E. M. Cioran (1911-1995)
[Source: Notizen/Cahiers 1957-1972, Karolinger]
“Emily Dickinson: 'I felt a funeral in my brain,' I could add, like Mademoiselle de Lespinasse, 'every moment of my life'. The eternal funeral of the mind.” [P. 15]
“I sought my salvation in utopia and found only a little comfort in the apocalypse.” [P. 17]
“To make more plans than an impostor or a researcher, and at the same time to be struck by a lack of will, reaches - without metaphor - to the root of will.” [P. 21]
“What cannot be translated into religious terms doesn't deserve to be lived.” [P. 22]
“Sometimes, deep inside, I feel endless powers. Unfortunately, I don't know what to use them for; I believe in nothing, and to act one must believe, believe, believe... I lose myself every day, then I let the world that resides in me die. With the arrogance of a fool, and yet dawning in disgracefulness, in sterile sadness, in powerlessness and in silence.” [P. 22]
“There is a certain pleasure in resisting the call of suicide.” [P. 23]
“The two greatest sages of late Antiquity: Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, a slave and an emperor.” [P. 23]
“All fame is ridiculous; those who seek it must truly have a taste for decay.” [P. 25]
“I must create a smile, arm myself with it, get under its protection, put something between the world and myself, hide my wounds, finally learn the mask.” [P. 26]
“Success doesn't necessarily encourage success, but failure always encourages failure. Fate is a word that makes sense only in misfortune.” [P. 27]
“Boredom: empty suffering, diffuse agony. One does not experience boredom in hell; only in paradise does one feel bored.” [P. 29]
“No matter how much I exert myself, I could never accept this universe without feeling guilty of deception.” [P. 27]
“There are moments of weakness and doubt in which truth, and even the idea of truth, seems so inaccessible and incomprehensible that the slightest probability appears as an unexpected perspective.” [P. 31]
“Up close, everything that lives, even the tiniest insect, seems full of mystery; from a distance, boundless insignificance. There is a distance that displaces metaphysics; to philosophize means to still be an accomplice of the world.” [P. 31]
"The rudeness of being 'profound.'" [P. 32]
“The entire Hindu philosophy can be summed up as terror, not of death, but of birth.” [P. 33]
“Not taking revenge poisons the soul as much, if not more, than taking revenge. Does one have the right not to take revenge?” [P. 35]
“We exist only for our enemies - and a few friends who don't love us.” [P. 35]
“I would give all the poets for Emily Dickinson.” [P. 35]
“I am a Mongol laid waste by melancholy.” [P. 35]
“Evil is as much a creative force as Good. Yet of the two, it is the more active. For too often Good loafs.” [P. 36]
“With each insult, we hesitate between a slap and a death blow; and this hesitation, which makes us waste precious time, confirms our cowardice.” [P. 39]
“We don't demand freedom, we demand the illusion of freedom. For millennia, humanity has been tormented by this illusion. And since freedom, as they say, is a feeling, what difference is there between being free or thinking you are free?” [P. 40]
“Man is inevitably heading towards catastrophe. To the extent that I remain convinced of this, I am interested in him, with greed, with passion.” [P. 40]
“For a skeptic to be born, a thousand believers must rage.” [P. 41]
“The breadth and depth of a mind are measured by the sufferings that he has endured to attain knowledge. No one knows who has not suffered. A keen intellect can be completely superficial. Every step towards knowledge must be paid for.” [P. 42]
“The story of the Fall may be the profoundest thing ever written. Here everything is told of what we were to experience and suffer. All of history in one page.” [P. 45]
“Some seek fame, others seek truth. I dare to join the latter. An unattainable goal is more seductive than an attainable one. The approval of men - what a humiliation to strive for it!” [P. 55]
“I am only interested in spirits endowed with the dimension of darkness.” [P. 55]
“The spirit flourishes neither in the excesses of freedom nor in those of terror. It requires a bearable constraint.” [P. 63]
“The more I think of life as a phenomenon distinct from matter, the more it frightens me: Life is based on nothing, it is an improvisation, an experiment, an adventure. It seems to me so fragile, so inconsistent, so devoid of any reality, that I cannot contemplate life and its conditions without shuddering. It is only a spectacle, a whim of matter. We would cease to exist if we knew how unreal we are. If one wants to live, one must forbid oneself to think about life, to isolate it in the universe, to want to bring it to the point.” [P. 63]
“There are no pure emotions between individuals who are engaged in the same pursuit. A novelist is not jealous of a philosopher, but novelists inevitably hate each other, as do philosophers, especially poets. Think of the hateful glances prostitutes throw at each other when they share the same sidewalk. Adam was only a beginner; Cain remains our universal sovereign, the true ancestor of our race.” [P. 68]
