KIERKEGAARDeitherordiapsalmata

I feel as if I were a piece in a game of chess, when my opponent says of it: That piece shall not be moved.

If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure dissappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so foaming, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!

Something wonderful has happened to me. I was carried up into the seventh heaven. There all the gods sat assembled. By special grace I was granted the favor of a wish. "Will you," said Mercury, "have youth, or beauty, or power, or a long life, or the most beautiful maiden, or any of the other glories we have in the chest? Choose, but only one thing." For a moment I was at a loss. Then I addressed myself to the gods as follows: "Most honorable contemporaries, I choose this one thing, that I may always have the laugh on my side." Not one of the gods said a word, on the contrary, they all began to laugh. Hence I concluded that my request was granted, and found that the gods knew how to express themselves with taste; for it would hardly have been suitable for them to have answered gravely: "It is granted thee."

The essence of pleasure does not lie in the thing enjoyed, but in the accompanying consciousness. If I had a humble spirit in my service, who, when I asked for a glass of water, brought me the world's costliest wines blended in a chalice, I should dismiss him, in order to teach him that pleasure consists not in what I enjoy, but in having my own way.

Unhappy artist pair, do you know that these tones are an eptiome of all the glories in the world? [about the song of a few poor street musicians]

What is youth? A dream. What is love? The substance of a dream.