Friedrich Nietzsche
~ 1844 - 1900
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) was a German philosopher, cultural critic, and poet. He is known for his profound and controversial ideas on existentialism, morality, and the concept of the "Übermensch" (Superman), which have had a significant influence on Western philosophy and intellectual thought.
A politician divides mankind into two classes: tools and enemies.
When we are tired, we are attacked by ideas we conquered long ago.
If you kill a cockroach, you're a hero. If you kill a butterfly, you're a villain. Morals have aesthetic criteria.
If there is something to pardon in everything, there is also something to condemn.
After coming into contact with a religious man I always feel I must wash my hands.
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.
Madness is rare in individuals - but in groups, parties, nations, and ages it is the rule.
On the mountains of truth you can never climb in vain: either you will reach a point higher up today, or you will be training your powers so that you will be able to climb higher tomorrow.
It is impossible to suffer without making someone pay for it; every complaint already contains revenge.
It is always consoling to think of suicide: in that way one gets through many a bad night.
There cannot be a God because if there were one, I could not believe that I was not He.
God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms. How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers? What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled to death under our knives; who will wipe this blood off us? What water is there for us to clean ourselves?
You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.
Germany is a great nation only because its people have so much Polish blood in their veins.
All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.
We love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving.
A sedentary life is the real sin. Only those thoughts that come by walking have any value.
One ought to hold on to one's heart; for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.
What is the truth, but a lie agreed upon.
Is not life a hundred times too short for us—to bore ourselves?
Without music, life would be a mistake.
Whoever wants to achieve something great must not seek to satisfy or please anyone but himself in his work: as soon as he fishes for the approval of others, it will not be anything great.
In family life, love is the oil that eases friction, the cement that binds closer together, and the music that brings harmony.
To use the same words is not a sufficient guarantee of understanding; one must use the same words for the same genus of inward experience; ultimately one must have one's experiences in common.
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.
Women are considered deep - why? Because one can never discover any bottom to them. Women are not even shallow.
We should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once. And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh.
War has always been the grand sagacity of every spirit which has grown too inward and too profound; its curative power lies even in the wounds one receives.
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.
Let us beware of saying that death is the opposite of life. The living being is only a species of the dead, and a very rare species.
He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. Is not life a hundred times too short for us to bore ourselves?
He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.
Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.
Sometimes people don't want to hear the truth because they don't want their illusions destroyed.
The secret of reaping the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment from life is to live dangerously.
He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living creatures.
It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.
You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame; how could you rise anew if you have not first become ashes?
A man's maturity consists in having found again the seriousness one had as a child, at play.
Either you think, or else others have to think for you and take power from you, pervert and discipline your natural tastes, civilize and sterilize you. F.
Go up close to your friend, but do not go over to him! We should also respect the enemy in our friend.
One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.
In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.
The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything.
The world itself is the will to power - and nothing else! And you yourself are the will to power - and nothing else!
Character is determined more by the lack of certain experiences than by those one has had.
The most common lie is that which one lies to himself; lying to others is relatively an exception.
The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.
Nothing is beautiful, only man: on this piece of naivete rests all aesthetics, it is the first truth of aesthetics. Let us immediately add its second: nothing is ugly but degenerate man - the domain of aesthetic judgment is therewith defined.
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you.
Happiness is the feeling that power increases – that resistance is being overcome.
I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you.
One who makes himself a worm cannot complain afterwards if people step on him.
He who has a why to live for can bear with almost any how.