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Wilhelm Friedrich Nietzsche, a man of enviable facial hair and even more superior intelligence, is mostly known for his philosophical works, cultural criticism, and philological achievements that have profoundly influenced modern intellectual history. Although his life wasn’t a long one, the work he did over his active years has positively changed the world we live in. And if you’re looking for a positive change to your day, too, we present to you our list of Nietzsche quotes that will definitely have the desired effect.
So, what should you expect from these philosophical quotes? Well, for starters, to deepen your knowledge of life itself and maybe even see the things around you in a different light. This might not happen the instant you read these Friedrich Nietzsche quotes, but they will definitely lay seeds in your head that will soon germinate into new, beautiful thoughts. And how could they not, when his quotes about life and everything it encompasses have literally changed history! So, even if you dislike the category of philosophy quotes, these are guaranteed to mesmerize you with their depth and intelligence.
So, buckle up and get ready for some undeniably moving quotes coming your way! They are, just, as usual, a bit further down, and once you are there, give the famous quote you just swore to live by your vote. After that’s all well and done, don’t forget to share this article with your friends!
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#1
“I am not upset that you lied to me, I am upset that from now on I cannot believe you.”
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#2
“Man is the cruelest animal.”
#4
“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.”
Anthony W. Pierson 3 years ago
Until the ones dancing started rubbing peanut butter on each other and then tickling themselves with peacock feathers....we started to wonder
#6
“Sometimes people don't want to hear the truth because they don't want their illusions destroyed.”
#7
“The earth has a skin and that skin has diseases; one of its diseases is called man.”
#9
“After coming into contact with a religious man I always feel I must wash my hands.”
#11
“Love is blind. Friendship closes its eyes.”
#12
“Without music, life would be a mistake.”
Antz Online 3 years ago
My girlfriend left me because of my obsession with Linkin Park. But in the end, it doesn’t even matter.
#13
“I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the time.”
#15
“Madness is something rare in individuals — but in groups, parties, peoples, and ages, it is the rule.”
#17
“Cynicism is the only form in which base souls approach honesty.”
#18
“No artist tolerates reality.”
#19
“Invisible threads are the strongest ties.”
Anthony W. Pierson 3 years ago
However they are not good for making clothing....I knitted this kick a*s suit ensemble from invisible thread I had purchased from a kindly fellow behind a jo ann fabrics.....anywho....I knitted this suit decided to wear it to job interview...didn't get the job and was arrested for indecent exposure....hope it makes a stronger rope
#21
“I fear you close by; I love you far away.”
#22
“You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.”
Brendon Peterson 3 years ago
Better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open ones mouth and remove all doubt. Buck up lil camper.
#23
“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.”
#24
“The advantage of a bad memory is that one enjoys several times the same good things for the first time.”
#25
“The thought of suicide is a great consolation: by means of it one gets through many a dark night.”
#26
“Perhaps I know best why it is man alone who laughs; he alone suffers so deeply that he had to invent laughter.”
#27
“But the worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself; you lie in wait for yourself in caverns and forests. Lonely one, you are going the way to yourself! And your way goes past yourself, and past your seven devils! You will be a heretic to yourself and witch and soothsayer and fool and doubter and unholy one and villain. You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame: how could you become new, if you had not first become ashes?”
#28
“A thought comes when it will, not when I will.”
#29
“Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings - always darker, emptier, and simpler.”
#30
“There are two different types of people in the world, those who want to know, and those who want to believe.”
#31
“Ultimately, it is the desire, not the desired, that we love.”
#33
“The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments.”
#35
“And once you are awake, you shall remain awake eternally. ”
#36
“Live dangerously.”
Anthony W. Pierson 3 years ago
Said the man who didn't answer the phone when I called for bail...go **** yourself
#37
“They call you heartless; but you have a heart and I love you for being ashamed to show it.”
#38
“Most people are far too much occupied with themselves to be malicious.”
