“The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die. As well the minds which are prevented from changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.”

“The advantage of a bad memory is that one enjoys several times the same good things for the first time.”

“I would believe only in a God that knows how to dance.”

“The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.”

“Man is the cruelest animal.”

“Faith: not wanting to know what the truth is.”

“Is man merely a mistake of God's? Or God merely a mistake of man?”

“A casual stroll through the lunatic asylum shows that faith does not prove anything.”

“Every deep thinker is more afraid of being understood than of being misunderstood.”

“Thoughts are the shadows of our feelings -- always darker, emptier and simpler.”

“The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous plaything.”

“What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: 'This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more' ... Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: 'You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine.”