Orts #762

 
 
 
 We see indeed that the finger moves, and that the foot moves; that some parts stir of themselves without our leave, and that others we move by our command; that a certain apprehension engenders a blush, a certain other, pallor. One imagination acts only on the spleen, another on the brain; one makes us laugh, another weep. Another paralyzes and stuns all our senses, and arrests the movement of our limbs. At one object the stomach rises; at another, a certain part lower down,
     But how a spiritual impression can cut such a swath in a massive and solid object, and the nature of the relation and connection between these wonderful springs of action, no man has ever known.
     -- Montaigne, in an essay, Apology for Raymond Sebond
 
 
   The reason why we doubt hardly anything is that we never test our common impressions. We do not probe the base, where the fault and weakness lies; we dispute only about the branches. We do not ask whether this is true, but whether it has been understood this way or that. We do not ask whether Galen said anything worth saying, but whether he said thus or otherwise. 
     -- Montaigne, in an essay, Apology for Raymond Sebond
 
 
Of what is the subtlest madness made, but the subtlest wisdom? As great enmities are born of great friendships, and mortal maladies of vigorous health, so are the greatest and wildest manias born of the rare and lively stirrings of our soul; it is only a half turn of the peg to pass from the one to the other.
     -- Montaigne, in an essay, Apology for Raymond Sebond