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18Source of a famous quote

Hello everyone!

I am curious as to whether anyone knows where this famous quote, attributed to the Marquis de Sade, is originally from:

"Imperious, choleric, irascible, extreme in everything, with a dissolute imagination the like of which has never been seen, atheistic to the point of fanaticism, there you have me in a nutshell, and kill me again or take me as I am, for I shall not change."

I took the quote from the beginning of the English translation of Simone de Beauvoir's essay *Must We Burn Sade?* (1955). I see this quote cited everywhere, perhaps more commonly in the shortened form:

"Either kill me or take me as I am, for I'll be damned if I ever change."

I couldn't find the quote's original source, perhaps because I don't speak a word of French.

The back cover of the 1966 publication *The 120 Days of Sodom and Other Writings*, which includes Beauvoir's essay, claims the quote is from Sade's Last Will and Testament, but this is false (see The Last Will and Testament https://philosophynow.org/issues/143/The_Last_Will_and_Testament_of_Donatien-Alphonse-Francois_Sade_Man_of_Letters06, English translation by R. J. Dent on Philosophy Now). I think the confusion arises from the fact that Beauvoir cites the Last Will on the next paragraph, as if it were a part of the previous citation. She however gives this famous quote without citing anything.
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