Literary and Philosophical Essays French, German and Italian
- Language:
- English
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~160,000 words · 742 passages
Cite this work
- APAMichel de Montaigne. (n.d.). Literary and Philosophical Essays French, German and Italian. Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/michel-de-montaigne/literary-and-philosophical-essays-french-german-and-italian
- MLAMichel de Montaigne. Literary and Philosophical Essays French, German and Italian. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/michel-de-montaigne/literary-and-philosophical-essays-french-german-and-italian.
- ChicagoMichel de Montaigne. Literary and Philosophical Essays French, German and Italian. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/michel-de-montaigne/literary-and-philosophical-essays-french-german-and-italian.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
A selection from Montaigne's 'Essays' within an anthology that gathers French, German and Italian authors: this is not the complete work.
Context and history
That is worth knowing before citing. The 'Essays' are three books and more than a hundred chapters, which Montaigne kept rewriting and enlarging for twenty years, and what is here is a selection made by an editor for a series of world classics. That said, what one reads is Montaigne, and Montaigne is the man who invented a way of writing: to take himself as the object of study without claiming to draw any doctrine from it, to change his mind within a single page and leave both versions standing, and to end each subject by confessing that he does not know enough. His question — 'what do I know?' — leads to a scepticism that does not paralyse but teaches how to live. If the aim is to cite Montaigne, it is worth finding a complete edition and giving book and chapter.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
purpose: who being taken by Cyrus, and by him condemned to die, upon the point of his execution, cried out aloud: "Oh Solon, Solon!" which words of his, being reported to Cyrus, who inquiring what he meant by them, told him, hee now at his owne cost verified the advertisement Solon had before times given him; which was, that no man, what cheerefull and blandishing countenance soever fortune shewed them, may rightly deeme himselfe happie, till such time as he have passed the last day of his life, by reason of the uncertaintie and vicissitude of humane things, which by a very light motive, and slight occasion, are often changed from one to another cleane contrary state and degree. And therefore Agesilaus answered one that counted the King of Persia happy, because being very young, he had gotten the garland of so mightie and great a dominion: "yea but said he, Priam at the same age was not unhappy." Of the Kings of Macedon that succeeded Alexander the Great, some were afterward seene to become Joyners and Scriveners at Rome: and of Tyrants of Sicilie, Schoolemasters at Corinth. One that had conquered halfe the world, and been Emperour over so many, Armies, became an humble and miserable suter to the raskally officers of a king of AEgypte: At so high a rate did that great Pompey purchase the irkesome prolonging of his life but for five or six moneths. And in our fathers daies, Lodowicke Sforze, tenth Duke of Millane, under whom the State of Italic had so long beene turmoiled and shaken, was seene to die a wretched prisoner at Loches in France, but not till he had lived and lingered ten yeares in thraldom, which was the worst of his bargaine. The fairest Queene, wife to the greatest King of Christendome, was she not lately scene to die by the hands of an executioner? Oh unworthie and barbarous cruelties And a thousand such examples.…