“The assertion that you are in falsehood and I am in truth ist the most cruel thing one man can say to another”

“One of the commonest and most generally accepted delusions is that every man can be qualified in some particular way -- said to be kind, wicked, stupid, energetic, apathetic, and so on. People are not like that. We may say of a man that he is more often kind than cruel, more often wise than stupid, more often energetic than apathetic or vice versa; but it could never be true to say of one man that he is kind or wise, and of another that he is wicked or stupid. Yet we are always classifying mankind in this way. And it is wrong. Human beings are like rivers; the water is one and the same in all of them but every river is narrow in some places, flows swifter in others; here it is broad, there still, or clear, or cold, or muddy or warm. It is the same with men. Every man bears within him the germs of every human quality, and now manifests one, now another, and frequently is quite unlike himself, while still remaining the same man.”

“One of the most widespread superstitions is thatevery man has his own special, definite qualities; that aman is kind, cruel, wise, stupid, energetic, apathetic, etc.Men are not like that . . . Men are like rivers; the water isthe same in each, and alike in all; but every river is narrowhere, is more rapid there, here slower, there broader, nowclear, now cold, now dull, now warm. It is the same withmen. Every man carries in himself the germs of everyhuman quality and sometimes one manifests itself,sometimes another, and the man often becomes unlikehimself—while still remaining the same man.”

“There is one thing, and only one thing, in which it is granted to you to be free in life, all else being beyond your power: that is to recognize and profess the truth.”

“He had the unlucky capacity many men have of seeing and believing in the possibility of goodness and truth, but of seeing the evil and falsehood of life too clearly to take any serious part in it.”

“The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him.”

“It's wrong, what you say, and I beg you, if you're a good man,to forget what you've said, as I forget it," she said at last."Not one word, not one gesture of yours shall I, could I, everforget...”