Source identified
Read & copy the quotation
“He also who loves himself must have learned it in this way: there is no other way. Love also has to be learned.”
- Source
- The Joyful Wisdom
- Date
- 1910
- English wording
- Thomas Common — Translator; Paul V. Cohn — Poetry renderer; Maude D. Petre — Poetry renderer · from German
Meaning of “He also who loves himself must have learned…”
The passage rejects the idea that love— including self-love—arrives fully formed, presenting it instead as an acquired capacity shaped through attention and familiarity.
Where does it come from?
The Joyful Wisdom, aphorism 334; Thomas Common translation. The surrounding passage compares learning to love music with learning to love people and oneself.
