† THE LAW WITHOUT ORGANS †

As for happiness, that is really useful to us in one way only, by making unhappiness possible. It is necessary for us to form in happiness ties of confidence and attachment that are both sweet and strong in order that their rupture may cause us the heart-rending but so valuable agony which is called unhappiness. Had we not been happy, if only in hope, the unhappiness that befall us would be without cruelty and therefore without fruit.

—Marcel Proust, In Search of Lost Time: Time Regained. (via batarde)