item: #1 of 20 id: 3581 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 01 date: None words: 20761 flesch: 64 summary: On the Tuesday, however, M. de la Boetie summoned him to aid him, as he said, in discharging the last office of a Christian. M. de Belot called in the afternoon to see him, and M. de la Boetie, taking his hand, said to him: I was on the point of discharging my debt, but my kind creditor has given me a little further time. keywords: account; boetie; book; brother; essays; french; god; good; honour; letter; life; man; men; mind; monsieur; montaigne; paris; place; present; sir; things; time cache: 3581.txt plain text: 3581.txt item: #2 of 20 id: 3582 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 02 date: None words: 17364 flesch: 49 summary: That, like examples in the progress of nature demonstrate to us, she has fortified me in my other faculties proportionably as she has left me unfurnished in this; I should otherwise have been apt implicitly to have reposed my mind and judgment upon the bare report of other men, without ever setting them to work upon their own force, had the inventions and opinions of others been ever been present with me by the benefit of memory. Plato, in the civil regimen that he models according to his own fancy, leaves to it the decision of several things of very great importance, and will, amongst other things, that marriages should be appointed by lot; attributing so great importance to this accidental choice as to ordain that the children begotten in such wedlock be brought up in the country, and those begotten in any other be thrust out as spurious and base; yet so, that if any of those exiles, notwithstanding, should, peradventure, in growing up give any good hope of himself, he might be recalled, as, also, that such as had been retained, should be exiled, in case they gave little expectation of themselves in their early growth. keywords: body; chapter; city; contrary; death; duke; enemy; good; iii; judgment; king; life; man; manner; means; memory; men; nature; place; power; reason; soul; things; time; truth; valour; victory; war cache: 3582.txt plain text: 3582.txt item: #3 of 20 id: 3583 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 03 date: None words: 19050 flesch: 60 summary: And this it is that makes me sometimes doubt in my own mind, whether a divine, or a philosopher, and such men of exact and tender prudence and conscience, are fit to write history: for how can they stake their reputation upon a popular faith? I have, in my time, known men of command checked for having rather obeyed the express words of the king's letters, than the necessity of the affairs they had in hand. keywords: age; day; days; death; die; end; eyes; fear; good; hand; iii; imagination; king; life; man; manner; men; nature; people; place; pleasure; power; reason; subject; things; time; tis; use; way; world; years cache: 3583.txt plain text: 3583.txt item: #4 of 20 id: 3584 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 04 date: None words: 18338 flesch: 51 summary: I am of a quite contrary humour to other men, for I always despise it; but when I am sick, instead of recanting, or entering into composition with it, I begin, moreover, to hate and fear it, telling them who importune me to take physic, that at all events they must give me time to recover my strength and health, that I may be the better able to support and encounter the violence and danger of their potions. Elsewhere the old husbands lend their wives to young men; and in another place they are in common without offence; in one place particularly, the women take it for a mark of honour to have as many gay fringed tassels at the bottom of their garment, as they have lain with several men. keywords: children; custom; fortune; good; judgment; knowledge; laws; life; man; manner; men; nature; opinion; people; place; power; public; reason; things; thou; time; tis; way; women; world cache: 3584.txt plain text: 3584.txt item: #5 of 20 id: 3585 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 05 date: None words: 19082 flesch: 54 summary: 3.]--that our life resembles the great and populous assembly of the Olympic games, wherein some exercise the body, that they may carry away the glory of the prize: others bring merchandise to sell for profit: there are also some (and those none of the worst sort) who pursue no other advantage than only to look on, and consider how and why everything is done, and to be spectators of the lives of other men, thereby the better to judge of and regulate their own. And this I can say, as having myself made trial of it, that having formerly taken the liberty of my own swing and fancy, and omitted or neglected certain rules of the discipline of our Church, which seemed to me vain and strange coming afterwards to discourse of it with learned