Everybody knows that pestilences have a way of recurring in the world; yet somehow we find it hard to believe in ones that crash down on our heads from a blue sky.

A true masterpiece does not tell everything.

To live is to hurt others, and through others, to hurt oneself. Cruel earth! How can we manage not to touch anything? To find what ultimate exile?

There is not a single true work of art that has not in the end added to the inner freedom insight and life of each person who has known and loved it.

I am not made for politics because I am incapable of wanting or accepting the death of the adversary.

It is normal to give away a little of one's life in order not to lose it all.

Purely historical thought is therefore nihilistic: it wholeheartedly accepts the evil of history and in this way is opposed to rebellion.