of montaigne

in our class we kinda decided that montaigne was trying to say two different things. the first was that most people judge other civilizations based on popular say and the second was that people should judge based on logic and reason. i dont think these two things can be separated. no matter how reason based you are there will undoubtedly be some aspect of your culture or life experience that factors into that reason. your upbringing and those around you will always have some sort of influence on you. you could either be in agreement with that popular say or you can disagree with it. even if you disagree with what the majority says, they are still having some sort of influence on you. in montaigne's case he has lived in france and he thinks it is full of problems. he is convinced that france is wrong. there may be many things wrong with how the country is run or its principles but there can still be an argument made for several positive aspects of france. it seems as though montaigne appreciates the brazilians for their culture, but it also seems like he appreciates them because they are not france. there is more distaste for france in this piece than admiration for brazil. he can say that based on reason and logic brazil is less barbaric than france but that reason is based off of what he does not like about this own culture.