He was radically opposed to violence and the insidious clashes between Protestants and Catholics. While Montaigne was a Catholic himself, he outspokenly condemned religious fanaticism: “I accept other people's choice and stay in the position where God put me. Otherwise I could not keep myself from rolling about incessantly. Thus I have, by the grace of God, kept myself intact, without agitation or disturbance of conscience, in the ancients beliefs of our religion, in the midst of so many sects and divisions that our century has produced." In accordance with his overall philosophy, belief itself, for Montaigne, always had to demonstrate its relevance and applicability to daily-life and experience.