Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for human suffering. These passions, like hurricanes, have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a ocean of anguish, reaching to the verge of despair.

I have sought love, first, because it brings me such great joy that I would sacrifice the rest of my life for a few hours of this joy. I have sought love, next, because it relieves loneliness. In that terrible loneliness, a trembling soul looks from the edge of the world into the cold, bottomless and dead abyss. Finally, I have sought love, because in the union of love I have seen the mysterious details of the heaven imagined by saints and poets. This is what I have been looking for, and although it seems too wonderful for life, it is what I finally found.

With the same passion, I explore knowledge. I hope to understand the human mind. I wish I knew why the stars twinkle. I tried to understand the digital power that Pythagoras admired, which dominated the ups and downs. Only to a small extent, I have achieved this goal.

Love and knowledge, whenever possible, will lead to heaven. But pity always brings me back to reality. The cry of pain echoed in my heart. Hungry children, victims devastated by oppressors, helpless old people regarded as disgusting burdens by children, together with the whole world full of loneliness, poverty and pain, make the life that human beings should have lived a laughing stock. I am eager to reduce evil, but there is nothing I can do, and I am suffering.

This is my life. I found it worth visiting. If I were given another chance, I would gladly live it again.

(Excerpt from the preface to Russell's autobiography)

Note: Buffett once quoted Russell's famous saying: "Most people would rather die than think." So Russell entered the field of vision of more people.