“If one is unfit for indifference, one cannot live without pleading. The soul is an eternal crucifixion.” [P. 71]
“Lady Macbeth, Brinvilliers - women to my liking. In moments of deep discouragement, there is a certain longing for cruelty.” [P. 71]
“I appreciate a thinker only to the extent that he doesn't conform to his time, just as I admire only those who become renegades of it, or better still, those who betray time and history.” [P. 72]
“If everything continues - the reason is that people lack the courage for hopelessness.” [P. 79]
“My strength: to have found no answer to anything.” [P. 84]
“The only benefit of funerals is to allow us to reconcile with our enemies.” [P. 104]
“To live is to be capable of indignation. The sage is a man who no longer protests. Hence he is not above but alongside life.” [P. 117]
“Every day that passes increases the dangers that threaten humanity. It will pay dearly for the 'progress' it doesn't cease to indulge. The means to preserve life are ridiculous compared to those suspected of destroying it, and whatever man may undertake, he will never be right against this disproportion. What one advances in months or years, one destroys in an instant. What makes destruction in general so immoral is its ease. Except for suicide, all destruction is effortless. These are edifying thoughts…” [P. 120]
“The state of the unconscious is the natural state of life. In it, life is at home, thrives, and finds the benevolent slumber of growth. As soon as it awakens, and especially stays awake, it becomes hurried, burdened, and begins to wither.” [P. 120]
“Among friends, feelings are inevitably false. How can one form a genuine attachment to someone they know too well without hidden intentions?” [P. 120]
“When I think that in my youth I regarded the anarchist as humanity's fulfillment! Is it progress or is it decline to have arrived at a resignation which makes me consider any act of rebellion as a sign of infantilism? And yet, if I no longer rebel, I continue to be indignant (which perhaps comes down to the same thing). This is because life and indignation are virtually equivalent terms. Nothing that is alive is neutral. Neutrality is a victory over life, not life.” [P. 120/121]
“I call 'naive' he who is unaware of his insignificance and consequently enjoys recognition. One can see that this definition encompasses almost the entire human race.” [P. 122]
“To repeat oneself is a sin against the spirit. How I love the writers who have written almost nothing!” [P. 123]
“A book must have weight and present itself as a fatality that, when we read it, gives us the impression that it couldn't have remained unwritten. That in the end it came into being by a decree of Providence.” [P. 123]
“The only realization I am proud of, because I had it so early, before my twentieth year, is that one shouldn't reproduce. My disgust for marriage, family, and all social conventions stems from this. It is a crime to pass on one's faults to offspring, forcing them to endure the same sufferings, perhaps an even worse crossroads than oneself. I have never been able to give life to a being that would have inherited my unhappiness and infirmities. All parents are either irresponsible or murderers. Only animals should give birth. Compassion prevents us from 'reproducing'. It is the worst word I know.” [P. 123]
“In essence, indifference cannot be learned; it is part of a civilization. It is not a goal; it is a gift.” [P. 128]
“'Sadness will last forever.' These seem to have been Van Gogh's last words. I could have spoken them at any moment of my life.” [P. 129]
“The profound word of the Gitâ, that one should always keep in mind: 'It is better to perish by one's own law than to be saved by another's.'” [P. 134]
“I am not afraid of death, but of life. As far back as I can remember, it has always seemed unfathomable and frightening to me. My inability to fit in. Then the fear of people, as if I belonged to a different species. Always the feeling that my interests were in no way in line with theirs.” [P. 142]
“No friend ever tells us the truth. That is why only the silent dialogue with our enemies is fruitful.” [P. 142]
“I have noticed that I am almost always happy when everyone else is not.” [P. 143]
“My inability to tell people the truth directly, in short, my cowardice, has entangled me in more complications than if I had been a moral hero. I fall over people as such, but in the face of an individual, I lack all courage. I am terribly afraid of hurting others and, no doubt, of being hurt myself. One can be afraid because of an excess of sensitivity.” [P. 144]
“I see it confirmed every day, one can have compassion for people, but to love them, that is impossible. Here, precisely on this central point, Christianity is mistaken.” [P. 144]
“The role of insomnia in history. From Caligula to Hitler. Is the inability to sleep the cause or the consequence of cruelty? The tyrant lies awake: that is what defines him as such.” [P. 147]
