What was there after all? Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valor, rage -- who can tell? -- but truth – thuth stripped of its cloak of time. Let the fool gape and shudder – the man knows, and can look on without a wink. But he must at least be as much of a man as these on the shore. He must meet that truth with his won true stuff – with his own inborn strength. Principles? Principles won’t do. Acquisitions, clothes, pretty rags – rags that would fly off at the first good shake. No; you want a deliberate belief.
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness. 1899. Blackwood’s Magazine, p.96, 97
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