“With regard to which, though we are dull of sight, yet let us strive to clear away the mist from the eyes of the soul.”
Upon The Mother Of The Gods (c. 362-363)
Context: To what purpose, pray, exist all these things that be born? Whence come male and female? Whence the difference in kind of all things that be, amongst visible species, unless there be certain pre-existing and previously established Reasons and Causes subsisting beforehand, in the nature of a pattern? With regard to which, though we are dull of sight, yet let us strive to clear away the mist from the eyes of the soul.
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Julian (emperor) 97
Roman Emperor, philosopher and writer 331–363Related quotes

“This book endeavors to clear away the mists which prevent so many from seeing the road.”
The Great Illusion (1910)

“Heaven grants us this hour: now from our gate
all mists have cleared; on high, clouds roll away.”
Source: The Tale of Kiều (1813), Lines 3121–3122; quoted by Joe Biden, while welcoming Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong in Washington (July 2015), as reported in "The Tale of Kieu, lotus and the US President" by Bui Hoang Tam, dtinews.vn (25 May 2016) http://dtinews.vn/en/news/027/45323/the-tale-of-kieu--lotus-and-the-us-president.html: "Thank heaven we are here today, to see the sun through parting fog and clouds."

“I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away.”
Source: The Thing (1929), Ch. IV : The Drift From Domesticity
Context: In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, "I don't see the use of this; let us clear it away." To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: "If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it."
This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. If he knows how it arose, and what purposes it was supposed to serve, he may really be able to say that they were bad purposes, or that they have since become bad purposes, or that they are purposes which are no longer served. But if he simply stares at the thing as a senseless monstrosity that has somehow sprung up in his path, it is he and not the traditionalist who is suffering from an illusion.

Canto XIX, lines 58–63 (tr. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Paradiso

“Every thing that is around us strives to draw us away from the true faith.”
Source: Sermons on the First Epistle of Peter (1855), p. 9

“We are striving for the amelioration of this suffering world. Let us be economical.”
Source: Why I Am a Vegetarian: An Address Delivered before the Chicago Vegetarian Society (1895), pp. 43–44