[E]very donkey who ever peered at himself in the water of the stream he was crossing has enjoyed the sight and been sure he was a handsome horse. – Gustave Flaubert, letter to Louise Colet, 1846 October 7th, translated by Franci

Each one of us is alone in the world… We seek pitifully to convey to others the treasures of our heart, but they have not the power to accept them, and so we go lonely, side by side but not together, unable to know our fellows and unknown by them. – W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence, 1919

The body is a house of many windows: there we all sit, showing ourselves and crying on the passers-by to come and love us. – Robert Louis Stevenson