Car, je te le dis en vérité, Nathanaël, chaque désir m'a plus enrichi que la possession toujours fausse de l'objet même de mon désir. - André Gide

At times it seems to me that I am living my life backwards, and that at the approach of old age my real youth will begin. My soul was born covered with wrinkles—wrinkles my ancestors and parents most assiduously put there and that I had the greatest trouble removing.

The deeper the soul plunges into religious devotion, the more it loses all sense of reality, all need, all desire, all love for reality.

What would a narrative of happiness be like? All that can be described is what prepares it, and then what destroys it.