The most subtle art, the strongest and deepest art - supreme art - is the one that does not at first allow itself to be recognized.
Fish die belly upward, and rise to the surface. Its their way of falling.
There are admirable potentialities in every human being.
The difficulty comes from this, that Christianity (Christian orthodoxy) is exclusive and that belief in its truth excludes belief in any other truth. It does not absorb; it repulses.
In other people's company I felt I was dull, gloomy, unwelcome, at once bored and boring.
Man is extraordinarily clever in preventing himself from being happy; it would seem that the less able he is to endure misfortune the more apt he is to attach himself to it.
In order to judge properly, one must get away somewhat from what one is judging, after having loved it. This is true of countries, of persons, and of oneself.
It is the special quality of love not to be able to remain stationary, to be obliged to increase under pain of diminishing.
Clear and precise ideas are the most dangerous, for one does not dare to change them.
Laws and rules of conduct are for the state of childhood; education is an emancipation.
Please do not understand me too quickly.
It would be wisest not to worry too much about the sterile periods. They ventilate the subject and instill into it the reality of daily life.
Art begins with resistance - at the point where resistance is overcome. No human masterpiece has ever been created without great labor.
The world will be saved by one or two people.
I find just as much profit in cultivating my hates as my loves.
I do not love men: I love what devours them.
Generally among intelligent people are found nothing but paralytics and among men of action nothing but fools.
Prejudices are the props of civilization.
Mozart's joy is made of serenity, and a phrase of his music is like a calm thought; his simplicity is merely purity. It is a crystalline thing in which all the emotions play a role, but as if already celestially transposed. Moderation consists in feeling emotions as the angels do.
The individual never asserts himself more than when he forgets himself.
The very act of sacrifice magnifies the one who sacrifices himself to the point where his sacrifice is much more costly to humanity than would have been the loss of those for whom he is sacrificing himself. But in his abnegation lies the secret of his grandeur.
There is no feeling so simple that it is not immediately complicated and distorted by introspection.
It seems to me that had I not known Dostoevsky or Nietzsche or Freud or X or Z, I should have thought just as I did, and that I found in them rather an authorization than an awakening. Above all, they taught me to cease doubting, to cease fearing my thoughts, and to let those thoughts lead me to those lands that were not uninhabitable because after all I found them already there .
The pettiness of a mind can be measured by the pettiness of its adoration or its blasphemy.
To read a writer is for me not merely to get an idea of what he says, but to go off with him and travel in his company.
Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Every day we present the best quotes! Improve yourself, find your inspiration, share with friends
or simply: