Man is a vile creature!

I believed, I believe, I want to believe, and I will believe

She enjoyed her own pain by this egoism of suffering, if I may so express it. This aggravation of suffering and this rebelling in it I could understand; it is the enjoyment of man, of...

Wer sich selbst belügt und seine eigenen Lügen anhört, kommt schließlich soweit, dass er keine Wahrheit mehr, weder in sich noch außer sich, zu erkennen vermag […]

Killing myself was a matter of such indifference to me that I felt like waiting for a moment when it would make some difference.

Generally speaking, our prisoners were capable of loving animals, and if they had been allowed they would have delighted to rear large numbers of domestic animals and birds in the prison. And I wonder what...

Since man cannot live without miracles, he will provide himself with miracles of his own making. He will believe in witchcraft and sorcery, even though he may otherwise be a heretic, an atheist, and a...

It is different with the upper classes. They, following science, want to base justice on reason alone, but not with Christ, as before, and they have already proclaimed that there is no crime, that there...

I drink because I wish to multiply my sufferings.

I love mankind, he said, “but I find to my amazement that the more I love mankind as a whole, the less I love man in particular.

The darker the night, the brighter the stars, The deeper the grief, the closer is God!

How could I alone have invented it or imagined it in my dream? Could my petty heart and fickle, trivial mind have risen to such a revelation of truth?

Quanto mais gosto da humanidade em geral, menos aprecio as pessoas em particular, como indivíduos.

But what about me? I suffer, but still, I don’t live. I am x in an indeterminate equation. I am a sort of phantom in life who has lost all beginning and end, and who...

Everything which is of use to mankind is honourable.

Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.

Of course boredom may lead you to anything. It is boredom sets one sticking golden pins into people, but all that would not matter. What is bad (this is my comment again) is that I...

But twice-two-makes-four is for all that a most insupportable thing. Twice-two-makes-four is, in my humble opinion, nothing but a piece of impudence. Twice-two-makes-four is a farcical, dressed-up fellow who stands across your path with arms...

Christ is with you. Do not abandon Him and He will not abandon you. You will see great sorrow, and in that sorrow you will be happy. This is my last message to you: in...

There are strange friendships: two friends are almost ready to eat each other, they live like that all their lives, and yet they cannot part.

During these three months I have gone through much; I mean, I have gone through much in myself; and now there are the things I am going to see and go through. There will be...

Every man has some reminiscences which he would not tell to everyone, but only to his friends. He has others which he would not reveal even to his friends, but only to himself, and that...

(Ivan) Hold your tongue, or I’ll kill you!(The devil) You’ll kill me? No, excuse me, I will speak. I came to treat myself to that pleasure. Oh, I love the dreams of my ardent young...

Do you think it is a vain hope that one day man will find joy in noble deeds of light and mercy, rather than in the coarse pleasures he indulges in today — gluttony, fornication,...

Know, then, that now, precisely now, these people are more certain than ever before that they are completely free, and at the same time they themselves have brought us their freedom and obediently laid it...

Reality is infinitely diverse, compared with even the subtlest conclusions of abstract thought, and does not allow of clear-cut and sweeping distinctions. Reality resists classification.

In short, the right given to one man to inflict corporal punishment on another is one of the ulcers of society, one of the most powerful destructive agents of every germ and every budding attempt...

It’s precisely in despair that you find the most intense pleasure, especially if you are already powerfully conscious of the hopelessness of your predicament.

The science of this world, which has become a great power, has, especially in the last century, analysed everything divine handed down to us in the holy books. After this cruel analysis the learned of...

At some thoughts one stands perplexed – especially at the sight of men’s sin – and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on...

O amor é um mistério divino, que deve permanecer escondido aos olhos de todos, aconteça o que acontecer.

We’ve got facts,” they say. But facts aren’t everything; at least half the battle consists in how one makes use of them!

There are seconds, they come only five or six at a time, and you suddenly feel the presence of eternal harmony, fully achieved. It is nothing earthly; not that it’s heavenly, but man cannot endure...

—No, no le dije una palabra de eso; de cualquier manera, no habría comprendido. Pienso que, si con la ayuda de la lógica se puede convencer a alguien de que no hay razón para llorar,...

originality and a feeling of one’s own dignity are achieved only through work and struggle.

The prince says that the world will be saved by beauty! And I maintain that the reason he has such playful ideas is that he is in love.

Do you suppose, gentlemen, that our children as they grow up and begin to reason can avoid such questions? No, they cannot, and we will not impose on them an impossible restriction. The sight of...

Money is the honey of humanity.

If God does not exist, everything is permitted.

Perhaps,” you will add, grinning, “those who have never been slapped will also not understand” – thereby politely hinting that I, too, may have experienced a slap in my life, and am therefore speaking as...

In wine is truth, and the truth had all come out, “that is, all the uncleanness of his coarse and envious heart”!

All of a sudden I became aware of a little star in one of those patches and I began looking at it intently. That was because the little star gave me an idea: I made...

Love the animals. God has given them the rudiments of thought and joy untroubled. Don’t trouble it, don’t harass them, don’t deprive them of their happiness, don’t work against God’s intent.

People talk sometimes of ‘bestial’ cruelty, but that’s a great injustice and insult to the beast; a beast can never be so cruel as a man, so artistically, so artfully cruel.

I did dream of it, chiefly because ‘all things are lawful.’ That was quite right what you taught me, for you talked a lot to me about that. For if there’s no everlasting God, there’s...

The only gain of civilisation for mankind is the greater capacity for variety of sensations – and absolutely nothing more.

To love someone means to see them as God intended them.

Without God all things are permitted.

Listen, listen!” I interrupted her. “Forgive me if I tell you something else…. I tell you what, I can’t help coming here to-morrow, I am a dreamer; I have so little real life that I...

…everyone needs a somewhere, a place he can go. There comes a time, you see, inevitably there comes a time you have to have a somewhere you can go!