THE Essays of French nobleman Michel de Montaigne represent the beginning of the essay as a species of writing. Montaigne called his reflective prose works "essais" to accentuate their tentative and personal qualities: they make no claims to objectivity or Conclusiveness, choosing rather to focus on their author's awareness of and reactions to stated topics. In form they are leisurely and meandering, conforming only to the contours of memory and fancy,seldom submitting to the disciplines of rhetoric. It is a testament to the quality and depth of Montaigne's thought that the results of this permissive method so rarely stray into self-indulgence: instead, they illumine the workings and particularities of an individual mind as few writings have before or since, while displaying an ironical blend of skepticism and common sense that has come to symbolize the spirit of the Renaissance.

In laying the literary groundwork for the development of the essay, French writer and thinker Michel de Montaigne presented to the world a complete self-portrait-physical, emotional and intellectual-that was also a mirror in which humanity as a whole found itself reflected. His early essays contained strong elements of stoicism and skepticism,while later efforts indicate a greater balance and an acceptance of nature, with an unflinching openness to new ideas and a willingness to examine impartially the foundations of accepted customs and values. Now readers can sample the vigor and penetration of Montaignes thought in this selection of eight of his best essays: Of Friendship, Of Books, Of Cruelty, Of Repentance, Of Three Commerces, Of Solitude, Of the Inequality Amongst Us and That It Is Folly to Measure Truth and Error by Our Own Capacity. This edition uses the classic Charles Cotton translation.

That It Is Folly to Measure Truth and Error by Our Own Capacity (Book I, Essay 27*)

Of Friendship (Book I, Essay 28)

Of Solitude (Book I, Essay 39)

Of the Inequality Amongst Us (Book I, Essay 42)

Of Books (Book II, Essay 10)

Of Cruelty (Book II, Essay 11)

Of Repentance (Book III, Essay 2)

Of Three Commerces (Book III, Essay 3)