William writes:
"Here's a line or two from Montaigne (essay 16). 'There is the name and the
thing. The name is a sound which designates and signifies the thing; the
name
is not part of the thing or of the substance, it is an extraneous piece
attached to the thing and outside of it.'
"I suppose you'll say Montaigne was muddled and confused.
WC"
In fact, Montaigne's Book One Chapter 16 is titled "On Glory". It is about
the dangers of investing belief and pursuit in high reputation. Montaigne has,
as usual, much of worth to say in the essay. (And much of folly. The lines
William quotes constitute the first paragraph of the piece. Read the second
paragraph, the one that begins, "God, who is himself all fullness and the acme
of
all perfectionb&")
And yes, to the extent Montaigne was not talking about "name" solely as
"reputation", to the extent he felt he was writing ontological wisdom about
issues
that were later addressed by philosophers of language, he was muddled and
confused. If I had an hour with him, I believe I could persuade him it's a
mistake
to say "names" -- as either sounds or scriptions -- "designate" or "signify"
anything, and the only "attachment" is in the associating minds of those who
have heard the "sound" before.
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