Imagination must first be filled to the point of saturation with life of every kind before the moment arrives when the friction of free sociability electrifies it to such an extent that the most gentle stimulus of friendly or hostile contact elicits from it lightning sparks, luminous flashes, or shattering blows.

Those works whose ideal has not as much living reality and, as it were, personality as the beloved one or a friend had better remain unwritten. They would at least never become works of art.

An aphorism ought to be entirely isolated from the surrounding world like a little work of art and complete in itself like a hedgehog.

Wit is an explosion of the compound spirit.

The whole history of modern poetry is a continuous commentary on the short text of philosophy: every art should become science, and every science should become art; poetry and philosophy should be united.

Where philosophy ends, poetry must commence. There should not be a common point of view, a natural manner of thinking which standsin contrast to art and liberal education, or mere living; that is, one should not conceive of a realm of crudeness beyond the boundaries of education. Every conscious link of an organism should not perceive its limits without a feeling for its unity in relation to the whole. For example, philosophy should not only be contrasted to non-philosophy, but also to poetry.

Like Leibniz's possible worlds, most men are only equally entitled pretenders to existence. There are few existences.