"State," I call it, where they all drink poison, the good and the wicked; "state," where they all lose themselves, the good and the wicked; "state," where they all call their slow suicide-"life."

Many a peacock hides his peacock tail from all eyes--and calls it his pride.

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!

[Heraclitus had] pride not in logical knowledge but rather in intuitive grasping of the truth.

It is always consoling to think of suicide: in that way one gets through many a bad night.

Yet for all that, there is nothing in me of a founder of a religion--religions are affairs of the rabble; I find it necessary to wash my hands after I have come into contact with religious people.

What we do is never understood, but always merely praised or blamed.