“If what we think of ourselves were true, the planet would overflow with geniuses.”
“Real geniuses would like that what we think of ourselves is true.”
“What others think of us would be of little moment did it not, when known, so deeply tinge what we think of ourselves.”
“I realize that a certain school of thoughtsays that who we are is something we construct for ourselves. We build ourselves out of what we think we remember, what we believe to be true about our life; and the possessions we gather around us are supposedly a part of this, that we are, to some extent what we own.”
“pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves, vanity to what we would have others think of us.”
“I wondered. What did she think of our attempts to persuader ourselves that this was life and that we were really living it?”