fate is strange.. almost no one i know married the first love of their lives. but for those who did are always telling me that they missed soemthing important, that they didn’t experience all that they might have.." - by the river piedra i sat down and wept
Humanity is our common lot. All men are made of the same clay. There is no difference, at least here on Earth, in the fate assigned to us. We come of the same void, inhabit the same flesh, are dissolved in the same ashes. But ignorance infecting the human substance turns it black, and that incurable blackness, gaining possession of the soul, becomes Evil.
I believe in Spinoza's God, who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind... to Rabbi Herbert Goldstein (1929)
If the whole responsibility is thrown upon our own shoulders, we shall be at our highest and best; when we have nobody to grope towards, no devil to lay our blame upon, no Personal God to carry our burdens, when we are alone responsible, then we shall rise to our highest and best. I am responsible for my fate, I am the bringer of good unto myself, I am the bringer of evil.
Come near, that no more blinded by man's fate, I find under the boughs of love and hate, In all poor foolish things that live a day, Eternal beauty wandering on her way.
O sir, you are old; nature in you stands on the very verge of her confine; you should be ruled and led by some discretion, that discerns your fate better than you yourself.
The weakness of modern tragedy[is that] transgression against the social code is made to bring destruction, as though the social code worked our irrevocable fate.