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Friedrich Nietzsche
111 quotes
“Gradually it has become clear to me what every great philosophy has been: namely, the personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Independence is for the very few; it is a privilege of the strong.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Good" is no longer good when one's neighbour takes it into his mouth. And how could there be a "common good"! The expression contradicts itself; that which can be common is always of small value. In the end things must be as they are and have always been — the great things remain for the great, the abysses for the profound, the delicacies and thrills for the refined, and, to sum up shortly, everything rare for the rare.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“So long as thou feelest the stars as an ‘above thee’, thou lackest the eye of the discerning one.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Mature manhood: that means to have rediscovered the seriousness one had as a child at play.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It was subtle of God to learn Greek when he wished to become an author – and not to learn it better.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Was aus Liebe getan wird, geschieht immer Jenseits von Gut und Böse.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Madness is something rare in individuals — but in groups, parties, peoples, epochs it is the rule.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The thought of suicide is a powerful solace: by means of it one gets through many a bad night.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Every enhancement of the type "man" has so far been the work of an aristocratic society—and it will be so again and again—a society that believes in the long ladder of an order of rank and differences in value between man and man, and that needs slavery in some sense or other.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“While every noble morality develops from a triumphant affirmation of itself, slave morality from the outset says No to what is "outside," what is "different," what is "not itself"; and this No is its creative deed.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All instincts that do not discharge themselves outwardly turn inward — this is what I call the internalization of man: thus it was that man first developed what was later called his "soul.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“That which Heraclitus avoided, however, is still the same at that which we shun today: the noise and democratic chatter of the Ephesians, their politics, their latest news of the “Empire,” ... their market business of “today”—for we philosophers need to be spared one thing above all: everything to do with “today.” We reverence what is still, cold, noble, distant, past, and in general everything in the face of which the soul does not have to defend itself and wrap itself up.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is nothing to life that has value, except the degree of power—assuming that life itself is the will to power.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Book 1, sec. 55 (10 June 1887)
“Natürlicher ist unsere Stellung in politicis: wir sehen Probleme der Macht, des Quantums Macht gegen ein anderes Quantum. Wir glauben nicht an ein Recht, das nicht auf der Macht ruht, sich durchzusetzen: wir empfinden alle Rechte als Eroberungen.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 120 (Spring-Fall 1887)
“The stronger becomes master of the weaker, in so far as the latter cannot assert its degree of independence — here there is no mercy, no forbearance, even less a respect for "laws.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1885 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 630 (Notebook W I 4. June - July 1885, KGW VII, 3.283, KSA 11.559)
“Morality is: the mediocre are worth more than the exceptions ... I abhore Christianity with a deadly hatred.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1888 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 685 (Notebook W II 5. Spring 1888, KGW VIII, 3.95-7, KSA 13.303-5)
“The states in which we infuse a transfiguration and a fullness into things and poetize about them until they reflect back our fullness and joy in life...three elements principally: sexuality, intoxication and cruelty — all belonging to the oldest festal joys.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 801 (Notebook W II 1. Fall 1887, KGW VIII, 2.57-8, KSA 12.393-4)
“The beautiful exists just as little as the true. In every case it is a question of the conditions of preservation of a certain type of man: thus the herd-man will experience the value feeling of the true in different things than will the overman.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 804 (Notebook W II 2. Fall 1887, KGW VIII, 2.220-1, KSA 12.554-5)
“A declaration of war on the masses by higher men is needed! ... Everything that makes soft and effeminate, that serves the end of the people or the feminine, works in favor of universal suffrage, i.e. the domination of the inferior men. But we should take reprisal and bring this whole affair to light and the bar of judgment.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1888 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 864 (Notebook W II 5. Spring 1888, KGW VIII, 3.157-62, KSA 13.365-70)
“The rights a man arrogates to himself are related to the duties he imposes on himself, to the tasks to which he feels equal. The great majority of men have no right to existence, but are a misfortune to higher men.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1884 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 872 (Notebook W I 1. Spring 1884, KGW VII, 2.97-8, KSA 11.101-2)
“The homogenizing of European man ... requires a justification: it lies in serving a higher sovereign species that stands upon the former which can raise itself to its task only by doing this. Not merely a master race whose sole task is to rule, but a race with its own sphere of life, with an excess of strength ... strong enough to have no need of the tyranny of the virtue-imperative.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 898 (Notebook W II 1. Fall 1887, KGW VIII, 2.88-90, KSA 12.424-6)
“To those human beings who are of any concern to me I wish suffering, desolation, sickness, ill-treatment, indignities — I wish that they should not remain unfamiliar with profound self-contempt, the torture of self-mistrust, the wretchedness of the vanquished: I have no pity for them, because I wish them the only thing that can prove today whether one is worth anything or not — that one endures.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1887 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec 910 (Autumn 1887, KSA 12.513)
