If Everything On Earth Were Rational, Nothing

Whoever Has Experienced The Power And The Unrestrained Ability To Humiliate Another Human Being Automatically Loses His Own Sensations. Tyranny Is A Habit, It Has Its Own Organic Life, It Develops Finally Into A Disease. The Habit Can Kill And Coarsen The Very Best Man Or Woman To The Level Of A Beast. Blood And Power Intoxicate ... The Return Of The Human Dignity, Repentance And Regeneration Becomes Almost Impossible.

We Always Imagine Eternity As Something Beyond Our Conception, Something Vast, Vast! But Why Must It Be Vast?

At That Point I Ought To Have Gone Away, But A Strange Sensation Rose Up In Me, A Sort Of Defiance Of Fate, A Desire To Challenge It, To Put Out My Tongue At It. I Laid Down The Largest Stake Allowe-four Thousand Gulden-and Lost It. Then, Getting Hot, I Pulled Out All I Had Left, Staked It On The Same Number, And Lost Again, After Which I Walked Away From The Table As Though I Were Stunned. I Could Not Even Grasp What Had Happened To Me.

For Example, I'm Terribly Proud. I'm As Mistrustful And As Sensitive As A Hunchback Or A Dwarf; But, In Truth, I've Experienced Some Moments When If Someone Had Slapped My Face, I Might Even Have Been Grateful For It. I'm Being Serious. I Probably Would Have Been Able To Derive A Peculiar Sort Of Pleasure From It-the Pleasure Of Despair, Naturally, But The Most Intense Pleasures Occur In Despair, Especially When You're Very Acutely Aware Of The Hopelessness Of Your Own Predicament.

Is There In The Whole World A Being Who Would Have The Right To Forgive And Could Forgive?