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Lean toward doubt
“And I follow Saint Augustine’s opinion, that it is better to lean toward doubt than toward assurance in things difficult to prove and dangerous to believe.” III.II “Of cripples” (p. 961)
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All the abuses in the world
“[A]ll the abuses in the world are engendered, by our being taught to be afraid of professing our ignorance and our being bound to accept everything that we cannot refute.” III.2 Of cripples (p. 959)
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No End to Research
“It is only personal weakness that makes us content with what others orourselves have found out in this hunt for knowledge. An abler man will not rest content with it. There is always room for a successor, yes, and for ourselves, and a road in another direction. There is no end to our researches; our…
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School of stupidity
“Isn’t that what we say, that the stupidity and lack of apprehension of the vulgar gives them this endurance of present troubles and this profound nonchalance about sinister accidents to come, that their souls, because they are thick and obtuse, are less penetrable and unstable? For Heaven’s sake, if that is so, let us henceforth…
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Speech belongs half to the speaker
“Speech belongs half to the speaker, half to the listener. The latter must prepare to receive it according to the motion it takes. As among tennis players, the receiver moves and makes ready according to the motion of the striker and the nature of the stroke.” III.13 “Of experience” (p.1016)
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Opinions
“There is nothing on which men are commonly more intent than on making a way for their opinions.” Of Cripples. 957
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Children
“Children are numbered among the things that we have no great reason to desire, especially at this time when it would be so hard to make them good.” III.9 “Of vanity” (p. 929) I wonder what Montaigne would think if he saw what it was like to raise children today, in our world.
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Courage and fear
“Fear sometimes arises from want of judgment as well as from want of courage. All the dangers I have seen, I have seen with open eyes, with my sight free, sound, and entire; besides, it takes courage to be afraid.” III.6 “Of coaches” (p. 832)
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Cure for ignorance
“Anyone who wants to be cured of ignorance must confess it.” III.11 Of cripples (p. 959)
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The goal of our career is death
“The goal of our career is death. It is the necessary object of our aim. If it frightens us, how is it possible to go forward without feverishness? The remedy of the common herd is not to think about it. But from what brutish stupidity can come so gross a blindness!” I.20 “That to philosophize…