Famous Michel de Montaigne Quotes Explained
Michel de Montaigne was a French Renaissance philosopher and the inventor of the modern essay. Montaigne invented the modern essay as a form of philosophy: short, personal, undogmatic. Below are eight of the most-quoted lines from the <em>Essais</em> (1580–88).
“The thing I fear most is fear.”
C'est ce de quoi j'ai le plus de peur que la peur.
What it means
From the Essais, Book I, chapter 18, "Of Fear." Montaigne treats fear as recursive: the most damaging effects of fear are produced not by the dangers it warns of but by the disturbance fear itself produces in the soul. The line is the source of the more famous Roosevelt formulation.
Attributed to Michel de Montaigne:
“He who fears he shall suffer, already suffers what he fears.”
What it means
From the Essais, Book III, chapter 13. Montaigne is echoing the Stoic observation that anticipated suffering is already a form of suffering; the imagination, in attempting to prepare for misfortune, brings the misfortune forward into the present.
“Nothing is so firmly believed as that which we least know.”
... il n'est rien creu si fermement que ce qu'on sçait le moins, ...
What it means
From the Essais, Book I, chapter 32. Montaigne is a careful sceptic about certainty: the loudest convictions, in his observation, tend to attach to the topics where evidence is weakest, because confidence is doing the work that evidence cannot.
“Lend yourself to others, but give yourself to yourself.”
Ch. 10. Of Managing the Will
What it means
From the Essais, Book III, chapter 10, "Of Husbanding Your Will." Montaigne's advice on civic life is to keep the engaged portion of oneself separate from the inward core that one preserves intact; obligations to others should not consume the relationship one has to oneself.
“On the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.”
Si, avons nous beau monter sur des échasses, car sur des échasses encore faut-il marcher de nos jambes. Et au plus élevé trône du monde, si ne sommes assis que sur notre cul.
What it means
From the Essais, Book III, chapter 13. The line is Montaigne's deflationary observation about power and rank: high office does not change the embodied human being who occupies it, and the philosopher should remember this when assessing both monarchs and himself.
“All passions that suffer themselves to be relished and digested are but moderate.”
Ch. 2. Of Sorrow (tr. Cotton, rev. W. Hazlitt, 1842)
What it means
From the Essais, Book I, chapter 2, "Of Sorrow." Montaigne argues that emotion intense enough to permit reflection is, by definition, not at its most intense; truly overwhelming passion bypasses the capacity that would be required to describe it.
“The laws of conscience, which we pretend to be derived from nature, proceed from custom.”
Book I | Ch. 22. Of Custom (tr. Cotton, rev. W. Hazlitt, 1842)
What it means
From the Essais, Book I, chapter 23, "Of Custom." Montaigne is anticipating a sociological view of morals: what we take to be natural law in our own society is often the local custom we have stopped noticing. The point is sceptical without being nihilistic.
“It is not without good reason said, that he who has not a good memory should never take upon him the trade of lying.”
Book I | Ch. 9. Of Liars (tr. Cotton, rev. W. Hazlitt, 1842)
What it means
From the Essais, Book I, chapter 9, "Of Liars." Montaigne's wry observation is that sustained lying is a feat of memory, since the liar must keep his fabrications consistent across audiences; the careless memory will betray itself before the truth ever does.