It has been remarked that most men are in the course of their lives frequently unlike themselves, and seem to be transformed into others very different from what they were.
 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Confessions (1782). copy citation

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Author Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Source Confessions
Topic life
Date 1782
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by Samuel William Orson
Weblink https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Confessions_(Rousseau)

Context

“I had likewise in my own mind projected a third, the idea of which I owed to the observations I had made upon myself and I felt the more disposed to undertake this work, as I had reason to hope I could make it a truly useful one, and perhaps, the most so of any that could be offered to the world, were the execution equal to the plan I had laid down. It has been remarked that most men are in the course of their lives frequently unlike themselves, and seem to be transformed into others very different from what they were. It was not to establish a thing so generally known that I wished to write a book; I had a newer and more important object. This was to search for the causes of these variations, and, by confining my observations to those which depend on ourselves, to demonstrate in what manner it might be possible to direct them, in order to render us better and more certain of our dispositions.” source