"In the end we are always rewarded for our good will, our patience, fair-mindedness, and gentleness with what is strange."

"A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything."

"The aphorism in which I am the first master among Germans, are the forms of "eternity"; my ambition is to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book - what everyone else does not say in a book."

"The future influences the present just as much as the past."

"There is in general good reason to suppose that in several respects the gods could all benefit from instruction by us human beings. We humans are - more humane."

"Success has always been a great liar."

"Your only problem, perhaps, is that you scream without letting yourself cry."

"Germany is a great nation only because its people have so much Polish blood in their veins."

"The most common sort of lie is that by which a man deceives himself: the deception of others is a relatively rare offense."

"One often contradicts an opinion when what is uncongenial is really the tone in which it was conveyed."

"It is hard enough to remember my opinions, without also remembering my reasons for them!"

"Necessity is not an established fact, but an interpretation."

"Everyone who has ever built anywhere a "new heaven" first found the power thereto in his own hell."

"And how does one basically recognize good development? In that a well-developed man does our senses good: that he is carved from wood which is hard, delicate, and sweet-smelling, all at the same time."

"Business people - Your business - is your greatest prejudice: it ties you to your locality, to the company you keep, to the inclinations you feel. Diligent in business - but indolent in spirit, content with your inadequacy, and with the cloak of duty hung over this contentment: that is how you live, that is how you want your children to live!"

"Profundity of thought belongs to youth clarity of thought to old age."

"A degree of culture, and assuredly a very high one, is attained when man rises above superstitions and religious notions and fears, and, for instance, no longer believes in guardian angels or in original sin, and has also ceased to talk of the salvation of his soul."

"Hitherto we have been permitted to seek beauty only in the morally good - a fact which sufficiently accounts for our having found so little of it and having had to seek about for imaginary beauties without backbone! - As surely as the wicked enjoy a hundred kinds of happiness of which the virtuous have no inkling, so too they possess a hundred kinds of beauty: and many of them have not yet been discovered."

"One may sometimes tell a lie, but the grimace that accompanies it tells the truth."

"I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you."

"When marrying, ask yourself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this person into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory."

"I love those who do not know how to live for today."

"What if pleasure and displeasure were so tied together that whoever wanted to have as much as possible of one must also have as much as possible of the other. You have a choice in life: either as little displeasure as possible, painlessness in brief or as much displeasure as possible as the price for an abundance of subtle pleasures and joys."

"A woman may very well form a friendship with a man but for this to endure it must be assisted by a little physical antipathy."

"The good life is that which succeeds in existing for the moment, without reference to past or future, without condemnation or selection, in a state of absolute lightness, and in the finished conviction that there is no difference therefore between the instant and eternity."

"Before the effect one believes in different causes than one does after the effect."

"The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude."

"He who writes in blood and aphorisms does not want to be read, he wants to be learned by heart."

"It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters."

"Only sick music makes money today."

"Arrogance on the part of the meritorious is even more offensive to us than the arrogance of those without merit: for merit itself is offensive."

"The "kingdom of Heaven" is a condition of the heart - not something that comes "upon the earth" or "after death.""

"Not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, does the enlightened man dislike to wade into its waters."

"Every talent must unfold itself in fighting."

"After coming into contact with a religious man I always feel I must wash my hands."

"If we possess a why of life we can put up with almost any how."

"The author must keep his mouth shut when his work starts to speak."

"No one dies of fatal truths nowadays: there are too many antidotes."

"Objection, evasion, joyous distrust, and love of irony are signs of health; everything absolute belongs to pathology."

"Dove la moralitA A troppo forte l'intelletto perisce."

"Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had."

"Do whatever you will, but first be such as are able to will."

"Many a man fails as an original thinker simply because his memory it too good."

"For nothing is more democratic than logic, it is no respecter of persons and makes no distinction between crooked and straight noses."

"The thought of suicide is a great consolation: by means of it one gets through many a dark night."

"The misunderstanding of passion and reason, as if the latter were an independent entity and not rather a system of relations between various passions and desires; and as if every passion did not possess its quantum of reason."

"How much truth does a spirit endure, how much truth does it dare?"

"In truth,there was only one christian and he died on the cross."

"In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule."

"Believe me, friend Hellishnoise: the greatest events-they are not our loudest but our stillest hours."