men, I have found those same things to be built upon very good and solid ground and strong foundation; and that nothing but stupidity and ignorance makes us receive them with less reverence than the rest. keywords: authority; children; education; fine; good; hand; having; judgment; knowledge; learning; life; man; men; mind; opinion; people; pupil; reason; soul; study; things; time; tis; truth; understanding; use; way; words cache: 3585.txt plain text: 3585.txt item: #6 of 20 id: 3586 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 06 date: None words: 28697 flesch: 58 summary: I do not take upon me to direct what other men should do in the government of their families, there are plenty that meddle enough with that, but only give an account of my method in my own: Mihi sic usus est: tibi, ut opus est facto, face. He cannot think himself sufficiently rid of vice, if he must yet contend with it in other men. keywords: --horace; age; art; children; common; contrary; country; day; death; enemy; est; father; fortune; friendship; god; good; king; life; love; man; manner; means; men; mind; nature; people; place; pleasure; reason; rest; soul; things; thou; time; tis; use; virtue; way; wives; world cache: 3586.txt plain text: 3586.txt item: #7 of 20 id: 3587 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 07 date: None words: 24308 flesch: 59 summary: Every one knows the story of Scaevola, that having slipped into the enemy's camp to kill their general, and having missed his blow, to repair his fault, by a more strange invention and to deliver his country, he boldly confessed to Porsenna, who was the king he had a purpose to kill, not only his design, but moreover added that there were then in the camp a great number of Romans, his accomplices in the enterprise, as good men as he; and to show what a one he himself was, having caused a pan of burning coals to be brought, he saw and endured his arm to broil and roast, till the king himself, conceiving horror at the sight, commanded the pan to be taken away. Item, there is a saying that it is a good thing to have a good name, that is to say, credit and a good repute; but besides this, it is really convenient to have a well-sounding name, such as is easy of pronunciation and easy to be remembered, by reason that kings and other great persons do by that means the more easily know and the more hardly forget us; and indeed of our own servants we more frequently call and employ those whose names are most ready upon the tongue. keywords: arms; battle; body; condition; day; death; end; enemy; est; fear; fortune; good; great; honour; king; letters; life; man; manner; means; men; mind; money; names; pain; people; place; pleasure; reason; things; thou; time; tis; war; way; world cache: 3587.txt plain text: 3587.txt item: #8 of 20 id: 3588 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 08 date: None words: 17018 flesch: 60 summary: The better half of their lives they lived upon the glory they had acquired in their youth; great men after, 'tis true, in comparison of others; but I do not know whether it may have the same operation upon other men that it has upon me, but when I hear our architects thunder out their bombast words of pilasters, architraves, and cornices, of the Corinthian and Doric orders, and suchlike jargon, my imagination is presently possessed with the palace of Apollidon; when, after all, I find them but the paltry pieces of my own kitchen door. keywords: affairs; age; arms; caesar; death; divine; god; good; honour; horses; judgment; king; life; man; men; opinion; people; present; reason; sort; soul; subject; things; time; tis; use; way; words; years cache: 3588.txt plain text: 3588.txt item: #9 of 20 id: 3589 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 09 date: None words: 20630 flesch: 57 summary: All story is full of such examples, and every man is able to produce so many to himself, or out of his own practice or observation, that I sometimes wonder to see men of understanding give themselves the trouble of sorting these pieces, considering that irresolution appears to me to be the most common and manifest vice of our nature witness the famous verse of the player Publius: Malum consilium est, quod mutari non potest. [Such are the minds of men, that they change as the light with which father Jupiter himself has illumined the increasing earth. keywords: body; condition; conscience; day; death; end; enemy; fear; fortune; good; having; judgment; life; man; means; men; nature; pain; people; pieces; reason; self; soul; things; thou; time; tis; use; vice; virtue; wine cache: 3589.txt plain text: 3589.txt item: #10 of 20 id: 3590 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 10 date: None words: 24688 flesch: 53 summary: No corruption could so universally have infected men that some one would not