Montaigne on Eloquence: The Masonic Art of the Right Word
In the sixteenth century, a French thinker penned a brief but striking essay on the art of speaking. His observations about eloquence and the speed with which people choose their words touch on something timeless. Centuries later, we can hear in his thoughts an echo of values that also stand at the heart of Freemasonry: the search for truth, the importance of self-reflection, and the understanding that true wisdom often resides in what we choose not to say. A Renaissance Thinker Speaks Michel de Montaigne lived from 1533 to 1592. After an active career in public life, he withdrew to his estate to write and to think. His collection of essays — written in an intensely personal, searching style — ranks among the most influential works in Western literature. In the tenth essay of his first book, he turned his attention to something seemingly simple: the way people speak. Some, he observed, speak quickly and rashly. Others weigh every word with care. Montaigne himself confessed to being one of the slower speakers, someone whose thoughts only reached full maturity after time had passed. This honest self-observation is characteristic of his method. He did not write to lecture others, but to […]
