Immortality—dazzling idea! who first imagined thee! Was it some jolly burgher of Nuremburg, who with night-cap on his head, and white clay pipe in mouth, sat on some pleasant summer evening before his door, and reflected in all his comfort, that it would be right pleasant, if, with unextinguishable pipe, and endless breath, he could thus vegetate onwards for a blessed eternity? Or was it a lover, who in the arms of his loved one, thought the immortality-thought, and that because he could think and feel naught beside!—Love! Immortality!

Wherever books are burned, human beings are destined to be burned too.

Out of my great sorrows, I make little songs.

Woman is at once apple and serpent.

Sleep is lovely, death is better still, not to have been born is of course the miracle.

The fundamental evil of the world arose from the fact that the good Lord has not created money enough.

Lo, sleep is good, better is death--in sooth The best of all were never to be born.