escape the contagion which makes me suspect that his own taste was vicious, whence it might happen that he judged other men by himself. He judged other men by himself I cannot well refuse to play with my dog I do not much lament the dead, and should envy them rather I had rather be old a brief time, than be old before old age keywords: affairs; affection; age; arms; children; condition; death; father; good; great; having; honour; judgment; knowledge; life; man; men; nature; opinion; order; pleasure; reason; soul; things; time; tis; truth; use; virtue; work; years cache: 3590.txt plain text: 3590.txt item: #11 of 20 id: 3591 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 11 date: None words: 26137 flesch: 57 summary: Neither, indeed, have I so great an intimacy with many men as is requisite to make a right judgment of them; and those with whom my condition makes me the most frequent, are, for the most part, men who have little care of the culture of the soul, but that look upon honour as the sum of all blessings, and valour as the height of all perfection. And whoever will observe will, I believe, find it experimentally true, that occasions of the least lustre are ever the most dangerous; and that in the wars of our own times there have more brave men been lost in occasions of little moment, and in the dispute about some little paltry fort, than in places of greatest importance, and where their valour might have been more honourably employed. keywords: actions; beauty; contrary; death; die; est; fear; fortune; glory; god; good; honour; ill; judgment; knowledge; life; man; means; men; mind; non; opinion; people; place; play; public; reason; reputation; soul; things; time; tis; truth; use; value; virtue; way; world cache: 3591.txt plain text: 3591.txt item: #12 of 20 id: 3592 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 12 date: None words: 23451 flesch: 56 summary: But as Philopoemen condemned wrestling, wherein he excelled, because the preparatives that were therein employed were differing from those that appertain to military discipline, to which alone he conceived men of honour ought wholly to apply themselves; so it seems to me that this address to which we form our limbs, those writhings and motions young men are taught in this new school, are not only of no use, but rather contrary and hurtful to the practice of fight in battle; and also our people commonly make use of particular weapons, and peculiarly designed for duel; and I have seen, when it has been disapproved, that a gentleman challenged to fight with rapier and poignard appeared in the array of a man-at-arms, and that another should take his cloak instead of his poignard. Of which there are other examples, but this is one: Philistus, general of the naval army of Dionysius the younger against the Syracusans, presented them battle which was sharply disputed, their forces being equal: in this engagement, he had the better at the first, through his own valour: but the Syracusans drawing about his gally to environ him, after having done great things in his own person to disengage himself and hoping for no relief, with his own hand he took away the life he had so liberally, and in vain, exposed to the enemy. keywords: age; anger; arms; cause; chapter; children; day; death; emperor; end; fear; fortune; hand; having; honour; king; life; man; manner; men; people; person; place; pleasure; reason; things; time; tis; use; valour; virtue; war; way; words cache: 3592.txt plain text: 3592.txt item: #13 of 20 id: 3593 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 13 date: None words: 29885 flesch: 49 summary: There might, on the contrary, many examples be produced of great men whom pleasures have made to neglect the conduct of their affairs, as Mark Antony and others; but where love and ambition should be in equal balance, and come to jostle with equal forces, I make no doubt but the last would win the prize. For besides that it is a disease very much to be feared in itself, it begins with me after a more sharp and severe manner than it is used to do with other men. keywords: age; army; art; body; caesar; condition; contrary; day; death; disease; example; force; fortune; good; health; honour; life; man; men; nature; opinion; people; physic; physicians; reason; sick; things; time; tis; use; virtue; war; way; world; years cache: 3593.txt plain text: 3593.txt item: #14 of 20 id: 3594 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 14 date: None words: 23778 flesch: 55 summary: --Cicero, De Offic., iii. 17.] insomuch that the sage Dandamis, hearing the lives of Socrates, Pythagoras, and Diogenes read, judged them to be great men every way, excepting that they were too much subjected to the reverence of the laws, which, to second and authorise, true virtue must abate very much of its original vigour; many