All the world knows me in my book, and my book in me.
Michel De MontaigneRead
Life in itself is neither good nor evil, it is the place of good and evil, according to what you make it.
Interpretation
Life is neutral and shaped by our actions and choices.
This quote by Michel De Montaigne suggests that life itself does not possess inherent qualities of good or evil. Instead, it serves as a canvas where human actions and decisions define the moral landscape, indicating that our perspectives and choices influence our understanding of life positively or negatively.
In practice
In a motivational speech about personal growth, this quote can inspire individuals to take responsibility for their life experiences.
All the world knows me in my book, and my book in me.
All I say is by way of discourse, and nothing by way of advice. I should not speak so boldly if it were my due to be believed.
Pythagoras used to say that life resembles the Olympic Games: a few people strain their muscles to carry off a prize; others bring trinkets to sell to the crowd for gain; and some there are, and not the worst, who seek no other profit than to look at the show and see how and why everything is done; spectators of the life of other people in order to judge and regulate their own.
There is not much less vexation in the government of a private family than in the managing of an entire state.
Those who have compared our life to a dream were right... we were sleeping wake, and waking sleep.
Such as are in immediate fear of a losing their estates, of banishment, or of slavery, live in perpetual anguish, and lose all appetite and repose; whereas such as are actually poor, slaves, or exiles, ofttimes live as merrily as other folk.
No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude.
Even when repressed, inequality grows; only the man who is below the average in economic ability desires equality; those who are conscious of superior ability desire freedom, and in the end superior ability has its way.
The U.S. should worry about the effects of its polices on the rest of the world. We would like to live in a world where countries take into account the effect of their policies on other countries and do what is right, broadly, rather than what is just right given the circumstances of that country.
Of all the classes of men, I dislike the most those who make their livings by talking - actors, clergymen, politicians, pedagogues, and so on. .... It is almost impossible to imagine a talker who sticks to the facts. Carried away by the sound of his own voice and the applause from the groundlings, he makes inevitably the jump from logic to mere rhetoric.
There should be a science of discontent. People need hard times and oppression to develop psychic muscles.
Every moment there is creation, every moment destruction. There is no absolute creation, no absolute destruction. Both are movement, and that is eternal.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.