{"id":1341,"date":"2007-02-12T07:31:38","date_gmt":"2007-02-12T12:31:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-4\/"},"modified":"2007-03-26T05:54:10","modified_gmt":"2007-03-26T10:54:10","slug":"monday-morning-montaigne-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-4","title":{"rendered":"Monday Morning Montaigne"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Various Outcomes of the Same Plan<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Now I say that not only in medicine but in many more certain arts Fortune has a large part. Poetic sallies, which transport their author and ravish him out of himself, why shall we not attribute them to his good luck? He himself confesses that they surpass his ability and strength, and acknowledges that they come from something other than himself and that he does not have them at all in his power, any more than orators say they have in theirs those extraordinary impulses and agitations that push them beyond their plan. It is the same thing with painting: sometimes there escape from the painter’s hand touches so surpassing his conception and his knowledge as to arouse his wonder and astonishment. But Fortune shows still more evidently the part she has in all these works by the graces and beauties that are found in them, not only without the workman’s intention, but even without his knowledge. An able reader often discovers in other men’s writings perfections beyond those that the author put in or perceived, and lends them richer meanings and aspects.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Various Outcomes of the Same Plan: Now I say that not only in medicine but in many more certain arts Fortune has a large part. Poetic sallies, which transport their author and ravish him out of himself, why shall we not attribute them to his good luck? He himself confesses that they surpass his … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Monday Morning Montaigne”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22,4,45],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1341","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-literature","category-monday-morning-montaigne"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4C7K-lD","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3501,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-of-husbanding-your-will","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":0},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne: Of husbanding your will","author":"Gil","date":"February 23, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a lot going on in Of husbanding your will (pp. 932-954): Montaigne relates the experience of his two-term stint as mayor of Bordeaux (by good luck, he didn't have to do anything dramatic); he explains how the idea of giving up one\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s own desires for the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153greater good\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Monday Morning Montaigne"","block_context":{"text":"Monday Morning Montaigne","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/monday-morning-montaigne"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1424,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-of-cato-the-younger","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":1},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne: Of Cato the Younger","author":"Gil","date":"April 2, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Yeah, yeah, I know: who cares about what Montaigne has to say about Cato the Younger? Well, as usual, M. uses the occasion of a brief (3+ pages) essay on Cato to digress into the nature and impact of poetry. The essay begins with a gorgeous little passage about M.'s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "literature"","block_context":{"text":"literature","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/literature"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1331,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-3","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":2},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne","author":"Gil","date":"February 4, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"This week's Montaigne passage comes from Of the Power of the Imagination. When I saw that title, I assumed it would be an essay on creativity and art. Nope! Turns out it's all about erectile dysfunction! People are right to notice the unruly liberty of this member, obtruding so importunately\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Monday Morning Montaigne"","block_context":{"text":"Monday Morning Montaigne","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/monday-morning-montaigne"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2616,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-of-presumption","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":3},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne: Of presumption","author":"Gil","date":"October 6, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Of presumption runs 30 pages (pp. 581-610 in my edition) in my Complete Works of Montaigne and, like other great essays in the book, its title gives no indication of what's ahead. The essay begins with a description of a \"kind of vainglory\": esteeming oneself too much and not esteeming\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Monday Morning Montaigne"","block_context":{"text":"Monday Morning Montaigne","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/monday-morning-montaigne"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2838,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-of-virtue","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":4},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne: Of virtue","author":"Gil","date":"November 3, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I'm perplexed, dear reader. Of virtue (pp. 646-653) starts with a promising thought \u00e2\u20ac\u201d that it is not in a crisis that we learn who a man is, but through his day-to-day actions \u00e2\u20ac\u201d and somehow evolves into a celebration of assassins. In between, we learn that the ritual suicides\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Monday Morning Montaigne"","block_context":{"text":"Monday Morning Montaigne","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/monday-morning-montaigne"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3342,"url":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/monday-morning-montaigne-of-the-disadvantage-of-greatness","url_meta":{"origin":1341,"position":5},"title":"Monday Morning Montaigne: Of the disadvantage of greatness","author":"Gil","date":"February 2, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"With Of the disadvantage of greatness (pp. 849-853), Montaigne counters Mel Brooks' wisdom that \"it's good to be the king.\" M. concedes that the actions and effects of kings are awesome, but the tradeoff is that they'll never have a measure of themselves because of the deference of their subjects.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Monday Morning Montaigne"","block_context":{"text":"Monday Morning Montaigne","link":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/category\/monday-morning-montaigne"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1341\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chimeraobscura.com\/vm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}