Metaphors by this thinker like “if I confer with a stubborn wit, and encounter a sturdy wrestler” were dulled in the Charles Cotton translation of him used until the 1900s. This thinker asserted the company of books is the best kind of friendship, since love involves committing to marriage. This thinker criticized Europeans who consider themselves “better-bred sort of men” and argued that “every man calls barbarous anything he is not accustomed to” in a work contrasting the West with Brazilian natives that (*) eat their dead. This thinker, who asserted that to study philosophy is to learn to die, defended a Spanish author’s Theologia naturalis in his Apology for Raymond Sebond. This author of the work Of Cannibals used the motto “what do I know?”. For 10 points, name this French thinker who wrote the Essays. ■END■
ANSWER: Michel de Montaigne [or Michel Eyquem, Seigneur de Montaigne]
<Philosophy - Philosophy>
= Average correct buzz position