Michel de Montaigne
I have been reading a lot of Montaigne's casual anecdotes and quotes lately. I love them because they are short and have a broad range of meaning and can apply to many aspects of life. Here are some of his that are my favorite.
There are some defeats more triumphant than victories.
No man is exempt from saying silly things; the mischief is to say them deliberately.
I care not so much what I am to others as what I am to myself.
He who establishes his argument by noise and command, shows that his reason is weak.
Each man calls barbarism what is not his own practice for indeed it seems we have no other test of truth and reason that the example and pattern of the opinions and customs of the country we live in.
Even on the highest throne in the world, we are still sitting on our ass.
These are great but I think my favorite quote that I think about often and applies to my life very well is still from Leonardo da Vinci. (what's with these "da" guys? Maybe I should change my name to Ian da Gill)
Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.
I find that I come up with quick sayings of my own like this sometimes, I think when I'm old and grizzled I will put a book together. I have one quick phrase that I came up with and come back to all the time. I came up with this while working at SPU and it relates to a lot of the maintenance there, but it also applies to a lot of artwork I see or many other things I see throughout the day.
Putting gold leaf on a dog turd will probably make it look good, but it's still just a piece of shit.
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