On the whole, the longing for solitude is a sign that there still is spirit in a person and is a measure of what spirit there is.

All essential knowledge relates to existence, or only such knowledge as has an essential relationship to existence is essential knowledge.

To the frivolous Christianity is certainly not glad tidings, for it wishes first of all to make them serious.

Ulysses was not comely, but he was eloquent, Yet he fired two goddesses of the sea with love

Deep within every human being there still lives the anxiety over the possibility of being alone in the world, forgotten by God, overlooked among the millions and millions in this enormous household. One keeps this anxiety at a distance by looking at the many round about who are related to him as kin and friends, but the anxiety is still there, nevertheless, and one hardly dares think of how he would feel if all this were taken away.

To despair over one's sins indicates that sin has become or wants to be internally consistent. It wants nothing to do with the good, does not want to be so weak as to listen occasionally to other talk. No, it insists on listening only to itself, on having dealings only with itself; it closes itself up within itself, indeed, locks itself inside one more inclosure, and protects itself against every attack or pursuit by the good by despairing over sin.

One should be an enigma not just to others but to oneself too. I study myself. When I'm tired of that I light a cigar to pass the time, and think: God only knows what the good Lord really meant with me, or what He meant to make of me.