Silence is worse; all truths that are kept silent become poisonous.

So long as the spectator has to figure out the meaning of this or that person, or the presuppositions of this or that conflict of inclinations and purposes, he cannot become completely absorbed in the activities and sufferings of the chief characters or feel breathless pity and fear.

Our destiny exercises its influence over us even when, as yet, we have not learned its nature: it is our future that lays down the law of our today

The best belongs to me and mine; and if we are not given it, we take it: the best food, the purest sky, the most robust thoughts, the fairest women!

What was formerly merely sickly now becomes indecent : it is indecent to be a Christian today.

Just as a waterfall grows slower and more lightly suspended as it plunges down, so the great man of action tends to act with greater calmness than his tempestuous desires prior to the deed would lead one to expect.

The greatest progress that the human race has made lies in learning how to make correct inferences.