Sometimes in conversation the sound of our own voice distracts us and misleads us into making assertions that in no way express our true opinions.

The aphorism, the apothegm, in which I am the first among the Germans to be a master, are the forms of “eternity”; it is my ambition to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book — what everyone else does not say in a book.

Ultimately, no one can extract from things, books included, more than he already knows.

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.

The one conclusive argument that has at all times discouraged people from drinking a poison is not that it kills but rather that it tastes bad.

The thought of suicide is a great source of comfort: with it a calm passage is to be made across many a bad night.

I am opposed to socialism because it dreams ingenuously of good, truth, beauty, and equal rights.