Michel de Montaigne

“ Beauty is the true
prerogative of women, and so peculiarly their own, that ours, though
naturally requiring another sort of feature, is never in its lustre but
when youthful and beardless, a sort of confused image of theirs. 'Tis
said that such as serve the Grand Signior upon the account of beauty, who
are an infinite number, are, at the latest, dismissed at two-and-twenty
years of age. Reason, prudence, and the offices of friendship are better
found amongst men, and therefore it is that they govern the affairs of
the world. ”

“ You must let yourself down to those with whom you converse; and sometimes
affect ignorance: lay aside power and subtilty in common conversation; to
preserve decorum and order 'tis enough-nay, crawl on the earth, if they
so desire it.
The learned often stumble at this stone; they will always be parading
their pedantic science, and strew their books everywhere ”

“ Meditation is a powerful and full study to such as can effectually taste
and employ themselves; I had rather fashion my soul than furnish it.
There is no employment, either more weak or more strong, than that of
entertaining a man's own thoughts, according as the soul is; the greatest
men make it their whole business,
"Quibus vivere est cogitare;" ”

“ They who have made Venus a goddess have taken notice that her principal
beauty was incorporeal and spiritual; but the Venus whom these people
hunt after is not so much as human, nor indeed brutal; the very beasts
will not accept it so gross and so earthly; we see that imagination and
desire often heat and incite them before the body does ”

“ A vain and prodigal humour I had
after this sort of furniture, not only for the supplying my own need,
but, moreover, for ornament and outward show, I have since quite cured
myself of.
Books have many charming qualities to such as know how to choose them;
but every good has its ill; 'tis a pleasure that is not pure and clean,
no more than others: it has its inconveniences, and great ones too. ”

“ Thus, as the Lacedaemonian valour stood in need of moderation, and of the
sweet and harmonious sound of flutes to soften it in battle, lest they
should precipitate themselves into temerity and fury, whereas all other
nations commonly make use of harsh and shrill sounds, and of loud and
imperious cries, to incite and heat the soldier's courage to the last
degree; so, methinks, contrary to the usual method, in the practice of
our minds, we have for the most part more need of lead than of wings ”

“ He who has nothing to do but only to discharge his body of a
natural necessity, need not trouble others with so curious preparations:
it is not meat for a gross, coarse appetite.
As one who does not desire that men should think me better than I am,
I will here say this as to the errors of my youth. ”

“ For it is certain that from such a practice, they who set it on
foot can expect no fruit that can please or satisfy a noble soul. A man
must have, in good earnest, desired that which he, in good earnest,
expects to have a pleasure in enjoying ”

“ Most men's minds require foreign matter to
exercise and enliven them; mine has rather need of it to sit still and
repose itself,
"Vitia otii negotio discutienda sunt,"
["The vices of sloth are to be shaken off by business."
—Seneca, Ep. 56.]
for its chiefest and hardest study is to study itself. Books are to it
a sort of employment that debauch it from its study. ”