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Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes

Total quotes (113)

Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche

Birthname

AKA Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Birthday October 15, 1844

Birthplace RÃ¶cken , Saxony, Prussia

Death August 25, 1900

Manner of Death Natural Causes

Educated At University Of Bonn

Nationality German, Statelessness, Kingdom Of Prussia

Occupations Educationist, French Moralists, Music Critic, Linguist, University Teacher

Religion Atheist

Total quotes (113)

It might be a basic characteristic of existence that those who would know completely would perish, in which case the strength of a spirit should be measured according to how much of the ‘truth’ one could still barely endure.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good & Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future

Truth Never Know The Truth Don’t Let It All Through Quote of the Moment

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But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Friedrich Nietzsche: Quotes & Facts

Self-awareness Self-Confidence

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The lonely one offers his hand too quickly to whomever he encounters.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra: A Book for All and None

Lonely Sadness Helping other Compassion kindness Empathy

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It is precisely he who is becoming who cannot endure the state of becoming.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits, Revised Edition

Search for Meaning Life Quotes Changes

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People think that the world itself is overflowing with beauty, but they forget that they are its cause.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsche: The Anti-Christ, Ecce Homo, Twilight of the Idols: And Other Writings (Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy)

Beautiful Thoughts Human Beauty Existence of Human

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For art to exist, for any sort of aesthetic activity or perception to exist, a certain physiological precondition is indispensable: intoxication.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols

Intoxication Art

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You can see that I have become so candid that I can endure only human relationships which are absolutely genuine. I avoid half-friendships...

— Friedrich Nietzsche, To Mathilde Maier (Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche)

Being Genuine Relationships

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My desire and my need are different — I hardly know how to say it or explain it.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche

Self-awareness Desire Need

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In loneliness, the lonely one eats himself; in a crowd, the many eat him. Now choose.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Assorted Opinions and Maxims

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My solitude doesn’t depend on the presence or absence of people; on the contrary, I hate who steals my solitude without, in exchange, offering me true company.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via www.goodreads.com

Presence Absence Solitude Companion

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To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via www.goodreads.com

Living Suffering

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

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche (Hackett Classics)

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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.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Dawn of Day

Youth Corruption Thinking Mindset

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Like the creatures of the forest and the sea, I love. To lose myself for a while.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Peacock and the Buffalo: The Poetry of Nietzsche by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Escapism Poetry Forest Sea

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Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being misunderstood.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

deep thinker Over Thinker Over Thinking Thinking Deep Insights Thinker

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But let this be your honour: always to love more than you are loved and never to be second in this.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Love Loved Importance Self-Worth

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One must give value to their existence by behaving as if ones very existence were a work of art.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via www.goodreads.com

Existence Existentialism Art

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Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings — always darker, emptier, simpler.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Thoughts Feelings Dark Thoughts

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I felt the most burning desire for once to be quite alone with my thoughts for a little while.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche

Aloneness alone time Solitude solitary Alone In Thoughts Thinking solitary enjoyment

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The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Friedrich Nietzsche on Facebook

Death Change Change of mind Uncertainty vulnerability

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They call you heartless; but you have a heart and I love you for being ashamed to show it.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche (Portable Library)

Love Connection Relationship Heartless Ashamed

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I am a law only of mine own, I am not a law for all. This - is now my way, - where is yours?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra (Dover Thrift Editions)

Self-awareness Self-assurance Law

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You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame. How could you become new if you haven’t first become ashes?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for Everyone and No One (Penguin Classics)

Readiness Bravery strength Falling Apart

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I am alone again and I want to be so; alone with the pure sky and open sea.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche

Alone Solitude solitary Want Isolation Nature

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Only where there are graves are there resurrections.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Resurrection Inspirational Failure

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The man who is responsive to artistic stimuli reacts to the reality of dreams as does the philosopher to the reality of existence; he observes closely, and he enjoys his observation: for it is out of these images that he interprets life, out of these processes that he trains himself for life.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy

Artistic Sensibility Art Existence reality of existence Life

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We have already gone beyond whatever we have words for.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols

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Be careful when you fight the monsters, lest you become one.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

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A thought, even a possibility, can shatter and transform us.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Friedrich Nietzsche: Quotes & Facts

Thoughts possibilities Thinking Life Change

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From which stars have we fallen to meet each other here?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Letter to Lou Salomé

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I and me are always too deeply in conversation.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsche: Thus Spoke Zarathustra

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Is it better to out-monster the monster or to be quietly devoured?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via GoodReads

Poetic argument

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You know a moment is important when it is making your mind go numb with beauty.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, azquotes

Deep Positive Thoughts

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I have found it necessary to remain silent.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via The Nietzsche Channel

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The demand to be loved is the greatest kind of arrogance.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Human All Too Human

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You have no idea what a charming memory you are to me.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters

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Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, A quote by Friedrich Nietzsche

