Love Quote by Georg C. Lichtenberg

Lichtenberg smuggles a whole psychology of projection into a single, chilly sentence. He starts with love because that idea flatters us: we like to believe affection is generous, outward-facing, evidence of our better nature. Then he pivots - "but hate" - and the line turns accusatory. The structure is the point. It’s a neat Enlightenment trapdoor: the same mechanism that makes our admiration feel noble also makes our disgust feel righteous.

The intent isn’t to moralize about hatred so much as to demystify it. Lichtenberg, a scientist with an aphorist’s bite, treats the self as a lab instrument that distorts whatever it observes. We don’t merely recognize ourselves in other people; we outsource our internal conflicts to them. The traits we can’t tolerate in ourselves - weakness, vanity, dependence, cowardice - become legible, even grotesque, when worn by someone else. Hatred becomes self-critique with plausible deniability.

The subtext is uncomfortable: interpersonal judgment is rarely about the other person. It’s about self-management. Loving "ourselves in others" suggests selection bias in friendship and romance: we’re drawn to mirrors that make us feel coherent. Hating "ourselves in others" explains the special heat of certain irritations - not dislike, but disproportionate disgust. That’s the tell that we’ve hit a nerve we own.

Context matters. Late-18th-century Europe is inventing modern subjectivity while also fetishizing reason. Lichtenberg’s skepticism punctures the era’s confidence: even our most confident moral reactions may be less principle than reflex, less clarity than self-recognition in hostile lighting.