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Question of conscience.—Tell me briefly what really is the new thing that you want? We no longer want to turn causes into sinners and consequences into executioners.
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Usefulness of the strictest theories.—We pardon many moral weaknesses in man, making use of a coarse sieve, provided he be a constant adherer to the strictest theory of morals. The life of free-thinking moralists, on the other hand, has always been placed under the microscope: with the mental reservation that all error in life is the surest argument against an unwelcome conviction
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The "thing in itself."—What is the ridiculous ? we used to ask formerly—as though there were beings other than ourselves, to whose qualities the ridiculous was added—and we exhausted ourselves in conjectures (a theologian even remarked that it might be "the naivete
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