Daniel monologue — The Fool: A Play in Four Acts

That's the second time you've spoken of my way. It isn't _my_ way. It's the sum total of all that has been learned and taught. You, and Jerry, and the others have called me eccentric, and a fool, because I'm trying to walk a path trod hard by countless feet. Was Christ eccentric? Was Confucius a fool? And how about Buddha and Mohammed? What of St. Bernard, and St. Teresa, and St. Francis of Assisi--of Plato, and Zeno, and Lincoln, and Emerson, and Florence Nightingale, and Father Damien, and Octavia Hill, and all the saints and scientists, and poets and philosophers, who have lived and died in complete forgetfulness of self? Were they fools, or were they wise men and women who had found the way to peace and happiness? Were they failures, or were they the great successes of all Time and all Eternity?