To "know thyself" must mean to know the malignancy of one's own instincts and to know, as well, one's power to deflect it.

More from Karl Menninger

• It is doubtless true that religion has been the world's psychiatrist throughout the centuries.
• Man can’t help hoping even if he is a scientist. He can only hope more accurately.
• Man can't help hoping even if he is a scientist. He can only hope more accurately. Love Against Hate
• One of the most untruthful things possible, you know, is a collection of facts, because they can be made to appear so many different ways.
• The voice of intelligence ... is drowned out by the roar of fear. It is ignored by the voice of desire. It is contradicted by the voice of shame. It is biased by hate and extinguished by anger. Most of all it is silenced by ignorance.
• Unrest of the spirit is a mark of life; one problem after another presents itself and in the solving of them we can find our greatest pleasure.