The blood flowed freely in my veins, but a weight of despair and remorse pressed on my heart, which nothing could remove. - Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

It was very different when the masters of science sought immortality and power; such views, although futile, were grand: but now the scene was changed. The ambition of the inquirer seemed to limit itself to the annihilation of those visions on which my interest in science was chiefly founded. I was required to exchange chimeras of boundless grandeur for realities of little worth.

You accuse me of murder; and yet you would, with a satisfied conscience, destroy your own creature. Oh, Praise the eternal justice of man!

In my joy I thrust my hand into the live embers, but quickly drew it out with a cry of pain. How strange, I thought that the same cause should produce such opposite effects.