Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits

Actions can be promised, but not feelings, for these are involuntary.

And in fact, I myself do not believe that anybody ever looked into the world with a distrust as deep as mine,

he wishes himself to gather the fruit from the tree that he plants and consequently he no longer plants those trees which require centuries of constant cultivation and are destined to afford shade to generation after generation in the future.

feeling and fellow feeling acquire depth,

A step further in recovery: and the free spirit draws near to life again, slowly indeed, almost refractorily, almost distrustfully.

As a matter of fact the free spirit is bothered with mere things—and how many things—which no longer concern him.

—and one was the counterpart of him who bothers himself with things that do not concern him.

One is habituated to the bad, like a person who all at once sees a fearful hurly-burly beneath him

One lives—no longer in the bonds of love and hate, without a yes or no, here or there indifferently, best pleased to evade, to avoid, to beat about, neither advancing nor retreating.

A "free spirit"—this refreshing term is grateful in any mood, it almost sets one aglow.