Is there such a feeling as love at first sight? And if there be, in what does its nature differ from love founded in long observation and slow growth… - Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

When falsehood can look so like the truth, who can assure themselves of certain happiness?

The rights and duties of man thus simplified, it seems almost impertinent to attempt to illustrate truths that appear so incontrovertible: yet such deeply rooted prejudices have clouded reason, and such spurious qualities have assumed the name of virtues, that it is necessary to pursue the course of reason as it has been perplexed and involved in error, by various adventitious circumstances, comparing the simple axiom with casual deviations.
Men, in general, seem to employ their reason to justify prejudices, which they have imbibed, they cannot trace how, rather than to root them out. The mind must be strong that resolutely forms its own principles; for a kind of intellectual cowardice prevails which makes many men shrink from the task, or only do it by halves. Yet the imperfect conclusions thus drawn, are frequently very plausible, because they are built on partial experience, on just, though narrow, views.

Alas! Victor, when falsehood can look so like the truth, who can look so like the truth, who can assure themselves of certain happiness?