“One speaks of the diseases of the will, and forgets that the will itself is a disease, that to want is not a natural action.” [P. 150]
“From a Christian, I have only the desire to torment myself and unnecessarily burden my conscience and my days.” [P. 162]
“As soon as one doesn't accept the irreparable, one falls back into the obsession of suicide.” [P. 165]
“The sufferings of those one loves are morally more unbearable than one's own.” [P. 165]
“One doesn't become better as one ages, one only learns to hide one's shame.” [P. 168]
“First condition of a perfect society: being able to kill all those one detests.” [P. 175]
“The whole secret of life is to surrender to illusions without knowing that they are illusions. Once you recognize them as such, the spell is broken.” [P. 175]
“The melancholy of being understood - for a writer, there is none greater.” [P. 210]
“The true prophet is the one who suffers from the horror of the future without believing in 'progress.'” [P. 221]
“Children who are not ashamed of their parents are irrevocably condemned to mediocrity. Nothing makes one more sterile than admiring one's 'creators.'” [P. 227]
“Only the failed works allow us to glimpse the essence of art.” [P. 227]
“In a century, or perhaps even sooner, people will speak of our time as an earthly paradise. When the whole earth is populated, humanity will only be able to draw hope from the past…” [P. 233]
“No one digests an insult or humiliation, no matter how insignificant it may be. Revenge is the fundamental fact of the moral universe.” [P. 235]
“I am not a pessimist, I love this terrible world.” [P. 235]
“I can only love those who show a certain impotence in the face of life.” [P. 236]
“Every newborn is for me one more unhappy person, just as every death is one less. It's a mechanical reaction of mine. Condolences for birth, congratulations for death.” [P. 247]
“When the Olympic gods descended to earth, they often took the form of an animal. This says a lot about their appreciation for humans.” [P. 257]
“'Judge no one until you have put yourself in his place.' This old saying (where does it come from?) makes any judgment impossible, for we judge someone precisely because we cannot put ourselves in his place.” [P. 257]
“If one wants to know what life is worth, it is important to remember that the only thing that reconciles us with it is sleep, that is, exactly what it is not: its negation.” [P. 259]
“Suffering created me, suffering will destroy me. I am its creation. In return, I render it a service: it lives through me, persists through my sacrifices.” [P. 261]
“When the fear of death fades, everything becomes frighteningly simple.” [P. 273]
“The enormous sadness in the eyes of a gorilla. An elegiac animal. It is from this stare that I am descended.” [P. 289]
“'No creature can attain the highest degree of nature without ceasing to exist.' (Thomas Aquinas) This is the anticipated response to the aberrations of the Übermensch. Man is condemned to be what he is. He cannot change his nature. He can even (not) improve himself without punishment. To be fallen is his nature. Much more, it is his way of life.” [P. 296]
“I have almost always ended by adopting the opinions of those I most opposed. (The Iron Guard, which I had detested at the start, became for me a phobic obsession.) Having attacked Joseph de Maistre, I suffered his contagion. The enemy insidiously triumphs over a man without character. By dint of thinking against someone or something, you become its prisoner, and reach the point of loving that servitude.” [P. 306]
“Nietzsche tires me. My weariness sometimes reaches the point of disgust. One cannot embrace a thinker whose ideal lies in the opposite of what he is. There is something repulsive about the weak pretending to be strong, about the weak without pity. All this is good for adolescents.” [P. 328]
“Greatness exists only where a man stands alone against all others.” [P. 341]
“The Demiurge is called Ialdabaôth in Hebrew, which means 'Son of Chaos.'” [P. 341]
“To withdraw into oneself forever, like God after creation!” [P. 343]
"'Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe on instinct.'" (F. H. Bradley) [P. 352]
“Injustice is not a mystery but the visible essence of this world.” [P. 355]
“For some, the prospect of dying (Proust, Hitler...) impels them to a frenzy of activity: they want to conclude everything, complete their work, and thereby become eternal; not a moment to lose, they are stimulated by the notion of their end - for others, the same prospect paralyzes them, leads them to a sterile sagesse, and keeps them from working: what's the use? The idea of their end flatters their apathy, instead of disturbing it; whereas among the first group, it rouses every energy, good as well as bad. Who is right here, where is reason? It is hard to say, especially since both reactions are justified. Everything depends on our inclinations, on our nature. In order to really know someone, you have to know what the thought of his end releases in him: is it exciting or benumbing? Lucky those who set to work because they think they're going to die, who in this idea find a truly dynamic impulse! Less fortunate those who lay down their arms and wait, for they have too much time to envisage their conclusion. They die during all the moments they dedicate to the idea of death: moribund in the full sense of the word, inexhaustibly moribund.” [P. 359]
