Self-knowledge (n.) eludes us: if the hare has seven skins, man can slough off seventy times seven and still not say 'this is really you'; to tunnel into oneself can wound beyond any physician's cure.
Self-knowledge (n.) is a siege: man sees only his own outer walls; the fortress itself is invisible unless friends and enemies turn traitor and lead him in by a secret path.
Self-knowledge (n.) needs history: the past flows in us in a hundred waves, and we are nothing but what we experience of that flowing — we cannot step into the same river of ourselves twice.
Self-knowledge (n.) needs self-surprise, torch in hand: he who looks in the mirror forgets how ugly he is, recovers it from the painter, then forgets again — man cannot endure the unchangingly ugly, and moralists must count on that moment.
Self-knowledge (n.) is the whole of science: only when man knows all things will he know himself, for things are only the boundaries of man.
Self-knowledge (n.) is hardest of all: the human being is hard to discover and hardest still for himself; often the spirit lies about the soul.
Self-knowledge (n.) is suspect because it may be useful for the subject to misinterpret itself — so ask the body instead, and let the subordinates speak.