Allen C

“My past is everything I failed to be.”
― Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet

“And that is not all: even if man really were nothing but a piano-key, even if this were proved to him by natural science and mathematics, even then he would not become reasonable, but would purposely do something perverse out of simple ingratitude, simply to gain his point. And if he does not find means he will contrive destruction and chaos, will contrive sufferings of all sorts, only to gain his point! He will launch a curse upon the world, and as only man can curse (it is his privilege's, the primarily distinction between him and other animas), may be by his curse alone he will attain his object- that is, convince himself that he is a man and not a piano key! If you say all this too, can be calculated and tabulated-chaos and darkness and curses, so that the mere possibility of calculating it all beforehand would stop it all, the reason would reassert itself, then man would purposely go mad in order to be rid of reason and gain his point! I believe in it, I answer for it, for the whole work of man really seems to consist in nothing but proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not a piano-key! Good heavens, gentleman, what sort of free will is left when we come to tabulation and arithmetic, when it will all be a case of twice two make four? Twice two makes four without my will. As if free will meant that!”
― Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground