Background Image
...
Mostly The Loss Teaches Us Only About The Value Of Things.
-Arthur Schopenhauer
...
Please Wait....
Translating....

Mostly The Loss Teaches

Arthur Schopenhauer
...
Mostly The Loss Teaches Us Only About The Value Of Things.

Understanding the Quote: "mostly the loss teaches us only about the value of things...."

This quote by Arthur Schopenhauer reflects deeply on the theme of loss. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Loss, Teach, Values, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Arthur Schopenhauer interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Arthur Schopenhauer

Arthur Schopenhauer is celebrated for insightful thoughts on loss and teach. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

Views: 5
Topic
Loss
Teach
Values
More From Arthur Schopenhauer
Every Original Idea Is First Ridiculed, Then Vigorously Attacked, And Finally Taken For Granted.
Taken
Ideas
Firsts
Console Yourself By Remembering That The World Doesn't Deserve Your Affection.
World
Affection
Remember
Everybody's Friend Is Nobody's.
Relationship
There Is No Opinion, However Absurd, Which Men Will Not Readily Embrace As Soon As They Can Be Brought To The Conviction That It Is Generally Adopted.
Men
Opinion
Global Warming
Religion Is The Metaphysics Of The Masses.
Religion
Mass
Metaphysics
Noise Is The Most Impertinent Of All Forms Of Interruption. It Is Not Only An Interruption, But Also A Disruption Of Thought.
Noise
Pessimism
Form
If A Relationship Is Perfectly Natural There Will Be A Complete Fusion Of The Happiness Of Both Of You-owing To Fellow-feeling And Various Other Laws Which Govern Our Natures, This Is, Quite Simply, The Greatest Happiness That Can Exist.
Law
Feelings
Fusion
It Is Only The Hope Of What Is Claimed That Begets And Nurishes The Wish.
Wish
Begets
What Makes People Hard-hearted Is This, That Each Man Has, Or Fancies He Has, As Much As He Can Bear In His Own Troubles.
Men
People
Fancy
Want And Boredom Are Indeed The Twin Poles Of Human Life.
Blessing
Boredom
Want
It Is The Courage To Make A Clean Breast Of It In The Face Of Every Question That Makes The Philosopher. He Must Be Like Sophocles' Oedipus, Who, Seeking Enlightenment Concerning His Terrible Fate, Pursues His Indefatigable Inquiry Even Though He Divines That Appalling Horror Awaits Him In The Answer. But Most Of Us Carry With Us The Jocasta In Our Hearts, Who Begs Oedipus, For God's Sake, Not To Inquire Further.
Philosophy
Heart
Fate
In Our Early Youth We Sit Before The Life That Lies Ahead Of Us Like Children Sitting Before The Curtain In A Theatre, In Happy And Tense Anticipation Of Whatever Is Going To Appear. Luckily We Do Not Know What Really Will Appear.
Children
Lying
Theatre
The Fundament Upon Which All Our Knowledge And Learning Rests Is The Inexplicable.
Mystery
Pessimism
Inexplicable
There Is No Doubt That Life Is Given Us, Not To Be Enjoyed, But To Be Overcome; To Be Got Over.
Philosophical
Adversity
Doubt
Life Is A Constant Process Of Dying.
Philosophical
Dying
Life Is
Human Life, Like All Inferior Goods, Is Covered On The Outside With A False Glitter; What Suffers Always Conceals Itself.
Suffering
Glitter
Human Life
The World Is Not A Factory And Animals Are Not Products For Our Use
Animal
Use
World
It Is The Courage To Make A Clean Breast Of It In The Face Of Every Question That Makes The Philosopher.
Oedipus
Faces
Philosopher
Every Generation, No Matter How Paltry Its Character, Thinks Itself Much Wiser Than The One Immediately Preceding It, Let Alone Those That Are More Remote.
Character
Thinking
Generations
Means At Our Disposal Should Be Regarded As A Bulwark Against The Many Evils And Misfortunes That Can Occur. We Should Not Regard Such Wealth As A Permission Or Even An Obligation To Procure For Ourselves The Pleasures Of The World.
Mean
Evil
World
The Cause Of Laughter Is Simply The Sudden Perception Of The Incongruity Between A Concept And The Real Project.
Laughter
Philosophy
Real
If The World Were A Paradise Of Luxury And Ease, A Land Flowing With Milk And Honey, Where Every Jack Obtained His Jill At Once And Without Any Difficulty, Men Would Either Die Of Boredom Or Hang Themselves; Or There Would Be Wars, Massacres, And Murders; So That In The End Mankind Would Inflict More Suffering On Itself Than It Has Now To Accept At The Hands Of Nature.
War
Men
Milk And Honey
First The Truth Is Ridiculed. Then It Meets Outrage. Then It Is Said To Have Been Obvious All Along.
Firsts
Truth Is
Outrage
Religions Are Like Fireflies. They Require Darkness In Order To Shine.
Spiritual
Atheist
Firefly
To Desire Immortality Is To Desire The Eternal Perpetuation Of A Great Mistake
Mistake
Desire
Immortality
We Can Do What We Wish, But We Can Only Wish What We Must.
Wish
Can Do
Personal Courage Is Really A Very Subordinate Virtue-a Virtue, Indeed, In Which We Are Surpassed By The Lower Animals; Or Else You Would Not Hear People Say, As Brave As A Lion.
Courage
Animal
People
Just As The Largest Library, Badly Arranged, Is Not So Useful As A Very Moderate One That Is Well Arranged, So The Greatest Amount Of Knowledge, If Not Elaborated By Our Own Thoughts, Is Worth Much Less Than A Far Smaller Volume That Has Been Abundantly And Repeatedly Thought Over.
Library
Research
Management
