Living Well — Montaigne Way
When I early-retired in 2020, I got a chance to spend a bit of time reading philosophy books. I wanted to solidify my vague ideas about how to live well. This lead me to Epicurean philosophy which appealed to me quite a bit at this phase of life.
The Epicurean philosophy is not widely known and the parody of “drink-sing-dance-and-be-marry” is a favorable, but not an accurate description. While Epicureanism would not discourage any pleasure in moderation, it actually considers intellectual pleasures to be of higher order than the physical examples above. In fact, it teaches you to choose what to derive pleasure from more wisely. It also has a heavy focus on avoiding pain of all manner including from mental disturbance. I believe this philosophy is well-suited to our times-of-plenty where mental issues are a lot more prevalent than physical struggles. Stoic philosophy is great at building grit and is more useful in contexts of struggle. Of course, you can draw from both philosophies and others, as Montaigne did.
Learning about Epicureanism led me to read a number of texts — ancient translations and modern takes. But I also wanted to read more about someone more modern than Epicurus who actually tried to live a good chunk of life according to these principles. The best documented example I could find was Montaigne. So, instead of writing about what I learnt and what I like about Epicureanism, I would like to present it by introducing someone who drew on it substantially (but far from exclusively). Montaigne is more modern than Epicurus, and despite his riches is very relatable.
I already wrote about Montaigne in my essay “Montaigne — the original FIRE blogger”, so I won’t repeat much of the background. This is more of a follow up to introduce him more broadly than just his outlook on early retirement. I would also highly recommend Sarah Bakewell’s book “How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer” about Montaigne on which I draw heavily here.
What I want to do in this essay is capture random bits that might describe Montaigne’s character and his aspiration on how to carry yourself and to live well. This is not a coherent portrait, but rather a collection of notes from reading his sprawling Essays and accounts of him by historians like Bakewell. Montaigne, who was not big on structure, would approve of free-wheeling brush strokes, although he would have used a lot of anecdotes himself.
Montaigne did not subscribe to any philosophies. His writing was also too unstructured to be called a philosophy. However, he was an observant practitioner who borrowed from major ancient Greek philosophies — namely Stoicism, Epicureanism and Scepticism. Above all, he was not dogmatic and would be the first to tell you to trust your own experience:
“My only aim here is to reveal myself, and I may be different tomorrow if I learn something new that changes me. I have no authority to be believed, nor do I want it, feeling myself too ill-instructed to instruct others. “
So, if some of what I captured sounds like prescriptions, it is not Montaigne’s fault, but my simplifications of his observations. It is not always easy to quote Montaigne because his writing is a lot of anecdotes. Often, it is the selection of quotes from others that he references that serves to shape the picture, so you will see a few such quotes here. Without further ado…
How to Live Well — A Rough Portrait of Montaigne
Be Human
- We are ordinary and imperfect. Ordinary life is a great life. Be ordinary and imperfect.
- Cultivate the spirit of liberty and delight.
- Have friends. Live with others.
- Engage in relationships. Conversation with a friend is the best reward.
- Enjoy conversation. “The most fruitful and natural play of the mind is conversation. I find it sweeter than any other action in life; and if I were forced to choose, I think I would rather lose my sight than my hearing and voice”
- Enjoy music. He was exposed to a lot of it through childhood.
- See the world and be curious. Learn local customs.
- Don’t get obsessed with work. Good enough is all right.
- Don’t be afraid to do something others have not done. Like unique style of writing and openness that Montaigne introduced with his Essays or his early retirement.
- “A happy man is not one who is believed by others to be so but one who himself believes he is so. And by that fact the belief acquires reality and truth. “
Calm Life, not Dull
- Disturbance to be avoided. Calm to be sought.
- Retired at 38 from public career to pursue life freedom, tranquility, calm, contemplation and leisure.
- Yet, variety is a spice of life. “A little of everything and nothing thoroughly, French style”
- Diversions are the best part, not a fixed path. Structure is overrated. Like his writing which was a careful reflection mixed with many tangents and semi-related anecdotes.
Virtues & Vice
- Kindness. Gentle ways. Sociability. Courtesy.
- Honesty. Bravery. Openness.
- No sadness. “Don’t have it, don’t like it and don’t respect it.”
- No regrets.
- “Lying is truly an accursed vice. It is only our words that bind us together and make us human.”
- “There is nothing I hate like bargaining. It is a pure exchange of trickery and effrontery: after an hour of arguing and haggling, each side goes back on his word and his oaths to gain five sous more. “
Desires:
- Moderation is a virtue — in opinions, judgements, desires.
- Disdain for pursuit of lasting fame, vanity.
Be Present:
- Pay full attention. Reflect.
- Present is where life is. Not past or future.
- Life should be an aim unto itself, a purpose unto itself. “Grasp and be satisfied with present goods because we have no grip on what is to come.”
- Observing life and yourself is the reward.
On Fears
- “Fear, desire, hope, impel us towards the future; they rob us of feelings and thoughts about what is, in order to preoccupy us with what will be — including what will be when we no longer exist. “Dreadful is the state of a soul that is anxious about the future” (Seneca).”
- ‘Just as folly will not be satisfied even when it gets what it wants, so also wisdom is happy with what is to hand and is never vexed with itself’ [Cicero]
- “Men, says an old Greek maxim, are tormented by their opinions of things and not by the things themselves.“
- Accept that you are not in full control
Scepticism & No Dogma
- Question everything. Doubt is good.
- Change of mind is healthy.