“There is only nobility of birth, only nobility of blood. When one speaks of "aristocrats of the spirit," reasons are usually not lacking for concealing something. As is well known, it is a favorite term among ambitious Jews. For spirit alone does not make noble. Rather, there must be something to ennoble the spirit. What then is required? Blood.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1885 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 942 (Notebook W I 5. August - September 1885, KGW VII, 3.412, KSA 11.678)
“The possibility has been established for the production of...a master race, the future "masters of the earth"...made to endure for millennia — a higher kind of men who...employ democratic Europe as their most pliant and supple instrument for getting hold of the destinies of the earth.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) first seen 1885 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Sec. 960 (Notebook W I 8. Fall 1885 - Fall 1886, KGW VIII, 1.85-6, KSA 12.87-8)
“Wisdom sets bounds even to knowledge ... I want, once and for all, not to know many things. Wisdom requires moderation in knowledge as in other things.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Hat man sein warum? des Lebens, so verträgt man sich fast mit jedem wie?”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Ohne Musik wäre das Leben ein Irrthum.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Nur die ergangenen Gedanken haben Werth.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The church combats passion by means of excision of all kinds. Its practice, its remedy is castration. It never inquires, “How can a desire be spiritualized, beautified, deified.” In all ages it has laid the weight of discipline in the process of extirpation. The extirpation of sensuality, pride, lust of dominion, lust of property, and revenge. But to attack the passions at the roots means attacking life itself at its source. The method of the church is hostile to life.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The spiritualization of sensuality is called love.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Any one of the laws of life is fulfilled by the definite cannon “thou shalt.” “Thou shalt not,” and any sort of obstacle or hostile element in the road of life, is thus cleared away.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We others, we immoralists, on the contrary, have opened our hearts wide to all kinds of comprehension, understanding, and approbation. We do not deny readily; we glory in saying “Yea” to things. Our eyes have opened ever wider and wider to that economy which still employs, and knows how to use to its own advantage, all that which the sacred craziness of priests and the morbid reason in priests rejects.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Die leichten Füsse das erste Attribut der Göttlichkeit.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Today, as we have entered into the reverse movement and we immoralists are trying with all our strength to take the concept of guilt and the concept of punishment out of the world again, and to cleanse psychology, history, nature, and social institutions and sanctions of them, there is in our eyes no more radical opposition than that of the theologians, who continue with the concept of a “moral world-order” to infect the innocence of becoming by means of “punishment” and “guilt.” Christianity is a metaphysics of the hangman ...”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To bewail one’s lot is always despicable: it is always the outcome of weakness. Whether one ascribes one’s afflictions to others or to one’s self, it is all the same. The socialist does the former, the Christian, for instance, does the latter. That which is common to both attitudes, or rather that which is equally ignoble in them both, is the fact that somebody must be to blame if one suffers—in short, that the sufferer drugs himself with the honey of revenge to allay his anguish.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All becoming and growing—all that guarantees a future—involves pain.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What is good? — All that heightens the feeling of power, the will to power, power itself in man. What is bad? — All that proceeds from weakness. What is happiness? — The feeling that power increases — that a resistance is overcome.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The very word "Christianity" is a misunderstanding—at bottom there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Aphorism 39 (translated by H. L. Mencken, 1918)
“Whom do I hate most among the rabble of today? The socialist rabble, the chandala apostles, who undermine the instinct, the pleasure, the worker's sense of satisfaction with his small existence–who make him envious, who teach him revenge. The source of wrong is never unequal rights but the claim of "equal" rights.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Christian church has left nothing untouched by its depravity; it has turned every value into worthlessness, and every truth into a lie, and every integrity into baseness of soul.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Aphorism 62 (translated by H. L. Mencken, 1918)
“I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty — I call it the one immortal blemish of mankind.And time is reckoned from the dies nefastus with which this calamity began — from the first day of Christianity! Why not rather after its last day? From today? Revaluation of all values!”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Man hat die Realität in dem Grade um ihren Werth, ihren Sinn, ihre Wahrhaftigkeit gebracht, als man eine ideale Welt erlog.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My formula for the greatness of a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different—not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely to bear what is necessary, still less conceal it … but love it.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Wie viel Wahrheit erträgt, wie viel Wahrheit wagt ein Geist? das wurde für mich immer mehr der eigentliche Werthmesser.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Wer mir aber durch Höhe des Wollens verwandt ist, erlebt dabei wahre Ekstasen des Lernens.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“„Femininismus” im Menschen, auch im Manne, ein Thorschluss für mich: man wird niemals in dies Labyrinth verwegener Erkenntnisse eintreten.”
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) said by 1900 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source