Freedom And Necessity Quotes

“When the consciousness of my lack of free will presents itself to me only in the form of the complete subjective and objective impossibility of acting differently from the way I am acting, and when, at the same time, my actions are to me the most desirable of all other possible actions, then, in my mind, necessity becomes identified with freedom and freedom with necessity; and then, I am unfree only in the sense that I cannot disturb this identity between freedom and necessity, I cannot oppose one to the other, I cannot feel the restraint of necessity. But such a lack of freedom is at the same time its fullest manifestation.”
― Georgi Plekhanov, The Role of the Individual in History

“Until the individual has won this freedom by heroic effort in philosophical thinking he does not fully belong to himself, and his mental tortures are the shameful tribute he pays to external necessity that stands opposed to him. But as soon as this individual throws off the yoke of this painful and shameful restriction he is born for a new, full and hitherto never experienced life; and his free actions become the conscious and free expression of necessity. Then he will become a great social force; and then nothing can, and nothing will, prevent him from

Bursting on cunning falsehood
Like a storm of wrath divine…

”
― Georgi Plekhanov, The Role of the Individual in History