MONTAIGNE, Michel de, a philosophe-moraliste, famous for his book of essays, was born at the castle of Montaigne, in Périgord, on the 28th of February 1533, being descended of an ancient family named Eyghem, originally from England. His father, a brave and loyal squire, who had served in Spain and Italy, where he had cultivatedhis mind and improved his taste, bestowed much attention on his education, and, in particular, initiated him in the knowledge of languages by a process much less tardy and laborious than that pursued in the schools. The expedient he adopted was to provide his son with a German master, who, being entirely ignorant of French, but well versed in Latin, spoke to him only in the latter tongue, which he consequently acquired as a vernacular language, and, at the age of six, was able to converse in it with tolerable freedom and fluency. Greek was also taught him as a sort of diversion. “Nous pelotions nos déclinaisons,” says he, “à la manière de ceux qui, par certains jeux de tablier (échiquier), apprennent l’arithmétique et la géométrie.” By means equally gentle and attractive, he was insensibly led to acquire some knowledge of science; and, without forcing his inclination, or imposing the necessity of application, his habits were formed, and his powers agreeably exercised. All this care and attention he repaid by the most tender affection for the memory of his father; indeed filial piety is said to have formed a conspicuous trait in his character, though it must be confessed that he sometimes displayed it in a manner sufficiently singular. At an early age he was sent to the college of Guienne, at Bordeaux, then the most flourishing in France, and there he had as masters Nicoas Grouchy, William Guérente, George Buchanan, and Muretus, under whom he appears to have made considerable proficiency. Having completed his studies at the age of thirteen, Montaigne resolved to study law; and although his mind, naturally averse to all constraint, must have been repidsed by the conflicting and complicated mass of consuetudinary ju[7:15:426]risprudence with which the tribunals were then surcharged, yet, in 1554, he became a counsellor or advocate at Bordeaux, and continued to practise as such until the death of his elder brother, when he abandoned a profession to which he never had any real liking, and which he appeared afterwards to consider as derogatory. On quitting the bar, for the business of which he had evidently no aptitude, he applied himself to the study of men and manners, and in prosecution of this object travelled through various parts of France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, making his observations on every thing curious or interesting in society, and receiving several marks of distinction in the course of his peregrinations. In 1581 he was admitted a citizen of Rome, in which city he then sojourned; and the same year he was elected mayor of Bordeaux, an office in which he seems to have given much satisfaction to his fellow-citizens. In 1582 he was sent on a special mission to court about some affairs of importance, and on the expiration of his mayoralty he was again elected to the same office. In 1588 he appeared to some advantage at the assembly of the states at Blois, and, though not a deputy, took a share in the proceedings, but on what pretence or in what capacity does not clearly appear. During one of his visits to court he received the cordon of the order of Saint Michel, a distinction which he appears to have greatly coveted, though we afterwards find him complaining of the discredit into which it had fallen. Having retired to his family residence, he devoted himself to study; but his tranquillity was disturbed by the civil wars which desolated Guienne; and being driven from his house, he wandered about during six months seeking for his family, and often with difficulty obtaining an asylum amongst those who had shared his hospitality. It appears, from a statement of De Thou, that Montaigne had sought to bring about a reconciliation between the Duke of Guise and the King of Navarre, afterwards Henry IV.; and on his return from Paris, where he had completed the impression of his Essays, in 1588, he was with the historian at Blois when the Duke of Guise was there assassinated. In his old age he was very much afflicted with stone and nephritic colic, which led him to observe that “la mort le pinçait continuellement à la gorge ou aux reins ;” but he never could be prevailed on to take physic, in which he had no faith whatever. He died on the 13th of September 1589, and was buried in the church of the Feuillants at Bordeaux, where a monument was erected to his memory. Notwithstanding his constitutional tendency to scepticism, and certain unguarded expressions which seem to intimate an entire extinction of the sentiment of religion, he is said to have died a Christian, probably because he had mass celebrated in his chamber in his last moments, and expired during the elevation of the host.

His reputation as a writer is founded solely on his Essays, which were at one time extremely popular, and which are still read with pleasure by a numerous class of persons, who, pardoning the delusions of’self-love and self-deceit, are charmed by the acuteness and originality mingled with good nature and sensibility which he displays, and captivated by the inviting frankness and vivacity with which he unbosoms himself about all his domestic habits and concerns. As a writer, he imparted to the French language an energy which it did not possess before, and which has not become antiquated, because it resides in the thoughts and sentiments rather than in the expression. As a philosopher, his object was to describe man as he is, without reserve and without exaggeration; he studied himself more than any other subject, and recorded his observations with an acuteness and fidelity which have rendered his work an authentic record of many interesting facts relative to human nature. He united in a high degree the powers of observation and reflection, without which the study of man can never be successfully prosecuted; and although there is no doubt much truth in the acute but severe strictures on his character contained in a masterly section of the Port-royal Logic, where his vanity, his self-love, and the indulgent manner in which he speaks of his vices, to say nothing of the use of language indicating a total absence of religious’principle and sentiment, are very freely exposed, yet, as Mr Stewart observes, “this consideration, so far from diminishing the value of his Essays, is one of the most instructive lessons they afford to those who, after the example of the author, may undertake the salutary but humiliating task of self-examination.” In the first Preliminary Dissertation (part i. section ii.), to which the reader is referred, will be found an exposition of the philosophical merits and defects of Montaigne, not less remarkable for ability and discrimination, than for the fair and equitable spirit in which both are distinguished and appreciated. Montaigne’s life was first written by the President Bouhier, and prefixed to a supplementary volume of his works in 1740. (a.)