Abandonment

"For many of my years — perhaps twelve — had passed away since my nineteenth, when, upon the reading of Cicero's Hortensius, I was roused to a desire for wisdom. And here I was, still postponing the abandonment of this world's happiness to devote myself to the search. For not just the finding alone, but also the bare search for it, ought to have been preferred above the treasures and kingdoms of this world; better than all bodily pleasures, though they were to be had for the taking."

"ABANDON, v.t. [1.] To correct an erring friend or admonish a needy one. Of women the word abandoned is used in the sense of indiscreet. [2.] To confer the advantage of being rid of you. To recant."

"O Posterity! Holy and sacred stay of the unhappy and the oppressed; thou who art just, thou who art incorruptible, thou who findest the good man, who unmaskest the hypocrite, who breakest down the tyrant, may thy sure faith, thy consoling faith never, never abandon me!"

"O humble and lowly Saviour, grant me the knowledge of the true Christian, and that I may willingly despise myself; let me learn the lesson so incomprehensible to the mind of man, that I must die to myself by an abandonment that shall produce true humility."

"Destruction did not cease with my abandonment of my realm, no more than people would cease to dream should you abandon yours."

"Man alone at the very moment of his birth, cast naked upon the naked earth, does she abandon to cries and lamentations."