
“One's real life is so often the life that one does not lead.”
Sec. 232
Variant: We have no dreams at all or interesting ones. We should learn to be awake the same way — not at all or in an interesting manner.
Source: The Gay Science (1882)
“One's real life is so often the life that one does not lead.”
450: Dreams — are well — but Waking's better
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson (1960)
"Reasons to De-Test the Schools," New York Times (1988-10-11), later published in Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning (1991)
“Further, as there is no one who does not wish to be happy, so there is no one who does not wish”
XI, 26, Parts of this passage has been heavily compared with later statements of René Descartes; in Latin and with a variant translations:
The City of God (early 400s)
Context: We both are, and know that we are, and delight in our being, and our knowledge of it. Moreover, in these three things no true-seeming illusion disturbs us; for we do not come into contact with these by some bodily sense, as we perceive the things outside of us of all which sensible objects it is the images resembling them, but not themselves which we perceive in the mind and hold in the memory, and which excite us to desire the objects. But, without any delusive representation of images or phantasms, I am most certain that I am, and that I know and delight in this. In respect of these truths, I am not at all afraid of the arguments of the Academicians, who say, What if you are deceived? For if I am deceived, I am. For he who is not, cannot be deceived; and if I am deceived, by this same token I am. And since I am if I am deceived, how am I deceived in believing that I am? for it is certain that I am if I am deceived. Since, therefore, I, the person deceived, should be, even if I were deceived, certainly I am not deceived in this knowledge that I am. And, consequently, neither am I deceived in knowing that I know. For, as I know that I am, so I know this also, that I know. And when I love these two things, I add to them a certain third thing, namely, my love, which is of equal moment. For neither am I deceived in this, that I love, since in those things which I love I am not deceived; though even if these were false, it would still be true that I loved false things. For how could I justly be blamed and prohibited from loving false things, if it were false that I loved them? But, since they are true and real, who doubts that when they are loved, the love of them is itself true and real? Further, as there is no one who does not wish to be happy, so there is no one who does not wish [themself] to be [into being]. For how can he be happy, if he is nothing?
“What one has, one ought to use; and whatever he does, he should do with all his might.”
“One does not learn how to die by killing others.”
Book IX: Ch. 4: Danton – Camille Desmoulins – Fabre d’Églantine.
Mémoires d'outre-tombe (1848 – 1850)