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Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes

Philologist

Friedrich Nietzsche was a German philosopher, cultural critic, poet, and writer whose works have had a profound impact on subsequent philosophy, literature, and thought. His ideas revolve around concepts such as the 'will to power', the 'Übermensch', and the 'eternal recurrence'.

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All Men Ifs Doe Philosophy People Knows Want World Should Religion

Famous Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes

“Childhood and youth are ends in themselves, not stages.”

Ends Childhood Stage Youth

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The dyed-in-the-wool teacher takes everything seriously only with respect to his students--himself included.”

Education Teacher Students Respect Wool

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“A noble soul is not the one that can manage the highest flights but the one that rises very little and falls very little but always dwells in a free, resplendent atmosphere and altitude.”

Littles Soul Fall Highest Rose Noble Flying Flight Manage Atmosphere Nobility

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Lying very still and thinking very little is the most inexpensive medicine for all the sicknesses of the soul, and when administered with good intentions it grows more and more pleasant with each passing hour.”

Thinking Littles Stills Soul Lying Grows Hours Medicine Intention Passing Passings Pleasant Sickness Stillness Good Intentions Inexpensive

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Someone said: "I have been prejudiced against myself from my earliest childhood: hence I find some truth in all blame and some stupidity in all praise. I generally estimate praise too poorly and blame too highly.”

Has Beens Said Childhood Prejudice Praise Blame Stupidity

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“A person must have a good memory to keep the promises he has made. A person must have a strong imagination to be able to have pity. So closely is morality tied to the quality of the intellect.”

Persons Made Able Strong Imagination Memories Quality Morality Promise Intellect Pity Tied Good Memories

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“In morality, man treats himself not as individuum but as dividuum.”

Men Morality Treats Individuality

Book:Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits

Source: Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits

“Do you suppose that sacrifice is the hallmark of moral action?--Just stop to consider whether sacrifice is not involved in every action that is done with deliberation, the worst as well as the best.”

Wells Done Action Moral Sacrifice Worst Involved Morality Hallmark Deliberation Moral Action

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The moral earth, too, is round! The moral earth, too, has its antipodes! The antipodes, too, have their right to exist! There is still another world to be discovered--and more than one! Set sail, you philosophers!”

World Stills Earth Moral Morality Rounds Philosopher Sail Sailing Another World Antipodes

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“This is the crux of the moral pessimists: if they really wanted to promote their neighbor's redemption, then they would have to resolve themselves to spoiling existence for him, and thus to being his misfortune; out of pity, they would have to--become evil!”

Ifs Wanted Evil Existence Moral Morality Neighbor Pity Redemption Good And Evil Resolve Misfortunes Pessimist Crux

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The enjoyment that all morality has given us to now and that it continues to give us--and so, what has kept it going up to now--lies in everyone's right, without lengthy investigation, to praise and blame. And who could endure life without praising and blaming!”

Giving Lying Given Morality Praise Blame Endure Enjoyment Investigation Lengthy

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Higher than "thou shalt" stands "I will" (the heroes), and higher than "I will" stands "I am" (the Greek gods).”

Hero Higher Morality Greek Autonomy My Hero Greek God

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“When horror is associated with what is harmful, evil results, when disgust does, badness.”

Doe Evil Results Horror Disgusting Badness

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The golden age, when rambunctious spirits were regarded as the source of evil.”

Age Spirit Evil Source Golden Golden Age

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“In the end we love our desire and not what it is that we desire.”

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Beware in the presence of cats: they never give, they do not even retaliate--they only reply, and purr in doing so.”

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The saying, "The Magyar is much too lazy to be bored," is worth thinking about. Only the most subtle and active animals are capable of boredom.--A theme for a great poet would be God's boredom on the seventh day of creation.”

Thinking Would Be Animal Creation Poet Capable Active Bored Boredom Theme Lazy Subtle Maxims Great Poet

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Animals know nothing of themselves, and they also know nothing of the world.”

Knows World Animal

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“We have to learn how to come out of unclean situations cleaner than we were, and even how to wash ourselves with dirty water whenwe need to.”

