One should, when overwhelmed by the shadow of a giant, move aside and see if the colossal shadow isn't merely that of a pygmy blocking out the sun.

A character is a completely fashioned will.

What delights, what pleasures does your life offer you that outweigh the raptures of death?

The art of writing books is not yet invented. But it is at the point of being invented. Fragments of this nature are literary seeds. There may be many an infertile grain among them: nevertheless, if only some come up!

Life is the beginning of death. Life is for the sake of death. Death is at once the end and the beginning—at once separation and closer union of the self. Through death the reduction is complete.

Nature is an aeolian harp, a musical instrument whose tones are the re-echo of higher strings within us.

The world must become romanticized, and in that way we find again its original meaning for us.