Book 1, Chapter 10: Of Quick or Slow Speech

In this quirky piece Montaigne outlines the difference between the witty speaker and the ponderous. Then, he muses over the benefits of being prepared vs. acting spontaneously, and he wonders where his own words come from.

‘All graces were never yet given to any one man’ – a verse from one of Le Brebis’s sonnets

Some are very gifted in the art of speaking; they have a quick and easy wit, ready on all occasions and never taken by surprise. Others are heavy and slow, unable to say anything they have not ‘long premeditated and taken great pains to fit and prepare’.

When we teach young women sports and exercises to enhance and showcase their beauty and their character, we should teach them eloquence too. At the moment, it seems to be a skill that belongs principally to the lawyers and preachers of our age. I for one think that the preacher should be a slow speaker and the lawyer quick, because the preacher can allow himself all the time he wants to prepare. After all, ‘his career is performed in an even … line, without stop or interruption.’ The lawyer, on the other hand, has to prepared to defend a number of different cases, and to face all kinds of ‘unexpected objections and replies’, when the opposition attempts to jostle him off course or have him think up new answers and defences.

Still, lawyers are not always quick-witted. Let me share the example of Pope Clement and King Francis, where the Pope was asked to have a speech delivered on his behalf to the King and his subjects. The man chosen to make the speech was Mr. Poyet, a very experienced lawyer, known for his eloquence. Poyet had prepared the speech long in advance, in Paris. On the day of the speech, the Pope, afraid that the prepared speech was not appropriate, told the King of a speech he felt more suiting to the time and place, but very different from the one Poyet had taken so much time in preparing. The King liked it, and Poyet was asked to contrive a new speech. He found himself completely unable to do so, and in the end someone else gave the speech instead.

The lawyer’s job is more difficult than that of the preacher; and yet, in my opinion we see more passable lawyers in France than preachers. ‘It should seem that the nature of wit is to have its operation prompt and sudden, and that of judgment to have it more deliberate and more slow’. But he who stays silent, in order to take his time in deciding what to say, and he who finds that time does not better his speech at all, are equally unhappy.

Severus Cassius, it is said, spoke best when he was unprepared to speak. He was more obliged then, to fortune than to his own diligence, and it was actually an advantage to him to be interrupted whilst speaking. His adversaries were afraid, therefore, to annoy him, ‘lest his anger should redouble his eloquence.’ I’m familiar with this kind of disposition – so impatient of tedious preparation that it can only perform well if it works with a care-free light-heartedness. We say of some paintings that ‘they stink of oil and of the lamp’ because laborious handling can sometimes lend a rough harshness to work. Besides, the over-worrying about doing well can result in a mind ‘too far strained and overbent’, and this mind ‘breaks and hinders itself’ like water that is unable to escape from the neck of a bottle or a narrow path, due to its own force and abundance. Also, this type of laborious and painstaking style of work cannot be disordered or stimulated with the same kinds of ‘passions of fury’ as Cassius in his speeches.

As for me, I always perform worst when prepared. Accident and chance play a larger role in anything that comes from me than I myself play. The situation, the people I am around, even the rising and falling of my own voice, extract more from my mind than I myself could find if I tried to use my mind myself. Thus, ‘the things I say are better than those I write, if either were to be preferred where neither is worth anything’. Also, I’ve noted that ‘I do not find myself where I seek myself’. I discover things more by chance than by reasoning. Sometimes, I hit upon something when I write, and it appears clever and fresh to me, although maybe to others it will seem dull and heavy. But let’s leave these compliments; everyone talks this way of his perceived talent. 


When I speak, ‘I am already so lost that I know not what I was about to say’ and sometimes the person I am addressing finds out what I mean before I do. If I were to stop myself every time this happened, I would, in fact, say nothing. Often, the meaning of what I have said is made clear to me long after I've actually said it.