Augustine Vs Montaigne Essay

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Augustine and Montaigne both accepted outside religions to certain degrees, but both men had their own views of Christianity. Augustine was converted to Christianity and went on to convert others to his faith while Montaigne wrote on the trying times going on between the Protestants and Catholics during the French civil wars and compared it to natives of South America. Augustine was stricter in thinking that Christianity was the only way to heaven, while Montaigne was more open to new beliefs. Augustine believed everyone should convert to Christianity and worked from his conversion to his death to try to convert people. Looking back after he was converted, he saw things in his past that could have been changed. For example when he said he “enjoy[ed] [the Overturners] companionship,” he knew that what they were doing was wrong and “abominated the acts that were their specialty” (56). Strictly speaking, he liked their friendship but loathed what they liked to do. This means that he could see them as people when he looked back, but he saw the “devils in their behavior” (56). One reason he might be able to accept other people more readily is his own past. In Confessions, he admits that he followed other…show more content…
He paints a picture with his words of the almost noble savage, who only fights when it is right. He does seem to project Jehovah onto the native’s ‘god’ when he says, “[d]ivination is a gift of God” (357).This means that the soothsayers were given a gift from “God”, but it is a little unclear if it is from Jehovah or a native god (357). At the same time, he defends the native’s practice of taking multiple wives by comparing it with the Bible. He tells of the time when “Stratonice… lent her husband for his use a very beautiful young chambermaid in her service” as well as naming other women who did similar

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