An impression is for the writer what an experiment is for the scientist, except that for the scientist the work of the intelligence precedes it, and … - Marcel Proust

Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind.

...infirmity alone makes us take notice and learn, and enables us to analyse mechanisms of which otherwise we should know nothing. A man who falls straight into bed night after night, and ceases to live until the moment when he wakes and rises, will surely never dream of making, I don't say great discoveries, but even minor observations about sleep. He scarcely knows that he is asleep. A little insomnia is not without its value in making us appreciate sleep, in throwing a ray of light upon that darkness. An unfailing memory is not a very powerful incentive to the study of the phenomena of memory.

Each of us is indeed alone.