“A human being is a part of the whole, called by us ‘universe,’ a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest – a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.”
Some of you may recognize the above passage as a quote from Albert Einstein in a letter he wrote in 1950 to an ordained rabbi, Norman Salit, who was seeking in vain to comfort his 19-year-old daughter over the death of her 16-year-old sister. In addition to his lifetime attempt to unify into a single, comprehensive theory the laws governing gravity and electromagnetism, his voluminous correspondences reflect a deep conviction that such a unity must exist throughout nature.
By M Bruce Shields MD (aao.org)
Albert Einstein (March 14, 1879 – April 18, 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist who is widely held to be one of the greatest and most influential scientists of all time. Wikipedia