Reality Scared People Truth

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If you can’t love yourself, I guess that’s it then.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Friedrich Nietzsche

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The real world is much smaller than the imaginary.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Dawn of Day by Friedrich Nietzsche - Delphi Classics (Illustrated)

Reality Imagination Small world Expectation

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Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

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When we are tired, we are attacked by ideas we conquered long ago.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, A quote by Friedrich Nietzsche

Tiredness Ideas realization Remembering

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Of all that is written, I love only what a person has written with his blood. Write with blood, and you will find that blood is spirit… He that writes with blood and proverbs does not want to be read, but learned by heart. In the mountains the shortest way is from peak to peak, but for that route you must have long legs. Proverbs should be peaks, and those spoken to should be big and tall.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Aphorisms Writing Write with Blood

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A few more indications of my morality. A hearty meal is easier to digest than one that is too light. The whole stomach working, the first condition for a good digestion. You must know the size of your stomach.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo

metabolism Philosophy

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Sit as little as possible; do not believe any idea that was not born in the open air and of free movement.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo: How To Become What You Are

Work Processes Creativity Making Art Ethics of Building Great Things Create In Movement/Air

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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.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Human All Too Human

Marrying Somebody Relationship Advice Communication is Key

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All prejudices emanate from the bowels. – Sitting still – is the real sin against the Holy Ghost.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo

Prejudice Great Sins resentment Indignation

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There are a few things we now know too well, we knowing ones: oh, how we now learn to forget well, and to be good at not knowing, as artists!

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Exformation Knowing Nothing

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You can never guide your heart enough.
It will feel.
It will break.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche

Feelings Heart Break heart Guiding Your Heart

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I overcame myself, the sufferer; I carried my own ashes to the mountains; I invented a brighter flame for myself.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Reinvent Yourself Survivor Fiesty Never Give Up reborn

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Paris, Provence, Florence, Jerusalem, Athens — these names prove something: that genius is conditioned by dry air, clear sky.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Why Am I So Wise

Importance of Place Landscape/Architecture Build Us It's In The Air

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Now I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when you have all denied me will I return to you.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Why I am So Wise (Penguin Great Ideas)

Overcoming When The Student Becomes Smarter Than The Teacher Overcoming Is Impossible Different Kind Of Eternal Recurrence Discovering Your Identity

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What makes Heroic? To face simultaneously one’s greatest suffering and one’s highest hope.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science

Heroic Heroic definition Bravery Courage Living surviving Life Living Boldly

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Though I may seem at times somewhat distant from you, through the gray mist of my own moods, I am never far; my thoughts always circle around you.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Selected Letters of Friedrich Nietzsche

Love Thoughts poem Letters Love & Relationships

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I rebel against the translation of reality into a morality: therefore I abhor Christianity with a deadly hatred.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

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I am afraid we are not rid of God because we still have faith in grammar.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols

Beyond Death of God Grammar Against Structure

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He is utterly without envy, but there is no merit in that, for he wants to conquer a country that nobody has possessed and scarcely anyone has even seen.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Envy Paths Unknown

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The new philosopher can arise only in conjunction with a ruling caste, as its highest spiritualization. Great politics, rule over the earth, are at hand.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Great Politics Theory and Practice Theory And Praxis

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Almost everything we call higher culture is based on the spiritualization of cruelty.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Good and Evil

Cruelty The Mechanics of How Things Work

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Be careful when you cast out your demons that you don’t throw away the best of yourself.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra

self Change Self-improvement

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On this road lies the future of the highest men: to bear the greatest responsibility and not collapse under it.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Responsibility Weight Extreme Politics Extremism

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Sit as little as possible; give credence to no thought that is not born in the open air and accompanied by free movement — in which the muscles do not also celebrate a feast.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce Homo

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To find everything profound—that is an inconvenient trait. It makes one strain one's eyes all the time, and in the end one finds more than one might have wished.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Eye Profound Seeing Seeing the Profound Thought Catalog Create Difference

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Those who know that they are profound strive for clarity. Those who would like to seem profound to the crowd strive for obscurity. For the crowd believes that if it cannot see to the bottom of something it must be profound.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Clarity Defining Quality Obscurity Timid How To Write Writing Strategies

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All ideals are dangerous: because they debase and brand the actual; all are poisons, but indispensable as temporary cures.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Idealism Ambition Is Poison The Power of Now

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I wish men would begin by respecting themselves: everything else follows from that.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

The Power of Ego Thought Catalog or Nietzsche?Your Value

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Philosophy, as I have understood and lived it, is a voluntary living in ice and high mountains: a seeking after everything strange and questionable in existence, all that has been excommunicated by morality.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Why I am So Wise (Penguin Great Ideas)

No Ethics Philosophy Think Different Screw Ethics

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An educator never says what he himself thinks, but always only what he thinks of a thing in relation to the requirements of those he educates.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Education Truth In A Passing Contextual Moment Relationalism

