Since Copernicus, man seems to have got himself on an inclined plane-now he is slipping faster and faster away from the center into-what? into nothingness? into a 'penetrating sense of his nothingness?' ... all science, natural as well as unnatural-which is what I call the self-critique of knowledge-has at present the object of dissuading man from his former respect for himself, as if this had been but a piece of bizarre conceit.

Experience, as a desire for experience, does not come off. We must not study ourselves while having an experience.

Existence really is an imperfect tense that never becomes a present.

We praise or blame as one or the other affords more opportunity for exhibiting our power of judgement.

But thought is one thing, the deed is another, and the image of the deed still another: the wheel of causality does not roll between them.

I love him who desireth not too many virtues. One virtue is more of a virtue than two, because it is more of a knot for one's destiny to cling to.

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