300 Quotes of Renaissance Philosophy

Written by Michel de Montaigne, Francis Bacon and Niccolo Machiavelli

Narrated by Katie Haigh

The Renaissance was a time of tremendous intellectual activity, with breakthroughs in science, arts and philosophy. Discover its immense creativity through three of its greatest thinkers, the French philosopher Michel de Montaigne, the English scientist Sir Francis Bacon, and the Italian political thinker Niccolò Machiavelli.

Montaigne is known for popularizing the essay as a literary genre; his style merges casual anecdotes and autobiography with deep intellectual insights. His "Essays" are among the most influential ever written, and inspired countless great authors.

Sir Francis Bacon was the first to argue for a skeptical and methodical approach in science, based on careful observation of events in nature, and founded on induction. This made him the father of scientific method, a groundbreaking turn of events at the time, and his work is still the basis of the scientific framework today.

Machiavelli is the author of "The Prince", one of the most controversial political treatises ever written; it gives very clear, precise and realistic instructions on how to gain and maintain power, fortune, and glory, sometimes at the expense of others.

This audiobook is a careful compilation of essential quotes, summarizing each one of the great masters' fundamental ideas, for you to get inspired and familiarize yourself with the greatest ideas of the Renaissance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Astorg Audio
• Release date: Jan 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9782821109339

Michel de Montaigne

Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) was a French philosopher, essayist, and statesman. Born in Aquitaine at the Château de Montaigne, he was raised in a wealthy and powerful family with Spanish, Portuguese, and Sephardic Jewish ancestry. Educated by tutors from his father’s humanist circle, he went on to study under Latin scholar George Buchanan at the College of Guienne in Bordeaux. After completing a law degree, he was appointed counselor of the Parlement in Bordeaux and from 1561 to 1563 served as a courtier to Charles IX. After retiring from public life in 1871, he began working on his celebrated Essais (1580). Believed to be inspired by the loss of his dear friend Étienne de La Boétie, a prominent humanist and poet of the French Renaissance, the Essais contain Montaigne’s reflections on literature, the classics, philosophy, human nature, and selfhood. Considered a landmark work of pre-Enlightenment French philosophy, Montaigne’s magnum opus both popularized the essay as a literary form and influenced a wide range of Western thinkers, including William Shakespeare, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, and Friedrich Nietzsche.