Mikhail Lermontov

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Love, like fire, goes out without fuel

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We practically always excuse things when we understand them

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I was modest--they accused me of being crafty: I became secretive. I felt deeply good and evil--nobody caressed me, everybody offended me: I became rancorous. I was gloomy--other children were merry and talkative. I felt myself superior to them--but was considered inferior: I became envious. I was ready to love the whole world--none understood me: and I learned to hate

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A childish feeling, I admit, but, when we retire from the conventions of society and draw close to nature, we involuntarily become children: each attribute acquired by experience falls away from the soul, which becomes anew such as it was once and will surely be again

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I've an insatiable craving inside me that consumes everything and makes me regard the sufferings and joys of others only in their relationship to me, as food to sustain my spiritual powers. I am no longer capable of loosing my head in love, Ambition has been crushed in me by circumstances, but it has come out in another way, for ambition is nothing but a lust for power and my chief delight is to dominate those around me. To inspire in others love, devotion, fear - isn't that the first symptom and the supreme triumph of power? To cause another person suffering or joy, having no right to do so - isn't that the sweetest food of pride?