savage in whatsoever she produceth, causeth oftentimes, even in rudest and most unarted nations, productions of spirits to arise, that confront and wrestle with the most artist productions. ”

“ It is a thing worthy great consideration, that in that excellent, and as I may terme it, matchlesse policie of Lycurgus, and in truth, by reason of her perfection, monstrous, yet notwithstanding, so carefull for the education of children, as of her principall charge, and even in the Muses bosome and resting-place, there is so little mention made of learning: as if that generous youth disdaining all other yokes but of vertue, ought only to be furnished, in liew of tutors of learning, with masters of valour, of justice, of wisdome, and of temperance. ”

“ For it is not in her power to give light unto the mind, that hath none, nor to make a blind man to see. The mysterie of it is not to affoord him sight, but to direct it for him, to addresse his goings, alwaies provided he have feet of his owne, and good, strait, and capable legs. Knowledge is an excellent drug, but no drug is sufficiently strong to preserve it selfe without alteration or corruption, according to the fault of the vessell that contained it. Some man hath a cleare sight, that is not right-sighted, and by consequence seeth what good is, and doth not follow it ”

“ The chiefest ordinance of Plato in his Commonwealth is to give unto his Citizens their charge according to their nature. Nature can doe all, and doth all. The crookt backt, or deformed, are unfit for any exercise of the bodie, and crooked and mis-shapen minds unproper for exercises of the minde. The bastard and vulgar sort are unworthy of Philosophie. When we see a man ill shod, if he chance to be a Shoomaker, wee say it is no wonder, for commonly none goes worse shod than they. ”

“ Esteeme you any man for possessing two hundred acres of land? They scoffe at him, as men accustomed to embrace all the world as their possession. Do you boast of your Nobilitie, because you can blazon your descent of seven or eight rich Grandafthers? ”

“ To this purpose, when Agesilaus was demanded what his opinion was, children should learne: he answered, What they should doe being men. It is no marvell, if such an institution have produced so admirable effects. ”

“ Wee take the opinions and knowledge of others into our protection, and that is all; I tell you they must be enfeoffed in us, and made our owne. Wee may verie well be compared unto him, who having need of fire, should goe fetch some at his neighbours chimney, where finding a good fire, should there stay to warme himselfe, forgetting to carrie some home. What availes it us to have our bellies full of meat, if it be not digested? ”

“ For wee must not only purchase wisdome, but enjoy and employ the same. Dionysius scoffeth at those Gramarians, who ploddingly labour to know the miseries of Ulysses, and are ignorant of their owne; mocketh those musitians that so attentively tune their instruments, and never accord their manners; derideth those orators that study to speake of justice, and never put it in execution. Except our mind be the better, unless our judgement be the sounder, I had rather my scholler had imployed his time in playing at tennis ”

“ I might say, that as plants are choked by over-much moisture, and lampe dammed with too much oyle, so are the actions of the mind over-whelmed by over-abundance of matter and studie: which occupied and intangled with so great a diversitie of things, loseth the meane to spread and cleare it selfe and that surcharge keepeth it low-drooping, and faint. ”

“ I hate men that are fooles in working, and Philosophers in speaking. As for those Philosophers, I say, that as they were great in knowledge, so were they greater in all action. And even as they report of that Syracusan Geometrician, who being taken from his bookish contemplation to shew some practice of his sk ill, for the defence of his countrie reared sodainly certaine terror-moving engines, and shewed effects farre exceeding all mens conceit, himselfe notwithstanding disdaining all this his handieworke, supposing he had thereby corrupted the dignitie of his art ”

“ You noble blouds, who with a noddle blind Should live, meet with the mocke that's made behind. Whosoever shall narrowly looke into this kind of people, which far and wide hath spred it selfe, he shall find (as I have done) that for the most part they neither understand themselves nor others, and that their memorie is many times sufficiently full fraught, but their judgment ever hollow and emptie: except their natural inclination have of it selfe otherwise fashioned them. ”

“ See but one of these our universitie men or bookish schollers returne from schole, after he hath there spent ten or twelve years under a pedants charge: who is so inapt for any matter? who so unfit for any companie? who so to seeke if he come into the world? all the advantage you discover in him is that his Latine and Greeke have made him more sottish, more stupid, and more presumptuous, than before he went from home. ”