Needs Water Situation Dirty Purity Cleanliness Cleaners Dirty Water

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“What is originality? To see something that is as yet without a name, that is as yet impossible to designate, even though it staresus in the face. The way it usually is with people, it is a thing's name that makes it perceptible to them in the first place.--For the most part, the original ones have also been the name-givers.”

People Way Firsts Faces Names Impossible Originals Originality Giver

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“With deep men, as with deep wells, it takes a long time for anything that falls into them to hit bottom. Onlookers, who almost never wait long enough, readily suppose that such men are callous and unresponsive--or even boring.”

Men Wells Long Enough Fall Waiting Long Time Depth Bottom Boring Boredom Profundity Callous Unresponsive

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“All idealists imagine that the causes they serve are fundamentally better than any other causes in the world, and they refuse to believe that if their cause is to flourish at all it requires precisely the same foul-smelling manure that is necessary to all other human undertakings.”

Ifs World Believe Humans Causes Imagine Refuse Imagine That Idealism Foul Undertakings Idealist Manure

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The most dangerous follower is the one whose defection would destroy the whole party: hence, the best follower.”

Whole Party Dangerous Betrayal Followers Partisans

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Unresolved dissonances between the characters and dispositions of the parents continue to reverberate in the nature of the child and make up the history of its inner sufferings.”

Children Character Suffering Parent Childhood Disposition Dissonance

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The child is innocence and forgetting, a new beginning, a game, a wheel rolling on its own, a prime movement, a sacred Yes.”

Children Play Games Forget Childhood Movement Yeah Sacred Innocence Wheels Prime Rolling New Beginnings

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Along the journey we commonly forget its goal. Almost every vocation is chosen and entered upon as a means to a purpose but is ultimately continued as a final purpose in itself. Forgetting our objectives is the most frequent stupidity in which we indulge ourselves.”

Mean Purpose Goal Forget Journey Finals Stupidity Chosen Objectives Vocation Forget It Indulge

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“You must await your thirst and allow it to become complete: otherwise you will never discover your spring, which can never be anyone else's!”

Needs Spring Over You Thirst

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Children from humble families must be taught how to command just as other children must be taught how to obey.”

Children Leadership Teaching Taught Humble Command Obedience Teaching And Learning

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“If you are too weak to give yourselves your own law, then a tyrant shall lay his yoke upon you and say: "Obey! Clench your teeth and obey!" And all good and evil shall be drowned in obedience to him.”

Ifs Giving Law Evil Weak Lays Tyranny Teeth Obedience Good And Evil Tyrants Autonomy Yoke Lawmakers

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“What a dissimilarity we see in walking, swimming, and flying. And yet it is one and the same motion: it is just that the load- bearing capacity of the earth differs from that of the water, and that that of the water differs from that of the air! Thus we should also learn to fly as thinkers--and not imagine that we are thereby becoming idle dreamers!”

Should Earth Water Imagine Air Becoming Walking Capacity Flying Thinker Swimming Dreamer Imagine That Load Idle Learn To Fly

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Man alone resists the direction of gravitation: he constantly wants to fall--upwards.”

Men Want Fall Flying Gravity Gravitation

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“What an age experiences as evil is usually an untimely reverberation echoing what was previously experienced as good--the atavismof an older ideal.”

Age Evil Ideals Good And Evil Reverberation

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Good deeds shun the light as anxiously as evil deeds: the latter fear that disclosure will bring on pain (as punishment), while the former fear that disclosure will take away pleasure (that pure pleasure, that pleasure per se, which immediately ceases once the vanity's satisfaction is added).”

Light Pain Evil Pleasure Pure Satisfaction Deeds Punishment Cease Former Vanity Good And Evil Latter Good Deeds Secrecy Disclosure

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“That the world is a divine game and beyond good and evil:Min this the Vedanta philosophy and Heraclitus are my predecessors.”

World Philosophy Play Evil Games Divine Good And Evil Predecessors Vedanta Beyond Good And Evil

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you.”

Want Evil Goodness Capable Good And Evil

Book:The Portable Nietzsche

Source: The Portable Nietzsche

“And if a man goes through fire for his doctrine - what does that prove? Verily, it is more if your own doctrine comes out of your own fire.”

Ifs Men Doe Fire Prove Doctrine

Book:The Portable Nietzsche

Source: The Portable Nietzsche

“Heavy, heavy-hearted people grow lighter and rise occasionally to their surface through precisely that which makes others heavier,through hatred and love.”