- Humans are not able to attain true certainty.
- “What do I know.”
- Trust your own experience above all.
On Learning
- Read a lot and forget most of it. “Excellent memories are apt to be associated with weak judgement.”
- Concrete examples and experience over the teaching of abstract knowledge intended to be accepted uncritically. “We work merely to fill the memory, leaving the understanding and the conscience empty.”
- ‘We are taught for the schoolroom, not for life’ [Seneca].
- ‘Now that so many are learned, it is good men that we lack’ [Seneca].
- Detested rote memorization in learning. “Remembering is easier than thinking”
- He thought his memory was worst than anyone. “I doubt if any other memory in the world is as grotesquely faulty as mine. All my other abilities are low and ordinary; but where memory is concerned I think I am singular and very rare, worthy of both name and reputation!”
- ‘But most of all I loathe pedantic learning.’ [Du Bellay]
- Don’t be ignorant of customs and social norms, but don’t treat them as dogma. “The knowledge of social dexterity is very useful knowledge. Like grace and beauty, it smooths the beginnings of fellowship and intimacy; as a result it opens the way to learning from the examples of others and to ourselves producing and showing our own example, if it is worth noting and passing on.“
- “On my travels, in order to be always learning something from conversations with others (which is one of the best schools there can be), I maintain this practice: I always steer those with whom I am talking back to the subjects they know best. ‘Let the sailor talk only of the winds, the farmer of oxen, the soldier of his wounds, the herdsman of his cattle’ [Propertius]. “
On Pain
- Violent pain is short — other pain is tolerable. “It ought to console us that in the course of nature if pain is violent it is short; if it is long, it is light. . . . You will not feel it for long if you feel it grievously: it will put an end to itself or — the same thing — put an end to you.” From Cicero: ‘Remember that the greatest pains are ended by death, the small ones are only intermittent, and we are masters of the moderate ones: if they are bearable we shall bear them; if they are not, we shall leave our life as we leave the theatre if the play does not please us’.
- “I grant people that pain is the worst thing that can happen to us… But it lies within us not to eliminate pain but at least to lessen it by patience (‘by putting up with it calmly’) and, even if the body is disturbed by it, by keeping our soul and our reason in good trim. “
Decision Making
- Let your own life be your teacher of how to live. Experience over theories.
- Anecdotes over sweeping generalization.
- Don’t overthink things. The most productive view is when you pull from a big bank of experiences.
- Accept that we don’t know many things like a wise man would. Don’t agonize over things we don’t know. Come to the best conclusions based on your experience. Don’t over intellectualize things.
- Sound judgement over quick wit.
- Slow and wise vs. fast and superfluous.
Fear of Death
- Don’t worry about death — it is natural and usually not too painful. When it comes, it comes.
- ‘There is less pain in death than in waiting for it’ [Ovid] Your own nature will prepare you for death.
- “The value of a life lies not in its length but in the use made of it. Some have lived long and lived little. Attend to it while you are in it. Whether you have lived enough depends not on the number of years but on your will”
- “In truth, what we say we chiefly fear in death is what usually precedes it: pain.”
- Death of his brother Arnaud: He died at the age of 23 while playing tennis; he was struck by a ball just above the right ear. There was no sign of bruising or of a wound; he did not even sit down or take a rest; yet five or six hours later he was dead from an apoplexy caused by that blow.
- ‘Believe that each day is your last; then each unexpected hour will be welcome indeed’ [Horace].
- “It is uncertain where death awaits us; let us wait for it everywhere. Preparing for death is preparing for liberty.”
Finances
- “Riches are more a matter of careful living than of income: ‘Each man is the maker of his own fortune’ [Sallust]”
- “And a rich man who is worried, hard up and over-busy seems to me more wretched than one who is simply poor. “
- “There is no more beautiful life than that of a carefree man; Lack of care is a truly painless evil” [Sophocles]
- “I live from day to day, and content myself with having enough to meet my present and ordinary needs: extraordinary ones could not be met by all the provision in the world.”
- “Fortune does us neither good nor harm: it only offers us the matter and the seeds for good or harm, and our soul, more powerful than fortune is, moulds the matter or sows the seeds as it pleases. It alone causes and controls our happy or unhappy state. Whatever comes to us from outside takes its savour and its colour from our inner constitution, just as our garments warm us not with their heat but with ours, which they are fitted to preserve and sustain. Shelter a cold body under them and they will help it preserve its coldness; that is how snow and ice are preserved.”
- “Happy the man who has ordered his needs so appropriately that his wealth can satisfy them without his care and trouble, and without the spending and the gathering of his wealth interrupting his other pursuits that are better suited to him, quieter, and more congenial. “
- See my article “Montaigne — the original FIRE blogger” for more
Life’s Pleasures
- “With every pleasure known to man the mere pursuit of it is pleasurable”
- Dedicate one of the towers in your chateau to yourself as your man cave.
Reading List
“How to Be an Epicurean: The Ancient Art of Living Well” by Catherine Wilson
Principal Doctrines of Epicurus. The best English translation: http://blogs.ubc.ca/phil102/files/2013/08/Epicurus-PrincipalDoctrines-epicurusinfo.pdf
Epicureanism: https://philosophybreak.com/articles/why-death-is-nothing-to-fear-lucretius-epicureanism/
Monaigne’s Essays free translations:
http://www.earlymoderntexts.com/authors/montaigne https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3600/3600-h/3600-h.htm
Sarah Bakewell’s book “How to Live: A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer”
