Dostoevsky preaches the morality of the pariah, the morality of the slave.

I was always hearing that I was pale and thin and small.

School is a foretaste of life.

But I did not find any positive inspiration in my studies until I approached my nineteenth year.

On the whole, the world was friendly. It chiefly depended on whether one were good or not.

My father, though, could run very much faster. It was impossible to compete with him on the grass. But it was astonishing how slow old people were. Some of them could not run up a hill and called it trying to climb stairs.

My first experiences of academic friendship made me smile in after years when I looked back on them. But my circle of acquaintances had gradually grown so large that it was only natural new friendships should grow out of it.