/author/Friedrich%20Nietzsche

640

The most common lie is that with which one lies to oneself; lying to others is, relatively, an exception.

613

The very word 'Christianity' is a misunderstanding: in truth, there was only one Christian, and he died on the cross. The 'evangel' died on the cross. What has been called 'evangel' from that moment was actually the opposite of that which he had lived: 'ill tidings,' a dysangel. It is false to the point of nonsense to find the mark of the Christian in a 'faith,' for instance, in the faith in redemption through Christ: only Christian practice, a life such as he lived who died on the cross, is Christian. \r\n \r\nSuch a life is still possible today, for certain people even necessary: genuine, original Christianity will be possible at all times. \r\n \r\nNot a faith, but a doing; above all, a not doing of many things, another state of being. States of consciousness, any faith, considering something true, for example - every psychologist knows this - are fifth-rank matters of complete indifference compared to the value of the instincts: speaking more strictly, the whole concept of spiritual causality is false. To reduce being a Christian, Christianism, to a matter of considering something true, to a mere phenomenon of consciousness, is to negate Christianism.

608

This 'bringer of glad tidings' died as he had lived, as he had taught - not to 'redeem men' but to show how one must live. This practice is his legacy to mankind: his behavior before the judges, before the catchpoles, before the accusers and all kinds of slander and scorn - his behavior on the cross. He does not resist, he does not defend his right, he takes no step which might ward off the worst; on the contrary, he provokes it. And he begs, he suffers, he loves with those, in those, who do him evil. Not to resist, not to be angry, not to hold responsible - to resist not even the evil one - to love him.

608

The 'kingdom of heaven' is a state of the heart - not something that is to come 'above the earth' or 'after death.' The whole concept of natural death is lacking in the evangel: death is no bridge, no transition; it is lacking because it belongs to a wholly different, merely apparent world, useful only insofar as it furnishes signs. The 'hour of death' is no Christian concept - an 'hour,' time, physical life and its crises do not even exist for the teacher of the 'glad tidings.' The 'kingdom of God' is nothing that one expects; it has no yesterday and no day after tomorrow, it will not come in 'a thousand years' - it is an experience of the heart; it is everywhere, it is nowhere.

596

The lie of the 'moral world order' runs through the whole development of modern philosophy. What does 'moral world order' mean? That there is a will of God, once and for all, as to what man is to do and what he is not to do; that the value of a people, of an individual, is to be measured according to how much or how little the will of God is obeyed; that the will of God manifests itself in the destinies of a people, of an individual, as the ruling factor, that is to say, as punishing and rewarding according to the degree of obedience.

558

In the end, it is courage in the face of reality that distinguishes a man like Thucydides from Plato: Plato is a coward before reality, consequently he flees into the ideal; Thucydides has control of himself, consequently he also maintains control of things.'

552

In Athens, in the time of Cicero, who expresses his surprise about this, the men and youths were far superior in beauty to the women. But what work and exertion the service of beauty had the male sex there imposed on itself for centuries! For one should make no mistake about the method in this case: a breeding of feelings and thoughts alone is almost nothing; one must first persuade the body. Strict perseverance in significant and exquisite gestures together with the obligation to live only with people who do not 'let themselves go' - that is quite enough for one to become significant and exquisite, and in two or three generations all this becomes inward. It is decisive for the lot of a people and of humanity that culture should begin in the right place - not in the 'soul' (as was the fateful superstition of the priests and half-priests): the right place is the body, the gesture, the diet, physiology; the rest follows from that. Therefore the Greeks remain the first cultural event in history: they knew, they did, what was needed; and Christianity, which despised the body, has been the greatest misfortune of humanity so far.

530

Whatever we have words for, that we have already got beyond.

525

I fear greatly that modern man is simply too comfortable for some vices, so that they die out by default. All evil that is a function of a strong will - and perhaps there is no evil without strength of will - degenerates into virtue in our tepid air. The few hypocrites whom I have met imitated hypocrisy: like almost every tenth person today, they were actors.

511

The three tasks for which educators are required - One must learn to see, one must learn to think, one must learn to speakandwrite: the goal in all three is a noble culture. Learning to see - accustoming the eye to calmness, to patience, to letting things come up to it; postponing judgement, learning to go around and grasp each individual case from all sides. That is the first preliminary schooling for spirituality: not to react at once to a stimulus, but to gain control of all the inhibiting, excluding instincts. Learning to see, as I understand it, is almost what, unphilosophically speaking, is called a strong will: the essential feature is precisely not to 'will' - to be able to suspend decision. All un-spirituality, all vulgar commonness, depend on the inabilty to resist a stimulus: one must react, one follows every impulse.

496

Most of our general feelings - every kind of inhibition, pressure, tension and explosion in the play and counterplay of our organs, and particularly the state of the nervus sympathicus - excite our causal instinct: we want to have a reason for feeling this way or that - for feeling bad or for feeling good. We are never satisfied merely to state the fact that we feel this way or that: we admit this fact only - become conscious of it only - when we have furnished some kind of motivation. Memory, which swings into action in such cases, unknown to us, brings up earlier states of the same kind, together with the causal interpretations associated with them - not their real causes. The faith, to be sure, that such representations, such accompanying conscious processes, are the causes, is also brought forth by memory. Thus originates a habitual acceptance of a particular causal interpretation, which, as a matter of fact, inhibits any investigation into the real cause - even precludes it.

487

Radical means are indispensable only for the degenerate; the weakness of the will - or, to speak more definitely, the inability not to respond to a stimulus - is itself merely another form of degeneration.

472

You run ahead? Are you doing it as a shepherd? Or as an exception? A third case would be the fugitive. First question of conscience.\r\n \r\nAre you genuine? Or merely an actor? A representative? Or that which is represented? In the end, perhaps you are merely a copy of an actor. Second question of conscience.\r\n \r\nAre you one who looks on? Or one who lends a hand? Or one who looks away and walks off? Third question of conscience.\r\n \r\nDo you want to walk along? Or walk ahead? Or walk by yourself? One must know what one wants and that one wants. Fourth question of conscience.

430

'Was that life?' I want to say to death. 'Well then! Once more!

379

...only the doer learns.

329

Are not words and sounds rainbows and illusive bridges between things which are eternally apart?

307

'This is my way; where is yours?' - thus I answered those who asked me 'the way.' For the way - that does not exist. Thus spake Zarathustra.

190

One repays a teacher badly if one always remains nothing but a pupil.

153

True, we love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving. There is always some madness in love. But there is always some reason in madness.

129

I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

97

The secret of the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment of existence is: to live dangerously! Build your cities under Vesuvius! Send your ships into uncharted seas! Live at war with your peers and yourselves! Be robbers and conquerors, as long as you cannot be rulers and owners, you lovers of knowledge.

542

Danger alone acquaints us with our own resources, our virtues, our armor and weapons, our spirit, and forces us to be strong. First principle: one must need to be strong - otherwise one will never become strong.

22 quotes by Friedrich Nietzsche