The thing is to understand myself,
to see what God really wishes me to do:
the thing is to find a truth which is true for me,
to find the idea for which I can live and die. …
I certainly do not deny that I still recognize an imperative of knowledge
and that through it one can work upon men,
but it must be taken up into my life,
and that is what I now recognize as the most important thing.
Søren Kierkegaard, letter to Peter Wilhelm Lund 1835
