One who is publicly honest about himself ends up by priding himself somewhat on this honesty: for he knows only too well why he is honest-for the same reasons another person prefers illusion and dissimulation.

The state lies in all languages of good and evil; and whatever it says, it lies-and whatever it has, it has stolen.

Genteel women suppose that those things do not really exist about which it is impossible to talk in polite company.

That, however, is - mediocrity, though it be called moderation.

Zarathustra was the first to consider the fight of good and evil the very wheel in the machinery of things: the transposition of morality into the metaphysical realm, as a force, cause, and end in itself, is his work. [...] Zarathustra created this most calamitous error, morality; consequently, he must also be the first to recognize it.

He who despises himself esteems himself as a self-despiser.

The beating of drums, which delights young writers who serve a party, sounds to him who does not belong to the party line like a rattling of chains, and excites sympathy rather than admiration.