#39
“If we train our conscience, it kisses us while it hurts”
Anthony W. Pierson 3 years ago
And if you really really really train it you will b able to magically ride an iridescent unicorn dolphin through the skies of gelzor but beware the evil goozlesnooches
#40
“Family love is messy, clinging, and of an annoying and repetitive pattern, like bad wallpaper.”
Buck Up 3 years ago
And here we have the classic "destruction of the family unit." This guy really checks all the boxes. While studies demonstrate the profound happiness to be found in family, he offers the same tired trope: "I'm bored" (says the bore). This is the kind of kid that destroys beehives for entertainment, notwithstanding the sweetness they offer.
#41
“The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad.”
KrackerJack43 Canni-Bliss 3 years ago
Unfortunate are the ones whom seek control. This just popped in my tiny little thought maker.
#42
“There is a false saying: “How can someone who can’t save himself save others?” Supposing I have the key to your chains, why should your lock and my lock be the same?”
#43
“There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.”
#45
“I would believe only in a God that knows how to dance.”
#46
“A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.”
#47
“One ought to hold on to one's heart; for if one lets it go, one soon loses control of the head too.”
#48
“All I need is a sheet of paper and something to write with, and then I can turn the world upside down.”
#49
“They muddy the water, to make it seem deep.”
#50
“I am one thing, my writings are another.”
#51
“Freedom is the will to be responsible for ourselves.”
#53
“It is hard enough to remember my opinions, without also remembering my reasons for them!”
#55
“Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being misunderstood.”
#56
“All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking.”
#57
“There is not enough love and goodness in the world to permit giving any of it away to imaginary beings.”
#59
“The visionary lies to himself, the liar only to others.”
#60
“If you know the why, you can live any how.”
#61
“There are no eternal facts, as there are no absolute truths.”
#62
“In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point.”
#63
“A politician divides mankind into two classes: tools and enemies.”
#67
“The higher we soar the smaller we appear to those who cannot fly.”
#68
“There is more wisdom in your body than in your deepest philosophy.”
#69
“I know of no better life purpose than to perish in attempting the great and the impossible.”
#70
“He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”
#72
“Nothing on earth consumes a man more quickly than the passion of resentment.”
#73
“He who climbs upon the highest mountains laughs at all tragedies, real or imaginary.”
#74
“The spiritualization of sensuality is called love: it is a great triumph over Christianity.”
#76
“I have learned to walk: since then I have run. I have learned to fly: since then I do not have to be pushed in order to move. Now I am nimble, now I fly, now I see myself under myself, now a god dances within me.”
#78
“That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”
#79
“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.”
#81
“We have art in order not to die of the truth.”
#83
“Amor Fati – “Love Your Fate”, which is in fact your life.”
#84
“Art is the proper task of life.”
#88
“The author must keep his mouth shut when his work starts to speak.”
#89
“Be careful when you cast out your demons that you don’t throw away the best of yourself.”
#90
“I obviously do everything to be "hard to understand" myself”
#92
“It is impossible to suffer without making someone pay for it; every complaint already contains revenge.”
#93
“It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters.”
#94
“Truths are illusions which we have forgotten are illusions.”
#95
“Of all that is written I love only what a man has written in his own blood.”
#96
“It is nobler to declare oneself wrong than to insist on being right - especially when one is right.”
#97
“Dancing in all its forms cannot be excluded from the curriculum of all noble education; dancing with the feet, with ideas, with words, and, need I add that one must also be able to dance with the pen?”
#98
“There will always be rocks in the road ahead of us. They will be stumbling blocks or stepping stones; it all depends on how you use them.”
#99
“The pure soul is a pure lie.”
#102
“The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends.”
#103
“God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. 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? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us? Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?”
Robert De Corah 3 years ago
He now fears the day he awaits while in hell's fire having to appear before the Judgment Seat of Christ to give an account for all the souls he mislead to hell. Revelation 20
#104
“Hope, in reality, is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.”
