Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
Some losses or defeats result in greater honor or insight than winning would have.
In plain terms
Sometimes losing feels more honorable than winning.
What can you take from it?
Defeat can bring unexpected honor or growth.

Where it applies

  • sports
  • politics
  • personal struggles

Putting it to work

  • reframing loss
  • learning from failure
  • valuing integrity

Questions to consider

  • Have you won by losing?
  • What makes a defeat triumphant?

Another view

Not all defeats are noble or meaningful.

More from Michel de Montaigne

  1. The worst of my actions or conditions seem not so ugly unto me as I find it both ugly and base not to dare to avouch for them.

    Permalink to quote #126
  2. There is a plague on Man, the opinion that he knows something.

    Permalink to quote #128
  3. The world is but a perpetual see-saw.

    Permalink to quote #125

Related quotes

  1. Success is counted sweetest By those who ne'er succeed. To comprehend a nectar Requires a sorest need. Not one of all the purple Host Who took the Flag today C…

    Emily DickinsonEmily Dickinson quote #2
  2. 'Sometimes you win by losing. Standard thinking said I was a loser; a man who couldn't make the grade at university; a quitter. (...) As it was, I had to open …

    Shigesato ItoiShigesato Itoi quote #3
  3. It is better to be defeated standing for a high principle than to run by committing subterfuge.

    Grover ClevelandGrover Cleveland quote #26