Had we not loved ourselves at all, we could never have been obliged to love anything. So that self-love is the basis of all love.
Source: Centuries, Fourth Century, no. 55 (written c. 1672; published 1908).
-- Thomas Traherne, ( 1637-1674), English poet, mystic; He wrote Roman Forgeries, 1673 and Christian Ethicks, 1675.