The various languages placed side by side show that with words it is never a question of truth, never a question of adequate expression; otherwise, there would not be so many languages. The 'thing in itself' (which is precisely what the pure truth, apart from any of its consequences, would be) is likewise something quite incomprehensible to the creator of language and something not in the least worth striving for.

He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.

One is not converted to christianity; one must be morbid enough for it.

We ought to learn from the kine one thing: ruminating.

The newspaper reader says: this party will ruin itself if it makes errors like this. My higher politics says: a party which makes errors like this is already finished -- it is no longer secure in its instincts.

Our knowledge will take its revenge on us, just as ignorance exacted its revenge during the Middle Ages.

No one can draw more out of things, books included, than he already knows. A man has no ears for that to which experience has given him no access.