“I think I would be the worst psychiatrist one could imagine, because I would understand and agree with all my patients.” [P. 360]
“Time is my life, my blood; the others - vampires who feed on it, exhausting me. Someone is robbing me of my substance, or at least gnawing at it.” [P. 364]
“If this universe were cleansed of life, there would be nothing to complain about.” [P. 372]
“The only interesting part of any doctrine of salvation (whether religious or political) is the destructive part.” [P. 399]
“You cannot argue with physical pain.” [P. 425]
“Life in its most beautiful moment is merely a balance of its disadvantages.” [P. 431]
“Hitler's marriage with Eva Braun took place a few hours before their suicide. An official was hurriedly summoned, and asked each of them separately the obligatory question: 'Are you Aryan?' They answered in the affirmative. If Hitler had said: 'No,' that would have been the most extraordinary answer in History.” [P. 446]
“The scapegoat. We cannot do without it, its existence is required by our biological constitution. Someone must pay for our faults and our failures; if we consider ourselves as alone responsible, what complications, what additional tortures! To have a good conscience, is all that we ask: the scapegoat serves that function. It takes an almost superhuman effort to be able to assume the blame ourselves for everything. But when we have made the effort we have the distinct sensation that we are approaching the truth. Alas! This doesn't make us more modest, only more vainglorious.” [P. 466/467]
“My love of Bach has overwhelmed me again. I love to listen to him in the dark. I turn off the light and take my pleasure in a tomb. Sometimes it's as if I were listening to music after my death.” [P. 526]
“Those who don't die young deserve to die.” [P. 545]
“There is no means to prove that being is preferable to non-being.” [P. 548]
“If revenge were to miraculously disappear, almost the entire human race would become a victim of previously unknown mental illnesses.” [P. 551]
“Every noble attitude is false. Insults are unforgivable, except those from strangers, - never if they come from a friend or an acquaintance.” [P. 556]
“Never hurt anyone: how to manage this? By not manifesting yourself. For every action hurts someone. By abstaining, one spares every one. But perhaps death is even better than abstention.” [P. 556]
“What an extraordinary sensation, for a writer, to be forgotten! To be posthumous in one's own lifetime, no longer to see one's name anywhere. For all literature is a question of names and of nothing else. To have a name, the expression speaks volumes. Well then, no longer having a name, if one has ever had such a thing, may be better than having one. Such is the price of freedom. Freedom, and even more: deliverance. A name - all that remains of a being. It's stupefying that one can toil and torment oneself for such a trifle.” [P. 556/557]
“One is driven by the demon every time one doesn't want to play the 'game,' every time one speaks a truth that necessarily goes against oneself.” [P. 557]
“Suicide is the most normal act one can commit. Every thought should lead to it, and every career should end with it. It should replace the unwanted and humiliating end everywhere. Everyone should choose his last hour.” [P. 564]
“Only the one who questions the very fact of existence is truly revolutionary; all others, the anarchist first and foremost, pact with the established order.” [P. 566]
“Children turn against their parents; and parents deserve their fate. Everything turns against everything; everyone creates their own enemy. Such is the law.” [P. 570]
“'Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.'" (Blake) [P. 571]
“Over time, tolerance brings forth more evil than intolerance - that is the true drama of history. If this assertion is true, it is the greatest indictment against man.” [P. 576]
“To be able to kill oneself and not do it is to be an autocrat who doesn't make use of his authority.” [P. 599]
“If a person forces himself to believe in something, it is only to avoid killing himself, for suicide is the logical consequence of the realisation that nothing withstands rigorous analysis, cruel reflection.” [P. 599]
“I am always afraid of scandal, I am always afraid of defamation, against which there is no defense. But I say to myself: if I were dead, what would it matter to me if people said these or those abominations about me? For the most honorable man in the world, death is not only a liberation, but an acquittal. One is no longer guilty; one is no longer a monster once six feet under. Death is truly immoral. Suicide even more so. One feels like committing all sorts of crimes and saying to oneself: what does it matter, a single bullet would free me from guilt, and I would find a peace as perfect as that enjoyed by the innocent.” [P. 606]
