“ To forbid us anything is to make us have a mind to’t ”
Michel de Montaigne, The Essays of Michel de Montaigne (1580). copy citation
| Author | Michel de Montaigne |
|---|---|
| Source | The Essays of Michel de Montaigne |
| Topic | censorship encouragement forbidding |
| Date | 1580 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Charles Cotton |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/files/3600/3600-h/3600-h.htm |
Context
“Our appetite contemns and passes by what it has in possession, to run after that it has not:
«Transvolat in medio posita, et fugientia captat.» [«He slights her who is close at hand, and runs after her who flees from him.» —Horace, Sat., i. 2, 108.]
To forbid us anything is to make us have a mind to't: «Nisi to servare puellam Incipis, incipiet desinere esse mea:» [«Unless you begin to guard your mistress, she will soon begin to be no longer mine.» —Ovid, Amoy., ii. 19, 47.]
to give it wholly up to us is to beget in us contempt.” source
«Transvolat in medio posita, et fugientia captat.» [«He slights her who is close at hand, and runs after her who flees from him.» —Horace, Sat., i. 2, 108.]
To forbid us anything is to make us have a mind to't: «Nisi to servare puellam Incipis, incipiet desinere esse mea:» [«Unless you begin to guard your mistress, she will soon begin to be no longer mine.» —Ovid, Amoy., ii. 19, 47.]
to give it wholly up to us is to beget in us contempt.” source
Meaning and analysis
