Doubt Is The Origin Of Wisdom

Desire Awakens Only To Things That Are Thought Possible.

In Order To Improve The Mind, We Ought Less To Learn, Than To Contemplate.

As I Considered The Matter Carefully It Gradually Came To Light That All Those Matters Only Were Referred To Mathematics In Which Order And Measurements Are Investigated, And That It Makes No Difference Whether It Be In Numbers, Figures, Stars, Sounds Or Any Other Object That The Question Of Measurement Arises. I Saw Consequently That There Must Be Some General Science To Explain That Element As A Whole Which Gives Rise To Problems About Order And Measurement, Restricted As These Are To No Special Subject Matter. This, I Perceived Was Called 'universal Mathematics'.

My Third Maxim Was To Try Always To Conquer Myself Rather Than Fortune, And To Change My Desires Rather Than The Order Of The World, And Generally To Accustom Myself To Believing That There Is Nothing Entirely In Our Power Except Our Thoughts, So That After We Have Done Our Best Regarding Things External To Us, Everything In Which We Do Not Succeed Is For Us Absolutely Impossible.

Instead I Ought To Be Grateful To Him Who Never Owed Me Anything For Having Been So Generous To Me, Rather Than Think That He Deprived Me Of Those Things Or Has Taken Away From Me Whatever He Did Not Give Me.