“If the fear of death were to miraculously disappear, life would have no protection at all: it would be at the mercy of our first whim. It would lose all value and perhaps all meaning. The sages who urge us so vehemently to free ourselves from this fear do not know what they are doing. They don't realize that they are destroyers.” [P. 623]
“The greatest misfortunes are those foreseen.” [P. 627]
“To understand other people, you must be obsessed by yourself to the point of disgust, such disgust being a symptom of health, a necessary condition in order to look beyond your own troubles.” [P.638]
“An advancing army knows nothing, doesn't even suspect defeat. Mankind drags itself forward in the belief that it is rushing towards victory. Where it is really heading is only glimpsed by those who have turned away from the march, those who anticipate the end.” [P.639]
“The truth is in neither revolution nor in reaction. It resides in the questioning both of society and of those who attack it.” [P.647]
“Health, like freedom, has no positive content, since you don't consciously enjoy it when you possess it. It contributes nothing to you, it can enrich no one. So it would be absurd to say that someone made some discovery or had some vision because he was feeling well. It is when you feel ill that you discover something new, health being a state of absence, since you are not conscious of it. You would have to be able to tell yourself at any moment at all: I am feeling well, and from this derive a real, conscious well-being. But such consciousness would be in contradiction with health and would merely prove that health is or is about to be compromised. Any conscious health is a threatened health. Health is a good, certainly, but those who possess it have been denied the opportunity of knowing their happiness. And one might speak without exaggeration of a just punishment of the healthy.” [P.647/648]
“One should humble man. The resulting dangers are much less than those caused by arrogance. A naturally arrogant animal - the only means to bring him to reason is to show him what mud he is made of.” [P.652]
"'My life is the hesitation before birth.' (Kafka) ... As I have always felt.” [P.658]
“My task is to awaken people from their eternal slumber, even though I know that I am committing a crime and that it would be a thousand times better to leave them in it. Even if they are awakened - I have nothing to offer them.” [P.680]
“Life is extraordinary, in the sense that the sexual act is extraordinary: during, and not after. Once you position yourself outside of life and consider it from an external point of view, everything collapses, everything seems deception, as after the sexual performance. All pleasure is extraordinary and unreal, as is the case for every act of life.” [P.689]
“You have to let people say what they want. Eventually the truth will be reestablished. Anything is better than humiliation. Injustice is necessary to the mind; it fortifies, cleanses it. A victim is always, with regard to lucidity, above his persecutors. To be a victim is to understand.” [P.693]
“Spring and suicide are two related concepts for me. Spring represents an idea that I am not ripe enough for, or rather one that doesn't fit into my system.” [P.698]
“In essence, I only love religions that have transcended the idea of God. That is why I hold Buddhism in such high regard.” [P.701]
“I believe that there is no greater pleasure than trampling upon that which one has worshipped.” [P.702]
“Attachment is the origin of all servitudes. The more you want to be free, the less you tie yourself to beings and things. But once you are tied to them, what a drama it is to be released! We begin living by creating ties for ourselves; the older we grow the stronger they become. A moment comes when we understand that they represent so many chains, that it is too late to shake them off, for we are too used to them.” [P.715]
“Being born is a catastrophe, we are all survivors of birth.” [P.730]
“Perceiving thought as a self-destructive poison, the product of a viper turned against itself.” [P.731]
“Only he who creates the void around us does us a service. My gratitude to those who have made me more alone, who - in spite of themselves, but no matter - have contributed to my spiritual consolidation.” [P.736]
“Man has been deceived by the gods. There is no other way to understand history.” [P.753]
“Birth and guilt are correlative concepts. Objective guilt, I am inclined to say: a mistake for which one cannot be held responsible, although one can imagine that one is. Thus, I can attribute the guilt of my birth to myself, but no one will consider me 'guilty.'” [P.753]
“How am I responsible for my birth? - I am responsible as soon as I am happy to be born.” [P.753]
“The Anti-Zarathustra. It is more likely that the future belongs to the subhuman rather than to the superhuman. It is ridiculous to speak of the superhuman, for ever since man has existed he has done nothing but surpass himself, to tear himself out of his origins. But he tears himself out of them only to fall back into them better; and when he is farthest from his beginnings he will fall deeper than ever. He will pay dearly for his will to ascend and transcend. I see man shrinking more and more until there is nothing left of him.” [P.753]
