Heavy unto him are earth and life, and so willeth the spirit of gravity! But he who would become light, and be a bird, must love himself:⁠—thus do I teach.

Not, to be sure, with the love of the sick and infected, for with them stinketh even self-love!

One must learn to love oneself⁠—thus do I teach⁠—with a wholesome and healthy love: that one may endure to be with oneself, and not go roving about.

Such roving about christeneth itself “brotherly love”; with these words hath there hitherto been the best lying and dissembling, and especially by those who have been burdensome to everyone.

And verily, it is no commandment for today and tomorrow to learn to love oneself. Rather is it of all arts the finest, subtlest, last and patientest.