Gradually it has become clear to me what every great philosophy so far has been: namely, the personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir.

In solitude the lonely man is eaten up by himself, among crowds by the many.

This mother needs happy, reputable children, and that one needs unhappy ones: otherwise she cannot show her kindness as a mother.

To explore the whole sphere of the modern soul, to have sat in every nook- my ambition, my torture, and my happiness

Because we have for millenia made moral, aesthetic, religious demands on the world, looked upon it with blind desire, passion or fear, and abandoned ourselves to the bad habits of illogical thinking, this world has gradually become so marvelously variegated, frightful, meaningful, soulful, it has acquired color - but we have been the colorists: it is the human intellect that has made appearances appear and transported its erroneous basic conceptions into things.

And if your friend does evil to you, say to him, ''I forgive you for what you did to me, but how can I forgive you for what you did to yourself?

Let old ones go. Dont be a memory-monger! Once you were young──now you are even younger.