The-Way-Of-NXVR

"... the art of not reading is highly important. This consists in not taking a book into one's hand merely because it is interesting the great public at the time -- such as political or religious pamphlets, novels, poetry, and the like, which make a noise and reach perhaps several editions in their first and last years of existence. Remember rather that the man who writes for fools always finds a large public: and only read for a limited and definite time exclusively the works of great minds, those who surpass other men of all times and countries, and whom the voice of fame points to as such. These alone really educate and instruct.

One can never read too little of bad, or too much of good books: bad books are intellectual poison; they destroy the mind.

In order to read what is good one must make it a condition never to read what is bad; for life is short, and both time and strength limited."

-- Arthur Schopenhauer

"Life will perpetuate itself, events will go on happening, spiritual conflicts will be resolved, and I will play no part in them. I have nothing to hope for on either side, moral or physical. For me there is perpetual sorrow and shadow, the night of the soul, and I have no voice to cry out.

Cast your riches far from this numb body, for it is insensible to the seasons of the spirit or the flesh.

I have chosen the domain of sorrow and shadow as others have chosen that of the glow and the accumulation of things. I do not labor within the scope of my domain. My only labor is eternity itself."

-- Antonin Artaud, Fragments of A Journal in Hell

"...Remember the beautiful mirage of concepts, and moving words,
palaces of mirrors built in a cave, and remember the man who came,
who broke everything, who took you with his rough hand, pulled you
from your dreams, and made you sit in the thorns of the full day
and remember that you do not know how to remember yourself..."
Rene Daumal

Kirilov's Dilemma

"All man did was to invent God so as to live without killing himself. That's the essence of universal history till now. I am the only man in universal history who for the first time refused to invent God. [...] To realize that there is no god and not to realize at the same instant that you have become god yourself - is an absurdity, for else you would certainly kill yourself. If you do realize it, you are a king and will never kill yourself, but will live in the greatest glory. But he who is first to realize it is bound to kill himself, for otherwise who will begin and prove it? [...] I am still only a god against my will, and I am unhappy because I am bound to express my self-will. [...] Fear is the curse of mankind. But I shall proclaim my self-will. I am bound to believe that I do not believe. I shall begin and end, and open the door."