People Hate Grows Hatred And Love Rose Heavy Surface Hearted Seriousness Lighters Love And Hate Frivolity Hatred And Love Heavy Hearted

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“One should steal only where one cannot rob.”

Should Stealing

Book:The Portable Nietzsche

Source: The Portable Nietzsche

“You lack the courage to be consumed in flames and to become ashes: so you will never become new, and never young again!”

Young Courage Flames Ashes Renewal Consumed Rejuvenation

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“People who feel insecure in social situations never miss a chance to exhibit their dominance over close, submissive friends, whomthey put down publicly, in front of everyone--by teasing, for example.”

People Feels Social Chance Situation Missing Fronts Example Insecure Humiliation Exhibits Dominance Tease Submissive

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“A person unlearns arrogance when he knows he is always among worthy human beings; being alone fosters presumption. Young people are arrogant because they always associate with their own peers, those who are all really nothing but who would like to be very important.”

People Knows Humans Persons Important Young Human Beings Importance Worthy Arrogance Arrogant Peers Associates Presumption Unlearn

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The arrogance that accompanies merit offends us even more than the arrogance of people who are lacking in merit: since merit itself offends us.”

People Merit Arrogance Lacking Accompany

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“There are people who are so presumptuous that they know no other way to praise a greatness that they publicly admire than by representing it as a preliminary stage and bridge leading to themselves.”

People Knows Way Stage Greatness Praise Admire Bridges Arrogance Representing Presumptuous

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The superman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: the superman is to be the meaning of the earth! I beseech you, my brothers, be true to the earth, and do not believe those who speak to you of otherworldly hopes! They are poisoners, whether they know it or not.”

Knows Believe Earth Speak Brother Being True My Brother Worldliness Poisoners

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“In Russia there is an emigration of intelligence: émigrés cross the frontier in order to read and to write good books. But in doing so they contribute to making their fatherland, abandoned by spirit, into the gaping jaws of Asia that would like to swallow our little Europe.”

Writing Littles Book Spirit Order Europe Crosses Russia Abandoned Asia Frontiers Good Book Fatherland Emigration

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Heaping glowing coals on another person's head is usually misunderstood and comes to nothing because the other person knows just as well that he is in the right and has also given some thought on his own part to heaping coals.”

Knows Wells Persons Given Coal Misunderstood Glowing Retribution

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“It is only those who know how to feel that "this is not good" who devise improvements.”

Knows Feels Know How Improvement Good And Bad

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“Many are obstinate with regard to the pathway once they have set upon it, few with regard to the goal.”

Goal Regard Pathways Obstinate Obstinacy

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“The shortest route is not the most direct one, but rather the one where the most favorable winds swell our sails:Mthat is the lesson that seafarers teach. Not to abide by this lesson is to be obstinate: here, firmness of character is tainted with stupidity.”

Character Teach Wind Lessons Direct Stupidity Sail Routes Firmness Obstinate Tainted Obstinacy

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

“As soon as we climb higher than those who had at one time admired us, we appear to them as though we have sunken and fallen down:for, in any event, they had at one time supposed that they were with us (even if it were through us) on the heights.”

Ifs Events Higher Height Fallen Climbs One Time Superiority

Author:Friedrich Nietzsche

About the Author

Born: October 15, 1844
Died: August 25, 1900
Known for: Philologist
Quotes: 2909

Related Topics

Men Ifs Doe Philosophy People Knows Want World Should Religion

Popular Topics

People Ifs Thinking Knows Men World Way Want Love Life Inspirational Needs Giving Feels Should Writing Trying Years Mind Firsts

Books & Sources

The Portable NietzscheRelated source material

Delphi Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (Illustrated): Friedrich NietzscheRelated source material

Basic Writings of NietzscheRelated source material

Human, All-Too-Human: Parts One and TwoRelated source material

The Gay Science: With a Prelude in Rhymes and an Appendix of SongsRelated source material

Thus Spoke ZarathustraRelated source material

Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free SpiritsRelated source material

Nietzsche: Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free SpiritsRelated source material

Beyond Good and EvilRelated source material

The Will to PowerRelated source material

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