Truth & Appearances

It is much easier to recognize error than to find truth; the former lies on the surface, this is quite manageable; the latter resides in depth, and this quest is not everyone's business.
-Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Unproductive Criticism

You can neither protect nor defend yourself against criticism; you have to act in defiance of it and this is gradually accepted.
-Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Doubt

You really only know when you know little; doubt grows with knowledge.
-Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Carnival

During a carnival men put cardboard faces over their masks.

-Xavier Forneret

Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?
-Abraham Lincoln

The desire for safety stands against every great and noble enterprise.
-Tacitus

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool.
To weep is to risk appearing sentimental.
To reach for another is to risk involvement.
To expose your ideas, your dreams, before a crowd, is to risk their loss.
To love is to risk not being loved in return.
To live is to risk dying.
To believe is to risk failure.
But risks must be taken, because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.
The people who risk nothing do nothing, have nothing, are nothing.
They may avoid suffering and sorrow, but they cannot learn, feel, change, grow, love, live.
Chained by their attitudes, they are slaves; they have forfeited their freedom.
Only a person who risks is free.
-Anon.

In the depth of winter, I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.
-Albert Camus