“Il les a, de bonne foy, renoncez et quittez” Good faith as recognition of ignorance in the Essays

This article aims to specify how Montaigne uses the notion of « good faith » in the Essays, examining its connection with the act of recognition understood as admission of ignorance. Stressing its legal origin and meaning, it attempts to show that goof faith is not to be understood within the paradigm of fides, in terms of fidelity to given word, but as a piece of the book’s gnoseology and ethics of « conférence ».