The Confessions of Montaigne
Journal Title: Religions - Year 2012, Vol 3, Issue 4
Abstract
Montaigne rarely repented and he viewed confession—both juridical and ecclesiastical—with skepticism. Confession, Montaigne believed, forced a mode of self-representation onto the speaker that was inevitably distorting. Repentance, moreover, made claims about self-transformation that Montaigne found improbable. This article traces these themes in the context of Montaigne‘s Essays, with particular attention to ―On Some Verses of Virgil‖ and argues that, for Montaigne, a primary concern was finding a means of describing a self that he refused to reduce, as had Augustine and many other writers before and after him, to the homo interior.
Authors and Affiliations
John Jeffries Martin
Keywords
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- EP ID EP25276
- DOI https://doi.org/10.3390/rel3040950
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