Pride is an established conviction of one’s own paramount worth in some particular respect, while vanity is the desire of rousing such a conviction in others, and it is generally accompanied by the secret hope of ultimately coming to the same conviction oneself. Pride works from within; it is the direct appreciation of oneself. Vanity is the desire to arrive at this appreciation indirectly, from without.

It is the courage to make a clean breast of it in the face of every question that makes the philosopher. He must be like Sophocles' Oedipus, who, seeking enlightenment concerning his terrible fate, pursues his indefatigable inquiry even though he divines that appalling horror awaits him in the answer. But most of us carry with us the Jocasta in our hearts, who begs Oedipus, for God's sake, not to inquire further.

Human life, like all inferior goods, is covered on the outside with a false glitter; what suffers always conceals itself.

Truth that is naked is the most beautiful, and the simpler its expression the deeper is the impression it makes.

To expect a man to retain everything that he has ever read is like expecting him to carry about in his body everything that he has ever eaten.

Mankind cannot get on without a certain amount of absurdity.

Satisfaction consists in freedom from pain, which is the positive element of life.