I cannot face with comfort the idea of life without work; work and the free play of the imagination are for me the same thing, I take no pleasure in anything else.

The gods retain their threefold task: they must exorcize the terrors of nature, they must reconcile men to the cruelty of Fate, particularly as it is shown in death, and they must compensate them for the sufferings and privations which a civilized life in common has imposed on them.

Religious ideas have sprung from the same need as all the other achievements of culture: from the necessity for defending itself against the crushing supremacy of nature.

One becomes gradually accustomed to a new realization of the nature of 'happiness': one has to assume happiness when Fate does not carry out all its threats simultaneously.

A certain degree of neurosis is of inestimable value as a drive, especially to a psychologist.

The effect of the consolations of religion may be compared to that of a narcotic.

All that matters is love and work.