Philosophy
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My Year With Montaigne: Of Time & Attention
“We must run through the bad and settle on the good.” III.13 Earlier in this series I discussed Montaigne’s famous chapter, “That to Philosophize is to Learn to Die.” Without being redundant, that chapter reflects the young Montaigne’s Stoic influences. Death awaits us, and to deeply contemplate this reality is to take away its power. Continue reading
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My Year With Montaigne–On Change
“There is nothing that abides and is always the same.” II.12 Let’s talk about change. We acknowledge it, and supposedly, sometimes begrudgingly, accept it. We even have pithy little mantras to toss around to prove we’re onboard with it: The only constant is change. “Change in all things is sweet.” (Aristotle) “Everything flows.” (Heraclitus) “Every Continue reading
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My Summer with Montaigne—Update.
Montaigne, “the greatest writer of any time, anywhere.” Orson Welles First a little housekeeping. With Labor Day behind us, you are perhaps wondering about my summer project, is it coming to an end? After all, I titled it, “My Summer with Montaigne”. Truth be told, I feel as if I’ve hardly scratched the surface. Continue reading
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My Summer with Montaigne–“Of Repentance”
“In all affairs, when they are past, however they have turned out, I have little regret.” III.2 Here’s a thought experiment. Imagine that you have come to the end of your life, and as you lie on your death bed, about to expire, you are approached by some sort of spectral demon who tells you Continue reading
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My Summer with Montaigne – “Of Experience.”
I have seen the grass, the flower, and the fruit; now I see the dryness–happily, since it is naturally. (III.2) I find great pleasure in existence, and much joy. With the advancing years, however, there is much that has fallen away in this regard, making what remains all the more subject to my attention. For Continue reading
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My Summer With Montaigne – “He’s a jumble of contradictions.”
“For thirty years I have kept Donald M. Frame’s translation of “The Complete Works of Montaigne” at, if not bedside, hand.” ~ Gore Vidal I was working in the campground. We’d had a violent thunderstorm the previous night and branches were down and stuff was strewn about. A woman approached. She was not young and Continue reading
...the house I live in... 