45 quotes
German philosopher (1788–1860)
“Genius lives only one storey above madness”
"Each day is a little life every waking and rising a little birth every fresh morning a little youth every going to rest and sleep a little death."
on Time
"Time is that by which at every moment all things become as nothing in our hands, and thereby lose all their true value."
"Compassion is the basis of all morality."
on Philosophy
"In general, nine-tenths of our happiness depends on our health alone."
on Happiness
"If I maintain my silence about my secret it is my prisoner...if I let it slip from my tongue, I am ITS prisoner."
on Wisdom
"To feel envy is human, to savour schadenfreude is devilish."
on Emotion
"Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things."
on Life
"Almost all of our sorrows spring out of our relations with other people. There is no more mistaken path to happiness than worldliness."
on Relationships
"Health so far outweighs all external goods that a healthy beggars is truly more fortunate than a king in poor health."
on Health
"If the immediate and direct purpose of our life is not suffering then our existence is the most ill-adapted to its purpose in the world."
"I've never known any trouble than an hour's reading didn't assuage."
"A man can do as he will, but not will as he will."
"One should use common words to say uncommon things"
on Writing
"Every fulfilled wish we wrest from the world is really like alms that keep the beggar alive today so that he can starve again tomorrow."
"Compassion is the basis of morality."
"A precondition for reading good books is not reading bad ones: for life is short."
"We should comport ourselves with the masterpieces of art as with exalted personages - stand quietly before them and wait till they speak to us."
on Art
"Hatred comes from the heart contempt from the head and neither feeling is quite within our control."
"The closing years of life are like the end of a masquerade party when the masks are dropped."
"Every possession and every happiness is but lent by chance for an uncertain time and may therefore be demanded back the next hour."
