Life He is not dead who departs from life with a high and noble fame; but he is dead, even while living, whose brow is branded with infamy. - Ludwig Tieck
There is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man's self. - Francis Bacon
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. - Maimonides
Listen to the cry of a woman in labor at the hour of giving birth - look at the dying man's struggle at his last extremity, and then tell me whether something that begins and ends thus could be intended for enjoyment. - Soren Kierkegaard