It was only the vulgarly mediocre that repelled her.

However much you knock at nature's door, she will never answer you in comprehensible words.

No matter how often you knock at nature's door, she won't answer in words you can understand--for Nature is dumb. She'll vibrate and moan like a violin, but you mustn't expect a song.

What's terrible is that there's nothing terrible, that the very essence of life is petty, uninteresting, and degradingly trite.

All human beings hang by a thread, an abyss may open under their feet at any moment, and yet they have to go and invent all sortsof difficulties for themselves and spoil their lives.

We’re young, we’re not monsters, no fools: we’ll conquer happiness for ourselves.

The people who bind themselves to systems are those who are unable to encompass the whole truth and try to catch it by the tail; a system is like the tail of truth, but truth is like a lizard; it leaves its tail in your fingers and runs away knowing full well that it will grow a new one in a twinkling.