Three passions have governed my life:
The longings for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of [humankind].
Love brings ecstasy and relieves loneliness.
In the union of love I have seen In a mystic miniature the prefiguring vision Of the heavens that saints and poets have imagined.
With equal passion I have sought knowledge.
I have wished to understand the hearts of [people].
I have wished to know why the stars shine.
Love and knowledge led upwards to the heavens, but always pity brought me back to earth; Cries of pain reverberated in my heart of children in famine, of victims tortured and of old people left helpless.
I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot, And I too suffer.
This has been my life; I found it worth living.
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