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Seeing that I must shortly approach mankind with the heaviest demand that has ever been made on it, it seems to me indispensable to say who I am.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Why I Am So Wise (Penguin Great Ideas)

first lines of books

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There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche (Portable Library)

Love Madness Reason

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All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks, in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

Philosophy How To Think The Art of Awareness

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I dance after you, I follow wherever your traces linger. Where are you? Give me your hand! Or only one finger.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Dancing Nietzche Poetry Women

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Consciousness is the last and latest development of the organic and hence also what is most unfinished and unstrong.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Consciousness Evolution Next Steps Push Unfinished Mind

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Mystical explanations are considered deep. The truth is that they are not even superficial.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Into The Void Superficial Theology

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Woe, when you feel homesick for the land as if it had offered more freedom—and there is no longer any 'land.'

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Freedom Groundless Ground Homesick To The Ocean

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To redeem the past and to transform every 'It was' into an 'I wanted it thus!' – that alone do I call redemption!

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

History Philosophy Philosophy of History Redemption

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I fear you close by; I love you far away.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for Everyone and No One (Penguin Classics)

Desire Confession

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This is what is hardest: to close the open hand because one loves.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche

Love Leaving Someone

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Man is grateful for himself: and this is why one needs a God.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Nietzsche: The Anti-Christ, Ecce Homo, Twilight of the Idols: And Other Writings

Narcissism Why We Worship Gods The Value of Gods

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...we want to be the poets of our life—first of all in the smallest, most everyday matters.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Art Poet poets of our life wise poetry of your life valuing time Life life as art

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I find it tasteless to be familiar.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Ethics of Explosion A Thousand Ethics

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What good is a book that does not even carry us beyond all books?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Beyond Books Books Childrens Books Medium = Message

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It is mythology to think that forces obey laws.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

The Biggest Picture God Lives

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Without music, life would be a mistake. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Without music, life would be a mistake.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of the Idols with the Antichrist and Ecce Homo

Music Friedrich Nietzsche

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Of what is great one must either be silent or speak with greatness.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

first lines of books

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Every error, of whatever kind, is a consequence of degeneration of instinct, disgregation of will: one has thereby virtually defined the bad. Everything good is instinct – and consequently easy, necessary, free. Effort is an objection.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of Idols and Anti-Christ

Effort Impulse Work Ethic

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Here is a little ideal I stumble upon once every five weeks on a wild and lonely walk, in an azure moment of sinful happiness. To spend one’s life amid delicate and absurd things; a stranger to reality; half an artist, half a bird and metaphysician; with no care for reality.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

My Idea Of A Vacation Azure

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A declaration of war on the masses by higher men is needed! A doctrine is needed powerful enough to work as a breeding agent: strengthening the strong, paralyzing and destructive for the world-weary. The annihilation of the decaying races... Dominion over the earth as a means of producing the higher type.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Elitism Evil War

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The aim is lacking; 'why?' finds no answer.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power

Groundless Ground Nihilism Teleology

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The influence of climate on the metabolism, its retardation, its acceleration goes so far that a mistake in climate or locality may not only alienate a person from his task, it can withhold him from it altogether: he never gets a look at it.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecce

Philosophy metabolism

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Gradually we become tired of the old, of what we safely possess, and we stretch out our hands again. Even the most beautiful scenery is no longer assured of our love after we have lived in it for three months, and some more distant coast attracts our avarice: possessions are generally diminished by possession.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of Songs

Awalys Move Change Ennui Possession

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Whatever forces us to assume that there is an essential difference between 'true' and 'false'? Is it not sufficient to assume different levels of semblance, lighter and darker shadows and tones of semblance — different values in the painter's sense of the term?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future

Objectivity Truth Logic Against Logic Scientific Perspectivism

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It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, via www.goodreads.com

Love Relationships Dating romance inspiration Sex reevaluate

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He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

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Every person is a prison.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good And Evil Oxford

People Prison Quote of the Moment

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Formula of my happiness: a Yes, a No, a straight line, a goal.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of Idols and Anti-Christ

Focus Mantras Teleology Work Strategies Aphorisms

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Really, why should we be forced to assume that there is an essential difference between 'true' and 'false' in the first place? Isn't it enough to assume that there are degrees of apparency and, so to speak, lighter and darker shadows and hues of appearance—different valeurs to use the language of painters?

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Philosophy of the Future

Art Complexity Liberal Arts Marginalization Objectivity Painting Truth

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There are no facts, only interpretations.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Portable Nietzsche (Portable Library)

Facts Perspective Reality

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In every desire for knowledge there is already a drop of cruelty.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good And Evil Oxford

Knowledge The Will To Power Power Cruelty

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I know my fate. One day there will be associated with my name the recollection of something frightful – of a crisis like no other before on earth, of the profoundest collision of conscience, of a decision evoked against everything that until then had been believed in, demanded, sanctified.

— Friedrich Nietzsche, why am I So

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