The first forty years of life give us the text the next thirty supply the commentary on it.

All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

It is difficult to find happiness within oneself, but it is impossible to find it anywhere else.

The majority of men... are not capable of thinking, but only of believing, and... are not accessible to reason, but only to authority.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.

Man is the only animal who causes pain to others with no other object than wanting to do so.

Genius and madness have something in common: both live in a world that is different from that which exists for everyone else.

A pessimist is an optimist in full possession of the facts.

Religions are like fireflies. They require darkness in order to shine.

Nature shows that with the growth of intelligence comes increased capacity for pain, and it is only with the highest degree of intelligence that suffering reaches its supreme point.

God did not call the qualified to serve Him: instead He qualified the called.

Don't rush to fellowship at the church, temple or mosque if you don't do so at the house - first. "Charity begins at home".

They say I need to learn, but nobody's here to teach me. If they don't understand, how can they reach me?

As I said in one of my songs, we're still abolishing slavery, but nobody says it's a good thing. Nobody justifies it.

Sleep is a little death, dreams the whisperings of the Other, who would drag us all into his eternal night.

excuse me' he added, taking the opera glasses out of her hands and looking over her bare shoulder at the row of boxes opposite, 'i'm afraid i'm becoming ridiculous

The beauty of my sport is that you can do it from anywhere.

How are we to write The Russian novel in America As long as life goes so unterribly?

Being brave and self-confident doesn't necessarily start inside...It starts with the rest of the world, and it leads back to you.

Our society finds truth too strong a medicine to digest undiluted. In its purest form, truth is not a polite tap on the shoulder; it is a howling reproach.