A Catalog of Montaigne's Beam Inscriptions

Each has his own tastes, Gods and men alike.

(Euripides–Hippolytus 104, from Erasmus)

I shelter where the storm drives me.

(Horace–Epistles I.i.14)

The only certainty is that nothing is certain, and that nothing is less noble or more proud than man.

(Pliny–Naturalis Historia II.5)

Happy is he who has fortunes and reason.

(Menander–Mon. 340, from Stobaeus)

The fool has more hope of wisdom than the man who calls himself wise. Proverbs 26

It is no more in this way than in that, or in neither.

(Aulus Gellius, via Henricius Stephanus’ 1562 annotated edition of Sextus Empiricus)

Be no wiser than is necessary, but be wise in moderation. Letter of Paul to the Romans, 12

Why with designs for the far future do you weary a mind that is unequal to them?

(Horace–Carmina II.11)

If any man thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself. Letter of Paul to the Galatians, 6[.3].