“All wishes, whatever their apparent content, have the same and unvarying meaning: "I refuse to be what I am."”
"Interlude: West's Disease", p. 241
The Dyer's Hand, and Other Essays (1962)
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W. H. Auden122
Anglo-American poet 1907–1973Related quotes
Bartolomeo Vanzetti (1888–1927) Italian American anarchist executed by Massachusetts
Last words http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/big/0823.html (April 15, 1920)
Epictetus (50–138) philosopher from Ancient Greece
That we do not study to make Use of the established Principles concerning Good and Evil, Chap. xvi.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
Paul of Tarsus book Epistle to the Romans
Romans 7:14-20 http://www.jw.org/en/publications/bible/nwt/books/romans/7/ <br class="br">Epistle to the Romans
John Newton (1725–1807) Anglican clergyman and hymn-writer
As quoted in The Christian Pioneer (1856) edited by Joseph Foulkes Winks, p. 84. Also in The Christian Spectator, vol. 3 (1821), p. 186 http://books.google.com/books?id=mv4oAAAAYAAJ&dq=ah%2C%20how%20imperfect%20and%20deficient!%20I%20am%20not%20what%20I%20wish%20to%20be&pg=PA186#v=onepage&q=ah,%20how%20imperfect%20and%20deficient!%20I%20am%20not%20what%20I%20wish%20to%20be&f=false <br class="br">Often paraphrased as I am not the man I ought to be, I am not the man I wish to be, and I am not the man I hope to be, but by the grace of God, I am not the man I used to be."'
Girish Raghunath Karnad (1938–2019) Indian playwright
Renaissance Man, 24 November 2013, India Today http://www.india-today.com/itoday/12041999/arts.html,