Even in the lust of knowledge I feel only my will's delight in begetting and becoming; and if there be innocence in my knowledge it is because my procreative will is in it.

We take a fancy to something: and scarcely have we thoroughly taken a fancy to it when that tyrant in us calls out: "Give me thatin sacrifice"--and we give it.

The sensible author writes for no other posterity than his own--that is, for his age--so as to be able even then to take pleasurein himself.

One is necessary, one is a piece of fate, one belongs to the whole, one is the whole - there exists nothing which could judge, measure, compare, condemn our being, for that would be to judge, measure, compare, condemn the whole...But nothing exists apart from the whole!

The charm of the Platonic mode of thought ... consisted precisely in the resistance to the obvious evidence of the senses.

Seducing one's neighbor to a good opinion and then afterwards believing devoutly in this neighbor's opinion--who can match women in this clever ploy?

There is a certain right by which we many deprive a man of life, but none by which we may deprive him of death; this is mere cruelty.