“Can you still recall Franz Kromer?” he asked. I winked at him, and I managed to smile, too. “Young Sinclair, pay attention! I’m going to have to depart. Perhaps you’ll need me again sometime, to protect you from Kromer or something else. If you call me then, I will no longer come riding so crudely on a horse or on a train. Then you’ll have to listen within yourself, and you’ll notice that I’m inside you." - [[Demian]] **Meaning:** There comes a point when you have read and understood the moral codes, values, and beliefs of your greatest teachers and mentors so greatly that they literally become a part of you. You stop needing to see them in real life because they are a part of your self. This resonates with me because of my own ingraining of [[Marcus Aurelius]] into my being. **Related:** - [[On the ultimate journey of life being a journey toward discovering oneself]]. It's also a journey of ingraining the greatest characters of the past and present into your being.