The sovereign being is burdened with a servitude that crushes him, and the condition of free men is deliberate servility. – Georges Bataille
The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil. – Georges Bataille
Sanity is the lot of those who are most obtuse, for lucidity destroys ones equilibrium: it is unhealthy to honestly endure the labors of the mind which incessantly contradict what they have just established. – Georges Bataille
Crime is a fact of the human species, a fact of that species alone, but it is above all the secret aspect, impenetrable and hidden. Crime hides, and by far the most terrifying things are those which elude us. – Georges Bataille
Slavery is so intolerable a condition that the slave can hardly escape deluding himself into thinking that he is choosing to obey his masters commands when, in fact, he is obliged to. Most slaves of habit suffer from this delusion and so do some writers, enslaved by an all too personal style. – W. H. Auden