True Virtue vs. Momentary Heroics — The Essays of Montaigne

Montaigne distinguishes heroic impulses from steady habit: we may briefly surpass ourselves, yet elevated moods rarely tinct the soul for good; order, moderation, and constancy matter more than peaks.

Pyrrho lived indifference in public yet snapped at his sister over a bit of a woman; the sages say judge a man by everyday habit, not surprise feats. Shocking acts follow: a jealous husband's sickle, a lover's self-mutilation, a wife's overnight resolve to drown herself, Indian widows training all life for ritual death beside husbands.

Belief in fixed days can free Bedouins to fight nearly naked or reduce our faith to talk. Montaigne contrasts assassins of the Prince of Orange, who said he was prepared for his sentence, with the bungled attack on Guise, and closes on holy murderers who prize certain death as paradise's door.