All idealism is falsehood in the face of necessity.

The advocates of a criminal are seldom artists enough to turn the beautiful terribleness of the deed to the advantage of the doer.

It quite often happens that the old man is subject to the delusion of a great moral renewal and rebirth, and from this experience he passes judgments on the work and course of his life, as if he had only now become clear-sighted; and yet the inspiration behind this feeling of well-being and these confident judgements is not wisdom, but weariness .

Our sense of the tragic waxes and wanes with our sensuality.

The hour-hand of life.

Whoever has provoked men to rage against him has always gained a party in his favor, too.

Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman — a rope over an abyss.