Freundlos war der große Weltenmeister, Fühlte Mangel - darum schuf er Geister. Sel'ge Spiegel seiner Seligkeit! Fand das höchste Wesen schon kein gle… - Friedrich Schiller

They have founded the whole structure of their happiness on these very illusions, which ought to be combated and dissipated by the light of knowledge, and they would think they were paying too dearly for a truth which begins by robbing them of all that has value in their sight. It would be necessary that they should be already sages to love wisdom: a truth that was felt at once by him to whom philosophy owes its name.

To what absurd conclusions must this notion of a sympathy of souls, derived from the propinquity of bodies, inevitably tend? A common source of being is to produce community of sentiment; identity of matter, identity of impulse.

De behoefte om welgevallig te zijn onderwerpt de machtige aan het fijnzinnige oordeel van de smaak; de lust kan hij stelen, maar de liefde moet een geschenk zijn.