“We set no special value on the possession of a virtue until we percieve that it is entirely lacking in our adversary.”

— Friedrich Nietzsche , book Human, All Too Human

Variant: We do not place especial value on the possession of a virtue until we notice its total absence in our opponent.
Source: Human, All Too Human

Last update Oct. 1, 2023. History

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Friedrich Nietzsche 655

German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and cl… 1844–1900

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“For it falls out
That what we have we prize not to the worth
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lacked and lost,
Why, then we rack the value, then we find
The virtue that possession would not show us
While it was ours.”

William Shakespeare book Much Ado About Nothing

Source: Much Ado About Nothing

“That virtue we appreciate is as much ours as another's. We see so much only as we possess.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

June 22, 1839
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“We will never recognize the true value of our own lives until we affirm the value in the life of others.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

1980s, First term of office (1981–1985), Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation (1983)

“It is not by lack of capability that we don't thrive but it is by either lack of knowledge that we possess it or by non-application of it.”

- Goa

“How can we expect people to put value on our work when we don't value ourselves enough to set and hold uncomfortable boundaries?”

Brené Brown (1965) US writer and professor

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“What we possess has its intrinsic value, but how we came to possess it is also an important question.”

Leonard Trelawny Hobhouse (1864–1929) British sociologist

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“The desire to vanquish faults because it is "I" who have them is ineffectual, since it falls within the same category as the faults themselves. Indeed, every fault is a form of egoism or even pride. We must tend towards Perfection because we understand it and therefore love it, and not because we desire that our ego should be perfect. In other terms, we must love and realize a virtue because it is true and beautiful, and not because it would become us if we possessed it; and we must hate and fight against a fault because it is false and ugly, and not because it is ours and because it disfigures us. To possess a virtue is first and foremost to be without the fault which is contrary to it, for God created us virtuous. He created us in His image; faults are superimposed. Moreover it is not we who possess virtue, it is virtue which possesses us.”

Frithjof Schuon (1907–1998) Swiss philosopher

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“The nearer we approach to the goal of life, the better we begin to understand the true value of our existence, and the real weight of our opinions. We set out much in love with both; but we leave much behind us as we advance.”

Edmund Burke book A Vindication of Natural Society

A Vindication of Natural Society (1756)
Context: You are, my Lord, but just entering into the world; I am going out of it. I have played long enough to be heartily tired of the drama. Whether I have acted my part in it well or ill, posterity will judge with more candour than I, or than the present age, with our present passions, can possibly pretend to. For my part, I quit it without a sigh, and submit to the sovereign order without murmuring. The nearer we approach to the goal of life, the better we begin to understand the true value of our existence, and the real weight of our opinions. We set out much in love with both; but we leave much behind us as we advance. We first throw away the tales along with the rattles of our nurses; those of the priest keep their hold a little longer; those of our governors the longest of all. But the passions which prop these opinions are withdrawn one after another; and the cool light of reason, at the setting of our life, shows us what a false splendour played upon these objects during our more sanguine seasons. Happy, my Lord, if, instructed by my experience, and even by my errors, you come early to make such an estimate of things, as may give freedom and ease to your life. I am happy that such an estimate promises me comfort at my death.

“If we value independence, if we are disturbed by the growing conformity of knowledge, of values, of attitudes, which our present system induces, then we may wish to set up conditions of learning which make for uniqueness, for self-direction, and for self-initiated learning.”

Carl R. Rogers (1902–1987) American psychologist

On Becoming a Person (1961)
Source: page # not specified

“If we are bothered by possessions we cannot really live either from without or from within; we are the possession of our possessions.”

Natalie Clifford Barney (1876–1972) writer and salonist

In "My Country 'tis of Thee", ADAM International Review, No. 299 (1962)
Context: I am beginning to have a healthy dread of possessions, be it of a country, a house, a being or even an idea. If we are bothered by possessions we cannot really live either from without or from within; we are the possession of our possessions. All wars and most loves come from the possessive instinct. Why grab possessions like thieves, or divide them like socialists when you can ignore them like wise men: that you may belong to everything and everything be yours inclusive of yourself.
Could we, and we can, have the vital necessities for all, we should do away with this cry of class and begin to differentiate between individuals.
Individual superiority can alone feed the soul and give back through some materialisation of itself this individualised wealth of being.

“We set no special value on the possession of a virtue until we percieve that it is entirely lacking in our adversary.”

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Friedrich Nietzsche 655

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