The hero is strangely akin to those who die young.

Winning does not tempt that man. This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively, by constantly greater beings.

Be ahead of all farewells as if they were behind you, like the winter that is just departing.

The highest form of love is to be the protector of another person’s solitude.

Who, if I cried out, would hear me among the angels'hierarchies? and even if one of thempressed me against his heart: I would be consumedin that overwhelming existence. For beauty is nothingbut the beginning of terror, which we still are just able to endure,and we are so awed because it serenely disdainsto annihilate us. Every angel is terrifying.

That is at bottom the only courage that is demanded of us: to have courage for the most strange, the most singular, and the most inexplicable that we may encounter.

It is a tremendous act of violence to begin anything. I am not able to begin. I simply skip what should be the beginning.