“It has often been said that a reformation should begin with each man reforming himself. That, however, is not what actually happened, for the reformation produced a hero who paid God dearly enough for his position as hero. By joining up with him directly people buy cheap, indeed at bargain prices, what he had paid for so dearly; but they do not buy the highest of all things.”

The Present Age, by Søren Kierkegaard, 1846, Dru translation 1962, p. 56-57
1840s, Two Ages: A Literary Review (1846)

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Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism 1813–1855

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