“One who lacks the strength to take revenge, or who overcomes the desire to take revenge, is impure.” [P.759]
“He who lacked the courage to kill himself in his youth will blame himself for the rest of his life.” [P.763]
“To write about suicide is to have left it behind.” [P.770]
“People accept without excessive terror the notion of eternal sleep; on the other hand, an eternal waking (which is what immortality would be, if such a thing were conceivable) is unbearable, in thought as in fact: it gives you the shivers.” [P.821]
“What is called 'pessimism' is nothing but the 'art of living', the art of tasting the bitter flavor of everything that exists.” [P.838]
“He who has a sense of justice should go into the desert.” [P.862]
“If I had a son, he would have been a murderer.” [P.868]
“To feel destructive impulses doesn't mean to be evil, but rather to be out of balance. One can be good and a monster, an angel and a murderer at the same time.” [P.871]
“The only revolution, the only upheaval that interests me and that I really understand is the apocalypse. A social change is not significant enough.” [P.878]
“The truth lies in discouragement. Therefore courage, hope, lies, ignorance, are false. To live is to opt for the unreal, the non-true. There is a heroism of truth and a heroism of falsehood. Which should one advocate for? There are those who waver between the two for their entire existence, unable to commit. Perhaps in this wavering lies the true secret, or at least the art of not erring.” [P.883]
“Everything is surrender, except unrest, except the unquenchable thirst for truth.” [P.890]
“I think it is a given that a balanced mind of an ordinary constitution is incapable of imagining the future, or even of grasping a single aspect of it. This has always been the case and will be even more so in the future. For a common mind cannot feel or imagine the extent of what man is capable of, both in good and, above all, in evil. To understand the future is to understand one more stage on the path towards the end of humanity. This is precisely what man refuses to imagine. A lower wisdom prevents them from doing so. Here, the prophet demonstrates their superiority, derived from a very precise matter: because their instinct for self-preservation is deeply shaken. This is their weakness but also their strength. If they had kept their defenses and self-preservation reflexes intact, they wouldn't have the audacity to look beyond the present.” [P.898]
“Universal happiness would only be possible in the midst of a completely disillusioned humanity, which, at the same time, shouldn't be so embittered, a humanity that would be thrilled to have no more illusions...” [P.939]
“Not committing suicide is a sign of complicity.” [P.939]
“Being conscious is a drama that ends with death. Let us at least hope so.” [P.966]
“Clairvoyance doesn't eradicate the desire to live, it simply renders one unfit for life.” [P.971]
“If the whole world had 'understood,' history would have ended long ago. But it is biologically impossible to 'understand.' And even if all but one were to succeed, history would continue because of him. Because of a single illusion!” [P.972]
“Every truth, at the moment of its discovery, gives a feeling of liberation; then it becomes a chain. The same can be said of a god; in the beginning, when one clings to Him, one breathes a sigh of relief - and then one suffocates.” [P.976]
“Last night I told Christabel that I love life, but that doesn't prevent me from believing that it would be better for me and everyone else never to have existed. She disagrees and replies, 'Every being is unique, so...' I have noticed that people are incapable of radically questioning their own lives. Why is that? Because everyone looks at themselves from the inside and believes they are necessary, indispensable. Each person feels like a whole, like the entirety. Once you identify completely with yourself (and almost all living beings do), you react like God, you are God. How could one then accept the idea that it would have been better never to have existed? Only by living both within and on the edge of oneself can one simultaneously experience the feeling of one's own uniqueness and worthlessness, and accept, without a trace of despair, that it would have been better, on the whole, never to have existed.” [P.976]
“One must liberate oneself from life without hating it.” [P.982]
“Every living person is a defeated one, for birth is only the prelude to surrender.” [P.985]
“There is no more wrong attitude than to have understood everything and yet continue living.” [P.996]
“Non-consent to death is the greatest drama of mortals.” [P.996]
“Without the notion of a failed universe, the spectacle of injustice under every regime would put even an indifferent man in a straitjacket.” [P.1006]
Thank you for reading!
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