Think Other-Wise

The folly of mistaking a paradox for a discovery, a metaphor for a proof, a torrent of verbage for a spring of capital truths, and oneself for an oracle, is inborn in us.
— Paul Ambroise Valery, from Introduction to the Method of Leonardo da Vinci, McGreevy (tr.), in The Portable Dragon: The Western Man's Guide to the I Ching, R.G.G. Sui, p. 75.

One might think that a man of genius could browse in the greatness of his own thoughts and dispose with the cheap applause of the mob which he dispises. But actually he falls a victim to the more mighty herd instinct; his searching, his findings, and his call are inexorably meant for the crowd and must be heard.
— Carl Gustav Jung, "Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido," Jacobi (tr.), in Psychological Reflections, quoted in Ibid., p. 83.

But perhaps the desire of the thing called fame will torment thee. — See how soon everything is forgotten, and look at the chaos of infinite time on each side of the present, and the emptiness of applause, and the changeableness and want of judgment in those who pretend to give praise, and the narrowness of the space within which it is circumscribed, and be quiet at last. For the whole earth is a point, and how small a nook in it is this thy dwelling, and how few are there in it, and what kind of people are they who will praise.
— Marcus Aurelius Antominus, Meditations, George Long (tr.), Bk. IV, in Ibid., p. 108.

When winter comes, a crow perches even on a scarecrow.
— Kikaku Enomoto, Japan in a Nutshell, 1952, in Ibid., p. 159.

When the heart dares to speak, it needs no preparation.
— Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, Minna von Barnheim, Ernest Bell (tr.), 1910, Act V, quoted in Ibid., p. 166.

It is the freeman who must win freedom for the slave; it is the wise man who must think for the fool; it is the happy who must serve the unhappy.
— Jean Paul Friedrich Richter, Hesperus, 1795, in Ibid., p. 177.

Considered as artists, we perhaps have no need to interfere in the affairs of the world. But considered as men, yes. The miner who is exploited or shot down, the slaves in the camps, those in the colonies, the legions of persequeted throughout the world — they need all those who can speak to communicate their silence and to keep in touch with them. I have not written, day after day, fighting articles and texts, I have not taken part in the common struggles because I desire the world to be covered with Greek statues and masterpieces. The man who has such a desire does not exist in me. Except that he has something better to do in trying to instill life into creatures of his imagination. But from my first articles to my latest book I have written so much, and perhaps too much, only because I cannot keep from being drawn toward everyday life, toward those, whoever they may be, who are humiliated and debased. They need hope, and if all keep silent or if they are given a choice between two kinds of humiliation, they will be forever deprived of hope and we with them. It seems to me impossible to endure that idea, nor can he who cannot endure it lie down to sleep in his tower. Not  through virtue, as you see, but through a sort of almost organic tolerance, which you feel or do not feel. Indeed, I see many who fail to feel it, but I cannot envy their sleep.
— Albert Camus, "The Artist and His Time," in The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays, Justin O'Brien (tr.), pp. 149-150, quoted in Ibid., pp. 270-271.

Man is perishable. That may be; but let us perish resisting, and if it be nothingness that awaits us, do not let us so act that it shall be justice.
— Etienne Pivert de Sénancour, "Letter XC," Obermann, 1804, quoted in Ibid., p. 297.