Saturday, May 14, 2011

On human nature and quotes I like

I just read this from Muriel Barbery's "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" and it really resonated.

So here is my profound thought for the day: this is the first time I have met
someone who seeks out people and who sees beyond. that may seem trivial but I
think it is profound all the same. We never look beyond our assumptions and,
what's worse, we have given up trying to meet others, we just meet ourselves. We
don't recognize each other because other people have become our permanent
mirrors. If we actually realized this, if we were to become aware of the fact
that we are only ever looking at ourselves in the other person, that we are
alone in the wilderness, we would go crazy.

I think it's up there with my other favorite quote, from Dostoevsky's "Crime and Punishment":

"What I want to say is this: - If you logically try to persuade a person that there is no absolute reason for shedding tears, the person in question will cease weeping. That's self evident. Why, I should like to know, should such a person continue doing so?"

"If such were the usual course of things, life would be a very easy matter," replied Raskolnikoff.

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