"Even if, by a special disfavor of fortune or by the niggardly provision of a stepmotherly nature, this will should wholly lack the capacity to carry out its purpose--if with its greatest efforts it should yet achieve nothing and only the good will were left (not, of course, as a mere wish but as the summoning of all means insofar as they are in our control)--then, like a jewel, it would shine by itself, as something that has its full worth in itself."
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Kant, Immanuel. "Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals" in <u>Practical Philosophy</u>. Trans. Mary J. Gregor, The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Immanuel Kant (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).