To learn from our enemies is the best pathway to loving them: for it makes us grateful to them.

We laugh at a man who, stepping out of his room at the very minute when the sun is rising, says, “It is my will that the sun shall rise”; or at him who, unable to stop a wheel, says, “I wish it to roll”; or, again, at him who, thrown in a wrestling match, says, “Here I lie, but here I wish to lie.” But, joking apart, do we not act like one of these three persons whenever we use the expression “I wish”?

Where there is the tree of knowledge, there is always Paradise: so say the most ancient and most modern serpents.

Every one being allowed to learn to read, ruineth in the long run not only writing but also thinking.

The strength required for the vision of the most powerful reality is not only compatible with the most powerful strength for action, for monstrous action, for crime - it even presupposes it.

One can promise actions, but not feelings, for the latter are involuntary. He who promises to love forever or hate forever or be forever faithful to someone is promising something that is not in his power.

Like tourists huffing and puffing to reach the peak we forget the view on the way up.