"The day of your birth leads you to death as well as to life."

Michel de Montaigne Philosophy See all quotes by Michel de Montaigne →

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“The day of your birth is one day’s advance towards the grave.”

“All the opinions of the world agree in this, that pleasure is our end.”

“Je veux que la mort me trouve plantant mes choux.”

“He who should teach men to die would at the same time teach them to live.”

“C'est ce de quoi j'ai le plus de peur que la peur.”

“We are, I know not how, double in ourselves, which is the cause that what we believe we do not believe, and cannot disengage ourselves from what we condemn.”

Resonant Thoughts

"Drunk with triumph, I cuddled in my rocking cradle and ransacked every unvisited chamber of the memory....to see the residue take life and meaning in the light of the great revelation."

— Robert Erskine Childers

Literature1870–1922

#life

"sometimes you don't need a goal in life, you don't need to know the big picture. you just need to know what you're going to do next!"

— Sophie Kinsella

Literature1969–2025

#life

"Humans are great lovers of consistency, and it annoys us that cats have different rules. Even if a cat is willing to give up her life for you, that does not mean that she is willing to change her mind…"

— Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Literature1941

#life

"Thoreau's disobedience is disobedience as refusal. I won't live in your world. I will live as if your world has ended, as indeed it deserves to end. I will live as if my gesture of refusing your world…"

— Curtis White

Literature1951

#life