“ Which done, Socrates forcing him particularly to allow the excellencie of their forme of publike government, the happinesse and vertue of their private life, remits unto him to guesse the conclusion of the unprofitablenesse of his arts.. Examples teach us both in this martiall policie, and in all such like, that the studie of sciences donth more weaken and effeminate mens minds than corroborate and adapt them to warre. The mightiest, yea the best setled estate, that is now in the world, is that of the Turkes, a nation equally instructed to the esteem e of armes, and disesteeme of letters. ”

“ These masters, as Plato speaketh of sophisters (their cosin Germanes) of all men, are those that promise to be most profitable unto men, and alone, amongst all, that not only amend not what is committed to their charge as doth a carpenter or a mason, but empaire and destroy the same, and yet they must full dearely be paied. ”

“ Note but the plaine husbandman, or the unwilie shoemaker, and you see them simply and naturally plod on their course, speaking only of what they know, and no further; whereas these letter-puft pedants, because they would faine raise themselves aloft, and with their litterall doctrine which floteth up and downe the superficies of their braine, arme themselves beyond other men, they uncessantly intricate and entangle themselves: they utter loftie words, and speake golden sentences, but so that another man doth place, fit, and applie them. ”

“ You may blow long enough, but if once you stirre your fingers, you may go seeke Wee can talke and prate, Cicero saith thus, These are Platoes customes, These are the verie words of Aristotle; but what say we our selves? what doe we? what judge we? ”

“ As I have seene Adrianus Turnebus who having never professed any thing but studie and letters, wherein he was, in mine opinion, the worthiest man that lived these thousand yeares, and who notwithstanding had no pedanticall thing about him but the wearing of his gowne, and some externall fashions that could not well be reduced, and incivilized to the courtiers cut ”

“ To receive so many, so strange, yea and so great wits, it must needs follow (said once a Lady unto me, yea one of our chiefest Princesses, speaking of some body) that a man's owne wit, force, droops, and as it were diminishes it selfe, to make roome for others. ”

“ A pedant knowledge, I Detest out of all cry. Yet is this custome very ancient; for Plutarke saith, that Greeke and Scholer were amongst the Romans words of reproach and reputation. And coming afterwards to yeares of more discretion, I have found they had great reason, and that magis magnos clericos, non sunt magis magnas sapientes: 'The most great Clerkes are not the most wisest men.But whence it may proceed, that a minde rich in knowledge, and of so many things, becommeth thereby never livelier nor more quickesighted ”

“ They were envied as being beyond the common sort, as despising publike actions, as having proposed unto themselves a particular and inimitable life, aiming and directed at certam high discourses, and from the common use; these are disdained as men beyond the ordinary fashion, as incapable of publike charges, as leading an unsociable life, and professing base and abject customes, after the vulgar kind. ”

“ My Regent might long enough make me a prolixe and cunning Oration in genere demonstrativo, in the oratorie kind of praise or dispraise, before ever hee should perswade me his Schoole is worth that. They have gone about to make the way shorter: and since Sciences (even when they are right taken) can teach us nothing but wisdome, honestie, integritie, and resolution ”

“ But some perceiving the seat of politike government possessed by unworthy and incapable men, have withdrawne themselves from it. And hee who demanded of Crates, how long men should Philosophize, received this answer, Untill such time as they who have the conduct of our Armies be no longer blockish asses. ”

“ Others having their imagination placed yond fortune and the world, found the seat of justice, and the thrones of Kings, to be but base and vile. And Empedocles refused the royaltie which the Agrigentines offered him. Thales sometimes accusing the carke and care men tooke about good busbandry, and how to grow rich ”

“ And concerning Philosophers, retired from all publike negotiations, they have indeed sometimes been vilified by the comike libertie of their times, their opinions and demeanors yeelding them ridiculous. Will you make them Judges of the right of a processe, or of the actions of a man? They are readie for it. They enquire whether there be any life yet remaining, wheth er any motion. Whether man be any thing but an Oxe, what working or suffering is ”

“ That wise man I cannot abide, That for himselfe cannot provide. Ex quo Ennius: Nequidquam sapere sapientem, qui ipso ibi prodesse non quiret.Whereupon saith Ennius: That wise man is vainly wise, who could not profit himselfe. ”