#105
“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.”
#106
“For art to exist, for any sort of aesthetic activity or perception to exist, a certain physiological precondition is indispensable: intoxication.”
#108
“All great things must first wear terrifying and monstrous masks in order to inscribe themselves on the hearts of humanity.”
#109
“Without forgetting it is quite impossible to live at all.”
#110
“He who cannot put his thoughts on ice should not enter into the heat of dispute.”
#111
“As long as you still experience the stars as something "above you", you lack the eye of knowledge.”
#112
“You say 'I' and you are proud of this word. But greater than this- although you will not believe in it - is your body and its great intelligence, which does not say 'I' but performs 'I'.”
#113
“The desire to annoy no one, to harm no one, can equally well be the sign of a just as of an anxious disposition.”
#116
“Sensuality often hastens the "Growth of Love" so much that the roots remain weak and are easily torn up.”
#120
“I hate you most because you attract, but are not strong enough to pull me to you.”
#123
“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.”
#124
“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.”
#125
“No one can construct for you the bridge upon which precisely you must cross the stream of life, no one but you yourself alone.”
#126
“I am a forest, and a night of dark trees: but he who is not afraid of my darkness, will find banks full of roses under my cypresses.”
#127
“You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame; how could you rise anew if you have not first become ashes?”
#128
“Be careful, lest in casting out your demon you exorcise the best thing in you.”
#130
“That which is done out of love is always beyond good and evil.”
Buck Up 3 years ago
It is one of basest and most immature mindsets, to believe that good intentions trump the actual impact of our actions. A woman said she felt "nothing but pure love" when sacrificing her baby to Sat*n. She was on drugs, per Nietzsche's prescription, when commiting this act of "art."
#132
“What does your conscience say? — 'You should become the person you are'.”
#133
“Today as always, men fall into two groups: slaves and free men. Whoever does not have two-thirds of his day for himself, is a slave, whatever he may be: a statesman, a businessman, an official, or a scholar.”
#135
“Is it better to out-monster the monster or to be quietly devoured?”
#136
“Everything the State says is a lie, and everything it has it has stolen.”
#137
“But it is the same with man as with the tree. The more he seeks to rise into the height and light, the more vigorously do his roots struggle earthward, downward, into the dark, the deep - into evil.”
#138
“True, we love life, not because we are used to living, but because we are used to loving. There is always some madness in love, but there is also always some reason in madness.”
#140
“He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster... when you gaze long into the abyss the abyss also gazes into you”
#141
“One must learn to love.— This is what happens to us in music: the first one has to learn to hear a figure and melody at all, to detect and distinguish it, to isolate it and delimit it as a separate life; then it requires some exertion and good will to tolerate it in spite of its strangeness, to be patient with its appearance and expression, and kindhearted about its oddity:—finally there comes a moment when we are used to it when we wait for it when we sense that we should miss it if it were missing: and now it continues to compel and enchant us relentlessly until we have become its humble and enraptured lovers who desire nothing better from the world than it and only it.
#143
“The most spiritual men, as the strongest, find their happiness where others would find their destruction: in the labyrinth, in hardness against themselves and others, in experiments. Their joy is self-conquest: asceticism becomes in them nature, need, and instinct. Difficult tasks are a privilege to them; to play with burdens that crush others, a recreation. Knowledge–a form of asceticism. They are the most venerable kind of man: that does not preclude their being the most cheerful and the kindliest.”
#144
“What is the truth, but a lie agreed upon.”
#145
“One loves ultimately one's desires, not the thing desired.”
#147
“You look up when you wish to be exalted. And I look down because I am exalted.”
#148
“He who obeys, does not listen to himself!”
#149
“A moral system valid for all is basically immoral.”
#150
“All things are subject to interpretation. Whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.”
#151
“In truth, there was only one christian and he died on the cross.”
#153
“Man is something that shall be overcome. Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman — a rope over an abyss. What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not an end.”
