Man-of all ages and cultures—is confronted with thesolution of one and the same question: the question of how toovercome separateness, how to achieve union, how to transcend one‘s own individual life and find at-onement. - P9
All forms of orgiastic union have three characteristics:they are intense, even violent; they occur in the total personal-ity, mind and body; they are transitory and periodical. Exactlythe opposite holds true for that form of union which is byfar the most frequent solution chosen by man in the past andin the present: the union based on conformity with the group, its customs, practices and beliefs. Here again we find a consid-erable development. - P12
This increasing tendency for the elimination of differencesis closely related to the concept and the experience of equality,
as it is developing in the most advanced industrial societies. - P13
In contemporary capitalistic society the meaning of equal-ity has beentransformed. By equality one refers to the equalityof automatons; of men who have lost their individuality.
Equality today means "sameness," rather than "oneness." - P14
Hence, they are only partial answers to the problem of existence. Thefull answer lies in the achievement of interpersonal union, offusion with another person, in love. - P17
In contrast to symbiotic union, mature love is union underthe condition of preserving one‘s integrity, one‘s individuality.
Love is an active power in man; a power which breaks throughthe walls which separate man from his fellow men, which uniteshim with others; love makes him overcome the sense of isola-tion and separateness, yet it permits him to be himself, toretain his integrity. In love the paradox occurs that two beingsbecome one and yet remain two. - P19
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