Species do not grow more perfect: the weaker dominate the strong, again and again--- the reason being that they are the great majority, and they are also cleverer. Darwin forgot the mind (---that is English!): the weak possess more mind. ... To acquire mind, one must need mind---one loses it when one no longer needs it. [Criticism of Darwin's Origin of Species.] Twilight of the Idols

″‘And if there were a contest, and he had to compete in measuring the shadows with the prisoners who had never moved out of the den, while his sight was still weak, and before his eyes had become steady (and the time which would be needed to acquire this new habit of sight might be very considerable), would he not be ridiculous? Men would say of him that up he went and down he came without his eyes; and that it was better not even to think of ascending; and if any one tried to loose another and lead him up to the light, let them only catch the offender, and they would put him to death.’ ‘No question,’ he said.” Republic

It is not poverty which produces sorrow, but desire. Fragment

For we carry our fate with us — and it carries us. Book III