A few hours of mountain climbing make a blackguard and a saint two rather similar creatures.

In a friend one should have ones best enemy. You should be closest to him with your heart when you resist him.

Mistrust those in whom the urge to punish is strong.

Whoever possesses the will to suffering within himself has a different attitude towards cruelty: he does not regard it as inherently harmful and bad.

I go in solitude, so as not to drink out of everybody's cistern. When I am among the many I live as the many do, and I do not think I really think; after a time it always seems as if they want to banish myself from myself and rob me of my soul.

Laughter means: taking a mischievous delight in someone else's uneasiness, but with a good conscience.

What is more harmful than any vice? Practical sympathy and pity for all the failures and all the weak : Christianity.