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PRIMARY_MONTAIGNER
November 20, 2005
Quotations from
"The Art of Conversation"
by Michel De Montaigne,
translated by M.A. Screech
(Page numbers are from
the Penguin 60s chapbook
edition of "Four Essays"):
For comparison, the older
Charles Cotton tranlation
(gutenberg project):
Studying books has a languid The study of books is a languishing
feeble motion, whereas and feeble motion that heats not,
conversation provides whereas conversation teaches and
teaching and exercise all at exercises at once. If I converse
once. If I am sparring with with a strong mind and a rough
a strong and solid opponent disputant, he presses upon my
he will attack me on the flanks, and pricks me right and
flanks, stick his lance in me left; his imaginations stir up mine;
right and left; his ideas jealousy, glory, and contention,
send mine soaring. -- p35 stimulate and raise me up to
something above myself; and
acquiescence is a quality altogether
Rivalry, competitiveness and tedious in discourse.
glory will drive me and raise
me above my own level. In
conversation the most painful
quality is perfect
harmony. -- p.35
Just as our mind is strengthened by contact
with vigorous and well-ordered minds, so too
it is impossible to overstate how much
it loses and deteriorates by the continuous
commerce and contact we have with mean
and ailing ones. -- p.35
I love arguing and discussing, but with only
a few men and for my own sake: for to serve
as a spectacle to the great and indulge in
a parade of your wits and verbiage is,
I consider, an unbecoming trade for an
honourable gentleman. -- p.35
Stupidity is a bad quality: but to be unable
to put up with it, to be vexed and ground
down by it (as happens to me) is another,
hardly worse in its unmannerliness
than stupidity. -- p.35-36
There is no idea so frivolous or odd
which does not appear to me to be fittingly
produced by the mind of man. Those of us
who deprive our judgment of the right to
pass sentence look gently on strange
opinions; we may not lend them our approbation
but we do readily lend them our ears.
-- p. 36
Among gentlemen I like people to express
themselves heartily, their words following
wherever their thoughts lead. We
ought to toughen and fortify our ears
against being seduced by the sound of
polite words. I like a strong,
intimate, manly fellowship, the kind of
friendship which rejoices in sharp
vigorous exchanges just as love rejoices
in bites and scratches which draw blood.
-- p. 37
It is impossible to argue in good faith
with a fool. -- p. 40
In debating we are taught merely how to refute
arguments; the result of each side's refuting the
other is that the fruit of our debates is the
destruction and annihilation of the truth.
That is why Plato in his _Republic_ prohibits
the exercise to ill-endowed minds not suited
to it. -- p. 41
You are in quest of what *is*. Why on earth do you
set out to walk that road with a man who has
neither pace nor style? -- p. 41
One fastens on a word or a comparison; another
no longer sees his opponent's arguments,
being too caught up in his own train of thought:
he is thinking of pursuing his own argument not
yours. -- p. 42
Lastly, there is the man who cannot see reason but
holds you under siege within a hedge of dialectical
conclusions and logical formulae. Who can avoid
beginning to distrust our professional skills and
doubt whether we can extract from them any solid
profit of practical use in life when he reflects on
the use we put them to? '_Nihil sanantibus
litteris_.' [such erudition as has no power to heal.]
((Seneca, _Epist. moral. LIX)) Has anyone ever
acquired intelligence through logic? Where are her
beautiful promises? '_Nec ad melius vivendum nec ad
commodius disserendum_.' [She teaches neither how to
live a better life nor how to argue properly.]
((Cicero, _De finibus, I, xix, 63)) Is there more of
of a hotchpotch in the cackle of fishwives than in the
public disputations of men who profess logic? I would
prefer a son of mine to learn to talk in the tavern
rather than in our university yap-shops. -- p. 42
The involved linguistic convolutions with which they
confound us remind me of conjuring tricks: their
sleight-of-hand has compelling force over our senses
but it in no wise shakes our convictions. -- p. 44
In my part of the country and during my own lifetime
school-learning has brought amendment of purse but
rarely amendment of soul. -- p. 44
Erudition is a thing the quality of which is
neither good or bad, almost: it is a most useful
adjunct to a well-endowed soul: to any other it is
baleful and harmful; or rather, it is a thing
which, in use, has great value, but it will
not allow itself to be acquired at a base price: in
one hand it is a royal sceptre, in another, a fool's
bauble. -- p. 44
For we are born to go in quest of truth:
to take possession of it is the property of
a greater Power. ((the theme of III "on experience"))
-- p. 45
This world is but a school of inquiry. The
question is not who will spear the ring but who
will make the best charges at it. -- p. 46
... there is in truth no greater silliness, none
more enduring, than to be provoked and enraged by
the silliness of this world ... p.47
... why can we encounter a man with a twisted
deformed body without getting irritated, yet are
unable to tolerate a deranged mind without
flying into a rage? ((Plutarch ...)) --p.48
It is not merely the reproaches which we make to
each other which can be regularly turned against us
but also our reasons and our arguments in matters
of controversy: we run ourselves through with our
own swords. As it was ingeniously and aptly put by
the man who first said it: '_Stercus cuique suum
bene olet_' [Everyone's shit smells good to
himself.] ((Erasmus, _Adages_, III, IV, II ...))
-- p. 49
If we had sound nostrils our shit ought to stink all
the more for its being our own. -- p. 51
Sometimes my mind launches out with paradoxes
which I mistrust and verbal subtleties which make
me shake my head; but I let them take their chance.
I know that some men make a reputation from such things.
It is not for me alone to judge them. -- p. 56
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