Man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.
Opinion is like a pendulum and obeys the same law. If it goes past the centre of gravity on one side, it must go a like distance on the other; and it is only after a certain time that it finds the true point at which it can remain at rest.
Bad books are intellectual poison; they destroy the mind.
Arthur Schopenhauer·1851So it comes about that if anyone spends almost the whole day in reading, and by way of relaxation devotes the intervals to some thoughtless pastime, he gradually loses the capacity for thinking; just as the man who always rides, at last forgets how to walk.
Oscar Wilde·1897Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.
Ralph Waldo Emerson·1841A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.
