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Wednesday, October 7, 2009

"Apology for Raimond Sebond" by Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

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(This essay,the longest of all of Montaigne's writings,sets forth the reasons for the great French humanist's belief in skepticism.It is the work which was most influetial in reviving and popularizing the Greek skeptical theory Pyrrhonism,during the Renaissance and in the 17nth century.Montaigne's followers based their arguments upon this essay,and many important philosophers,including Rene Descartes,Pierre Gassendi,Blaise Pascal,and Nicolas Malebranche stydied it and used some of Mntaigne's ideas in developing their own philosophies.)
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True religion must be based on faith ;
but,given faith,reasons can used to strengthen faith.
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Rationality is a form of animal behavior ;
in many respects animals excel men,
and in comparison to animals,men seem to be vain,stupid,and immoral.
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The Greek skeptics,the Pyrrhonists,were sensible in doubting everything, contesting all claims,and living according to nature and custom.
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Scientists,philosophers,and all others who seek knowledge
-including those who seek knowledge of probabilities-
faith in their effort.
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We depend on sense experience for our knowledge of the world,
but we do not know whether five senses are adequate,
nor can we determine how accurately the senses represent the real world.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel_de_Montaigne
Montaigne's Quotes :
Obsession is the wellspring of genius and madness.
Everyone calls barbarity what he is not accustomed to.[9]
If you belittle yourself, you are believed; if you praise yourself, you are disbelieved.
When I play with my cat, how do I know that she is not passing time with me rather than I with her?[10]
Life in itself is neither good nor evil, it is the place of good and evil, according to what you make it.
The continuous work of our life is to build death.
If you press me to say why I loved him, I can say no more than because he was he, and I was I.
Kings and philosophers defecate, and so do ladies.
I enter into discussion and argument with great freedom and ease, inasmuch as opinion finds me in a bad soil to penetrate and take deep root in. No propositions astonish me, no belief offends me, whatever contrast it offers to my own. There is no fancy so frivolous and so extravagant that it does not seem to me quite suitable to the production of the human mind.
Our religion is made to eradicate vices, instead it encourages them, covers them, and nurtures them.
Human understanding is marvellously enlightened by daily conversation with men, for we are, otherwise, compressed and heaped up in ourselves, and have our sight limited to the length of our own noses.
Not being able to govern events, I govern myself.
The clatter of arms drowns the voice of law.
No matter that we may mount on stilts, we still must walk on our own legs. And on the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom.
Montaigne's axiom: "Nothing is so firmly believed as that which least is known."
Man cannot make a worm, yet he will make gods by the dozen.
I have gathered a garland of other men’s flowers, and nothing is mine but the cord that binds them.
No man is a hero to his own valet.
The only thing certain is nothing is certain.
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Works by Montaigne : http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/m#a1230
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