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Essays

By Michel Eyquem De Montaigne

Book Id: WPLBN0002097028
Format Type: Default
File Size: 2,810 KB
Reproduction Date: 8/30/2011

Title:	Essays
Author:	Michel Eyquem De Montaigne
Volume:
Language:	English
Subject:	Non Fiction, Drama and Literature, Health
Collections:	Physiology, Authors Community, Medicine, Fine Arts, Literature, Favorites in India
Historic Publication Date:	1999
Publisher:	University of Oregon

Member Page:	Community Books
Citation APA MLA Chicago De Montaigne, M. E. (1999). Essays. Retrieved from http://www.self.gutenberg.org/

Description
(Author to reader)--Reader, loe here a well-meaning Booke. It doth at the first entrance forewarne thee, that in contriving the same I have proposed unto my selfe no other than a familiar and private end: I have no respect or consideration at all, either to thy service, or to my glory: my forces are not capable of any such desseigne. I have vowed the same to the particular commodity of my kinsfolk and friends: to the end, that losing me (which they are likely to do ere long), they may therein find some lineaments of my conditions and humours, and by that meanes reserve more whole, and more lively foster the knowledge and acquaintance they have had of me. Had my intention beene to forestal and purchase the world's opinion and favour, I would surely have adorned myselfe more quaintly, or kept a more grave and solemne march. I desire thereun to be delineated in mine own genuine, simple and ordinarie fashion, without contention, art or study; for it is myselfe I pourtray. My imperfections shall thus be read to the life, and my naturall forme discerned, so farre-forth as publike reverence hath permitted me. For if my fortune had beene to have lived among those nations which yet are said to live under the sweet liberty of Nature's first and uncorrupted lawes, I assure thee, I would most willingly have pourtrayed myselfe fully and naked. Thus, gentle Reader, myselfe am the groundworke of my booke: it is then no reason thou shouldest employ thy time about so frivolous and vaine a subject. Therefore farewell,

Excerpt
They have a secret, unperceived and delicate beauty; he had neede of a cleere, farreseeing and true-discerning sight that should rightly discover this secret light. Is not ingenuity (according to us) cosin germaine unto sottishnesse, and a quality of reproach? Socrates maketh his soule to moove, with a naturall and common motion. Thus saith a plaine Country-man, and thus a seely Woman: Hee never hath other people in his mouth than Coach-makers, Joyners, Coblers, and Masons.