That roguish and cheerful vice, politeness.

What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.

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.

Fear is the mother of morality.

Once we have found ourselves, we must understand how from time to time to lose--and then to find--ourselves once again: assuming,that is, that we are thinkers. For a thinker it is a drawback to be bound to a single person all the time.

Not to him who is offensive to us are we most unfair, but to him who doth not concern us at all.

We hear only those questions for which we are in a position to find answers.