I'm A Libertine, But It's Not My

If It Is True That There Is No Greater Sorrow Than To Remember A Happy Time In A State Of Misery, It Is Just As True That Calling Up A Moment Of Anguish In A Tranquil Mood, Seated Quietly At One's Desk, Is A Source Of Profound Satisfaction.

Conquering Matter Is To Understand It, And Understanding Matter Is Necessary To Understanding The Universe And Ourselves: And That Therefore Mendeleev's Periodic Table, Which Just During Those Weeks We Were Learning To Unravel, Was Poetry.

The Butterfly's Attractiveness Derives Not Only From Colors And Symmetry: Deeper Motives Contribute To It. We Would Not Think Them So Beautiful If They Did Not Fly, Or If They Flew Straight And Briskly Like Bees, Or If They Stung, Or Above All If They Did Not Enact The Perturbing Mystery Of Metamorphosis: The Latter Assumes In Our Eyes The Value Of A Badly Decoded Message, A Symbol, A Sign.

To Accuse Another Of Having Weak Kidneys, Lungs, Or Heart, Is Not A Crime; On The Contrary, Saying He Has A Weak Brain Is A Crime.

But Many, Many Stories Were Told; From What Could Be Gathered, All Fifty Of The Mine's Inhabitants Had Reacted On Each Other, Two By Two, As In Combinatorial Analysis, That Is To Say, Everyone With All The Others, And Especially Every Man With All The Women, Old Maids Or Married, And Every Woman With All The Men. All I Had To Do Was To Select Two Names At Random, Better If Different Sex, And Ask A Third Person, "what Happened With Those Two?" And Lo And Behold, A Splendid Story Was Unfolded For Me, Since Everyone Knew The Story Of Everyone Else.