Illness is a clumsy attempt to arrive at health: we must come to nature's aid with intellect.

I love all who are like heavy drops falling one by one out of the dark cloud that lowereth over man: they herald the coming of the lightning, and succumb as heralds.

To do great things is difficult; but to command great things is more difficult.

Admiration for a quality or an art can be so strong that it deters us from striving to possess it.

For such is man: a Theological Dogma might be refuted to him a thousand times - provided however, that he had need of it, he would again and again accept it as true. Belief is always most desired, most pressingly needed where there is a lack of will. Fanaticism is the sole "volitional strength" to which the weak and irresolute can be excited, as a sort of hypnotising of the entire sensory-intellectual system.

The refinement of morality increases together with the refinement of fear. Today the fear of disagreeable feelings in other people is almost the strongest of our own disagreeable feelings.

If a man wishes to become a hero, then the serpent must first become a dragon: otherwise he lacks his proper enemy.