The Loss Of Our Illusions

What Is Failure Except Feebleness? And What Is It To Miss One's Mark Except To Aim Widely And Weakly?

Fame! It Is The Flower Of A Day, That Dies When The Next Sun Rises.

Imagination Without Culture Is Crippled And Moves Slowly; But It Can Be Pure Imagination, And Rich Also, As Folk-lore Will Tell The Vainest.

The State Only Aims At Instilling Those Qualities In Its Public By Which Its Demands Are Obeyed, And Its Exchequer Is Filled. Its Highest Attainment Is The Reduction Of Mankind To Clockwork. In Its Atmosphere All Those Finer And More Delicate Liberties, Which Require Treatment And Spacious Expansion, Inevitably Dry Up And Perish. The State Requires A Taxpaying Machine In Which There Is No Hitch, An Exchequer In Which There Is Never A Deficit, And A Public, Monotonous, Obedient, Colorless, Spiritless, Moving Humbly Like A Flock Of Sheep Along A Straight High Road Between Two Walls.

It Is Only To Those Who Have Never Lived That Death Ever Can Seems Beautiful.