During his relatively short life, he died in 1592, he distinguished himself mainly as an adviser to the powerful, a policy wonk if you will. But posterity reveres him as an essayist.
To essay is to try, An essay is an attempt. It's throwing something out to see if it sticks.
Montaigne wrote about himself to a degree generally beyond anything published before him. He helped spawn a world in which essays, memoirs and autobiographies are rife,
I think of Montaigne as an originator of the immanent frame -- guiding us to the observable world in which we live, He is hailed as a great skeptic, but I think it is most accurate to see him as a champion of observation. And as an archenemy of superstition, which is the creation of suppositions for which there is no proof and their promotion as things to be believed"
'via Blog this'