#154
“There is an innocence in admiration: it occurs in one who has not yet realized that they might one day be admired.”
#155
“To those human beings who are of any concern to me, I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities—I wish that they should not remain unfamiliar with profound self-contempt, the torture of self-mistrust, the wretchedness of the vanquished: I have no pity for them because I wish them the only thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not—that one endures.”
#156
“A subject for a great poet would be God's boredom after the seventh day of creation.”
#157
“The strength of a person's spirit would then be measured by how much 'truth' he could tolerate, or more precisely, to what extent he needs to have it diluted, disguised, sweetened, muted, falsified.”
#158
“I change too quickly: my today refutes my yesterday. When I ascend I often jump over steps, and no step forgives me that.”
#161
“What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: 'This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more' ... Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: 'You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine.”
#163
“Meaning and morality of One's life come from within oneself. Healthy, strong individuals seek self-expansion by experimenting and by living dangerously. Life consists of an infinite number of possibilities and the healthy person explores as many of them as possible. Religions that teach pity, self-contempt, humility, self-restraint, and guilt are incorrect. The good life is ever-changing, challenging, devoid of regret, intense, creative, and risky.”
#164
“...Throw roses into the abyss and say: 'Here is my thanks to the monster who didn't succeed in swallowing me alive.”
#165
“I assess the power of a will by how much resistance, pain, torture it endures and knows how to turn to its advantage”
#166
“The end of a melody is not its goal: but nonetheless, had the melody not reached its end it would not have reached its goal either. A parable.”
#167
“One must pay dearly for immortality; one has to die several times while still alive.”
#168
“I know my fate. One day my name will be associated with the memory of something tremendous — a crisis without equal on earth, the most profound collision of conscience, a decision that was conjured up against everything that had been believed, demanded, hallowed so far. I am no man, I am dynamite.”
#169
“I hate who steals my solitude, without really offer me in exchange company.”
#172
“In the end things must be as they are and have always been--the great things remain for the great, the abysses for the profound, the delicacies and thrills for the refined, and, to sum up shortly, everything rare for the rare.”
#173
“He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living creatures.”
#174
“A thinker sees his own actions as experiments and questions-as attempts to find out something. Success and failure are for him answers above all.”
#175
“The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything.”
#176
“To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.”
#177
“One must shed the bad taste of wanting to agree with many. "Good" is no longer good when one's neighbor mouths it. And how should there be a "common good"! The term contradicts itself: whatever can be common always has little value. In the end it must be as it is and always has been: great things remain for the great, abysses for the profound, nuances and shudders for the refined, and, in brief, all that is rare for the rare.”
#178
“One must give value to their existence by behaving as if ones very existence were a work of art.”
#179
“No shepherd and one herd! Everybody wants the same, everybody is the same: whoever feels different goes voluntarily into a madhouse.”
#180
“At bottom every man knows well enough that he is a unique being, only once on this earth; and by no extraordinary chance will such a marvelously picturesque piece of diversity in unity as he is, ever be put together a second time.”
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What do you think ?
LostThought 3 years ago (edited)
Was Buck Up trying to troll Nietzsche? 122 years after his death?!
Buck Up 3 years ago (edited)
Absolutely! A rotten legacy like his deserves a good smack-down. And according to Nietzsche, he's immortal. So let him defend himself.
Load More Replies...
Buck Up 3 years ago
Some of his statements are salient, if not original. But poison with which they are intermingled renders the whole lot deadly.
LostThought 3 years ago (edited)
Was Buck Up trying to troll Nietzsche? 122 years after his death?!
Buck Up 3 years ago (edited)
Absolutely! A rotten legacy like his deserves a good smack-down. And according to Nietzsche, he's immortal. So let him defend himself.
Load More Replies... Buck Up 3 years ago
Some of his statements are salient, if not original. But poison with which they are intermingled renders the whole lot deadly.
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