Mercedes

“You are my son Dantés! You are the child of my captivity. My priestly office condemned me to celibacy: God sent you to me both to console the man who could not be a father and the prisoner who could not be free”
― Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

“I am he whom you sold and dishonored — I am he whose betrothed you prostituted — I am he upon whom you trampled that you might raise yourself to fortune — I am he whose father you condemned to die of hunger — I am he whom you also condemned to starvation, and who yet forgives you, because he hopes to be forgiven - I am Edmund Dantes!”
― Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo

“Dantes remained confused and silent by this explanation of the thoughts which had unconsciously been working in his mind, or rather soul; for there are two distinct sorts of ideas, those that proceed from the head and those from the heart.”
― Alexandre Dumas

“No one can construct for you the bridge upon which precisely you must cross the stream of life, no one but you yourself alone.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche