“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.”

“In any case such a monster must of necessity be in our scheme of things an anomaly and an intruder, whose extirpation forms a primary duty with every man not an enemy to the world's life, health, and sanity.”

— H. P. Lovecraft《The Shunned House》

“But ere that time he had studied to good effect, and not books alone, but the world around him too, and the world within.”

— Dante Alighieri《The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri》

“He is to be pitied, to tell the truth, in his coming into the world as a king, for he is but a man--and having to waste himself on a pack of nonsense instead of sticking to our art, in which he makes good way.”

— Alexandre Dumas《The Hero of the People: A Historical Romance of Love, Liberty and Loyalty》

“DEAR DICK, At what time of life may a man think himself exempted from the necessity of sacrificing his repose to the punctilios of a contemptible world?”

— Tobias Smollett《The Expedition of Humphry Clinker》

“Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”

— J. Robert Oppenheimer《The Decision to Drop the Bomb interview》

“I thought of Scudder, of the thousand friends I had lost, of the great seas of blood and the mountains of sorrow this man and his like had made for the world.”

— John Buchan《Mr. Standfast》

“How strange it is, that a fool or a knave, with riches, should be treated with more respect by the world, than a good man, or a wise man in poverty!”

— Ann Radcliffe《The Mysteries of Udolpho》

“As for yourself, death shall come to you from the sea, and your life shall ebb away very gently when you are full of years and peace of mind, and your people shall bless you.”

— Homer《Odyssey》

“Advocates and magistrates, reporters and men of the world, actresses and society women were crowded together on the benches provided for the public.”

— Maurice Leblanc《The Extraordinary Adventures of Arsène Lupin, Gentleman-Burglar》

“The friend praying at her side was forgotten, the world had vanished, every law of reason was annihilated, all knowledge was out of her mind--every hard-won conquest of human empiricism was effaced.”

— Wilhelmine von Hillern《On the Cross: A Romance of the Passion Play at Oberammergau》

“I am the happiest creature in the world.”

— Jane Austen《Pride and Prejudice》

“The living soul demands life, the soul won’t obey the rules of mechanics, the soul is an object of suspicion, the soul is retrograde!”

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky《Crime and Punishment》