Questions for "Of Experience," by Montaigne

Interpretive Questions

On p. 41, Montaigne writes, "There is nothing that should be recommended so much to youth as activity and vigilance." What does he mean by "vigilance?" Why would these things not be recommended to people of all ages?

P. 63: What does Montaigne mean by the line, "May her [Philosophy's] followers have no more right and sinews and sap in deflowering their wives than her lessons have"?

P. 63:"Nature is a gentle guide, but no more gentle than wise and just. We must penetrate into the nature of things and clearly see exactly what it demands [Cicero]. I seek her footprints everywhere. We have confused them with artificial tracks, and for that reason the sovereign god of the Academics and the Peripatetics, which is "to live according to nature," becomes hard to limit and express; also that of the Stoics, a neighbor to the other, which is "to consent to nature." What does Montaigne mean when he says he seeks nature's footprints "everywhere"?

p.64: What is the significance of the placement in this essay of the St. Augustine quote from City of God (our November reading!) : "He who praises the nature of the soul as the sovereign good and condemns the nature of the flesh as evil, truly both carnally desires the soul and carnally shuns the flesh; for his feeling is inspired by human vanity, not by divine truth."?

Is Montaigne, in his detailed accounts of his bodily functions, giving us "too much information (TMI)"?

Evaluative Questions

Comment on the following passage (p. 47) "I am more naturally inclined to follow the example of Flaminius, who lent himself to those who needed him more than to those who could benefit him, than that of Pyrrhus, who was prone to truckle to the great and be arrogant with the weak."

p. 65: "Between ourselves, these are two things that I have always observed to be in singular accord: supercelestial thoughts and subterranean conduct." Have you ever made the same observation?

Is Montaigne's philosophy based on the importance of personal experience, as the title of this piece implies, and if so, why does he need to display his extensive conversancy with classical sources?

What are Montaigne's strategies for enduring hardships, and do you find them personally relevant?

For Textual Analysis

A. Pages 1 through 9, beginning, "There is no desire more natural than the desire for knowledge ... to "There is no remedy."

B. Pages 11-14, beginning, "In this universe of things" ... to "assertion and proof precede knowledge and perception" [Cicero].

C. Pages 16-19 beginning, "The scholars distinguish and mark off" ... to ... "affection and frankness, but of much courage as well."

D. Pages 54-55 beginning, "I, who operate only close to the ground" ... to ... but "attending to it, sitting at it, not lying down at it."

Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592)

Montaigne was a French gentleman of Bordeaux best known for his multi-volume Essais (Essays), and he is generally regarded as the inventor of the genre. According to noted Montaigne translator Donald Frame, you might interpret the term "essay" two ways:

• as a "test" or "trial" of the writer's judgement
• as a "probing" or "sampling" of the writer's self.

Of that self, the nineteeth-century literary historian Edward Dowden writes:

"He was of middle temperment ... between the jovial and the melancholic, a lover of solitude, yet the reverse of morose, choosing bright companions rather than sad; able to be silent, as the mood took him, or to gossip; loyal and frank; a hater of hypocrisy and falsehood; a despiser of empty ceremony; disposed to interpret all things to the best; cheerful among his children; careless of exercising authority; incapable of househould management; trustful and kind towards his neighbors; indulgent in his judgements; yet warm in his admiration of old heroic virtue."(a)

Our selection this month, "Of Experience," is the very last in the sequence of Montaigne's Essais.

It fascinates as a capsule of Montaigne's philosophy. For example, he writes:

I would rather be an authority on myself than on Cicero. In the experience I have of myself I find enough to make me wise, if I were a good scholar. He who calls back to mind the exess of his past anger, and how far this fever carried him away, sees the ugliness of this passion better than in Aristotle, and conceives a more justified hatred for it. (b)

If Montaigne is considered a "modern" because of his reliance on his own perceptions and judgement, however, why does he cite passages from classical authors throughout the piece?

(a) Dowden, Edward, A History of French Literature, LaVergne, TN: Bibliolife, 2009.
(b) Great Books Reading and Discussion Program, Fourth Series, v.3, p.12)