vicious actions are introduced, not only by their permission, but by their advice: Ex senatus consultis plebisquescitis scelera exercentur. For private man, as he was, it is more easy; and in such kind of work, I think a man may justly not be ambitious to offer and insinuate himself. keywords: actions; age; business; conscience; contrary; death; fortune; good; hand; justice; life; love; man; men; mind; nature; need; opinion; people; place; pleasure; public; reason; soul; things; thoughts; time; tis; use; way; world cache: 3594.txt plain text: 3594.txt item: #15 of 20 id: 3595 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 15 date: None words: 26172 flesch: 62 summary: --Virgil, Georg., ii. 511.] and withdraw them from the sight of other men; who avoid health and cheerfulness, as dangerous and prejudicial qualities. Order it so that your virtue may conquer your misfortune; that good men may curse the occasion, and that he who wrongs you may tremble but to think on't. keywords: age; beauty; body; contrary; custom; desire; est; eyes; favour; god; good; hand; honour; husband; know; ladies; leave; life; love; man; marriage; men; mind; nature; people; plato; pleasure; reason; soul; things; thou; time; tis; use; venus; virtue; way; wife; women; words; world cache: 3595.txt plain text: 3595.txt item: #16 of 20 id: 3596 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 16 date: None words: 21649 flesch: 55 summary: Melanthius being asked what he thought of the tragedy of Dionysius, I could not see it, said he, it was so clouded with language; so most of those who judge of the discourses of great men ought to say, I did not understand his words, they were so clouded with gravity, grandeur, and majesty. 'Tis for the most ignorant to look at other men over the shoulder, always returning from the combat full of joy and triumph. keywords: advantage; day; end; folly; fortune; gold; good; judge; judgment; king; knowledge; life; man; matter; men; mind; opinion; people; place; reason; right; sort; thing; time; tis; use; way; words; world cache: 3596.txt plain text: 3596.txt item: #17 of 20 id: 3597 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 17 date: None words: 26460 flesch: 63 summary: They were both variously great men, and certainly, according to the age, rare and great, each of them in his kind: but what destiny was it that placed them in these times, men so remote from and so disproportioned to our corruption and intestine tumults? [The gifts of great men are unknown to me. keywords: affairs; age; care; condition; death; evil; fortune; god; good; government; house; humour; laws; liberty; life; look; love; man; men; mind; nature; particular; people; place; pleasure; reason; sort; state; things; time; tis; travel; way; world cache: 3597.txt plain text: 3597.txt item: #18 of 20 id: 3598 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 18 date: None words: 28505 flesch: 60 summary: Two of my acquaintance, great men in this faculty, have, in my opinion, lost half, in refusing to publish at forty years old, that they might stay till threescore. Of Physiognomy. CHAPTER X OF MANAGING THE WILL Few things, in comparison of what commonly affect other men, move, or, to say better, possess me: for 'tis but reason they should concern a man, provided they do not possess him. keywords: affairs; age; cause; contrary; day; death; end; fortune; good; having; health; ignorance; knowledge; life; man; means; men; mind; nature; opinion; people; place; reason; right; socrates; sort; soul; things; time; tis; truth; use; way; world; years cache: 3598.txt plain text: 3598.txt item: #19 of 20 id: 3599 author: Montaigne, Michel de title: Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Volume 19 date: None words: 25823 flesch: 59 summary: [Young men are taken away by violence, old men by maturity. This happened in my time: certain men were condemned to die for a murder committed; their sentence, if not pronounced, at least determined and concluded on. keywords: age; art; body; day; disease; end; est; good; health; laws; life; man; men; mind; nature; need; opinion; people; plato; pleasure; reason; sleep; socrates; subject; thee; things; thou; time; tis; truth; use; way; world cache: 3599.txt plain text: 3599.txt item: #20 of 20 id: 46759 author: Gourmont, Remy de title: Philosophic Nights in Paris Being selections from Promenades Philosophiques date: None words: 23732 flesch: 71 summary: A player is a man who always compares himself to other men. The branches are broken at a height that other men cannot reach. keywords: beginning; colors; conditions; days; fact; form; france; god; gourmont; happiness; helvétius; human; idea; leopardi; life; love; man; matter; men; moment; names; nature; order; philosophy; place; river; things; time; world; year cache: 46759.txt plain text: 46759.txt