“You must first be nothing to become something.”
Book: Cometan, the Omnidoxy
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Cometan 20
Related quotes

“It is far better to become something than to remain anything but become nothing.”
Source: Books, Beyond Order (2021), p. 188

No record of this specific remark exists prior to its use by a George W. Phillips, in an address to the fifth annual convention of the National Association of Life Underwriters (June 1894), reported in The Chronicle: A Weekly Journal, Devoted to the Interests of Insurance Vol. LIII (1894), p. 336 https://books.google.com/books?id=xoAoAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA335&dq=%22What+is+defeat?+Nothing+but+education.+Nothing+but+the+first+step+to+something+better.%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiFiMan5KveAhWl6YMKHYV6C44Q6AEIdTAO#v=onepage&q=%22What%20is%20defeat%3F%20Nothing%20but%20education.%20Nothing%20but%20the%20first%20step%20to%20something%20better.%22&f=false
Misattributed

After the Ending
Lyrics, The Empyrean (2009)

“To enrich God, man must become poor; that God may be all, man must be nothing.”
The Essence of Christianity (1841)