Every State Of Welfare, Every Feeling Of Satisfaction, Is Negative In Its Character; That Is To Say, It Consists In Freedom From Pain, Which Is The Positive Element Of Existence.
Pain
Character
Feelings
What People Commonly Call Fate Is Mostly Their Own Stupidity.
Funny
Fate
Destiny
A Man Can Be Himself Only So Long As He Is Alone.
Being Alone
Men
Alone Man
All Pantheism Must Ultimately Be Shipwrecked On The Inescapable Demands Of Ethics, And Then On The Evil And Suffering Of The World. If The World Is A Theophany , Then Everything Done By Man, And Even By Animal, Is Equally Divine And Excellent; Nothing Can Be More Censurable And Nothing More Praiseworthy Than Anything Else; Hence There Is No Ethics.
Animal
Men
Evil
The Brain May Be Regarded As A Kind Of Parasite Of The Organism, A Pensioner, As It Were, Who Dwells With The Body.
Brain
Body
May
Intellect Is Invisible To The Man Who Has None.
War
Men
Pessimism
The Universe Is A Dream Dreamed By A Single Dreamer Where All The Dream Characters Dream Too.
Dream
Character
Dreamer
Every Parting Gives A Foretaste Of Death; Every Remeeting A Foretaste Of The Resurrection. That Is Why Even People Who Are Indifferent To Each Other Rejoice So Much If They Meet Again After Twenty Or Thirty Years Of Separation.
Years
People
Giving
Women Remain Children All Their Lives, For They Always See Only What Is Near At Hand, Cling To The Present, Take The Appearance Of A Thing For Reality, And Prefer Trifling Matters To The Most Important.
Children
Reality
Hands
The Conviction That The World And Man Is Something That Had Better Not Have Been, Is Of A Kind To Fill Us With Indulgence Towards One Another.
Men
Love Hate
World
It Is Difficult, If Not Impossible, To Define The Limit Of Our Reasonable Desires In Respect Of Possessions.
Desire
Limits
Impossible
Our Civilized World Is Nothing But A Great Masquerade. You Encounter Knights, Parsons, Soldiers, Doctors, Lawyers, Priests, Philosophers And A Thousand More: But They Are Not What They Appear - They Are Merely Masks... Usually, As I Say, There Is Nothing But Industrialists, Businessmen And Speculators Concealed Behind All These Masks.
Knights
Doctors
Soldier
Marrying Means Doing Whatever Possible To Become Repulsed Of Each Other
Marriage
Wedding
Mean
A Major Difficulty In Translation Is That A Word In One Language Seldom Has A Precise Equivalent In Another One.
Language
Difficulty
Translations
Consciousness Is The Mere Surface Of Our Minds, Of Which, As Of The Earth, We Do Not Know The Inside, But Only The Crust.
Life
Mind
Earth
The Brut First Knows Death When It Dies, But Man Draws Consciously Nearer To It Every Hour That He Lives; And This Makes His Life At Times A Questionable Good Even To Him Who Has Not Recognised This Character Of Constant Anaihilation In The Whole Of Life.
Character
Men
Firsts
In Many Cases Hate A Person Is Rooted In The Involuntary Estimate Of Its Virtues.
Hate
Virtue
Cases
In Reading, The Mind Is, In Fact, Only The Playground Of Another's Thoughts.
Reading
Mind
Facts
To Become Indignant At [people's] Conduct Is As Foolish As To Be Angry With A Stone Because It Rolls Into Your Path. And With Many People The Wisest Thing You Can Do, Is To Resolve To Make Use Of Those Whom You Cannot Alter.
People
Use
Stones
Every Satisfaction He Attains Lays The Seeds Of Some New Desire, So That There Is No End To The Wishes Of Each Individual Will.
Wish
Desire
Satisfaction
To Read A Book Is To Hold An Entire World In The Palm Of Your Hand. That World Is Unique To You; No Two Readers Can Ever Inhabit The Same World
Book
Unique
Hands
We May Divide Thinkers Into Those Who Think For Themselves And Those Who Think Through Others. The Latter Are The Rule And The Former The Exception. The First Are Original Thinkers In A Double Sense, And Egotists In The Noblest Meaning Of The Word.
Thinking
May
Firsts
There Are, First Of All, Two Kinds Of Authors: Those Who Write For The Subject's Sake, And Those Who Write For Writing's Sake.
Writing
Two
Sake
What Disturbs And Depresses Young People Is The Hunt For Happiness On The Firm Assumption That It Must Be Met With In Life. From This Arises Constantly Deluded Hope And So Also Dissatisfaction. Deceptive Images Of A Vague Happiness Hover Before Us In Our Dreams, And We Search In Vain For Their Original. Much Would Have Been Gained If, Through Timely Advice And Instruction, Young People Could Have Had Eradicated From Their Minds The Erroneous Notion That The World Has A Great Deal To Offer Them.
Dream
Depressing
People
Malebranche Teaches That We See All Things In God Himself. This Is Certainly Equivalent To Explaining Something Unknown By Something Even More Unknown. Moreover, According To Him, We See Not Only All Things In God, But God Is Also The Sole Activity Therein, So That Physical Causes Are So Only Apparently; They Are Merely Occasional Causes. ( Recherches De La Vérité , Livre Vi, Seconde Partie, Chap. 3.) And So Here We Have Essentially The Pantheism Of Spinoza Who Appears To Have Learned More From Malebranche Than From Descartes.
Causes
Spinoza
Pantheism
If You Want To Know Your True Opinion Of Someone, Watch The Effect Produced In You By The First Sight Of A Letter From Him.
Sight
Watches
Letters
A Book Can Never Be Anything More Than The Impression Of Its Author’s Thoughts. The Value Of These Thoughts Lies Either In The Matter About Which He Has Thought, Or In The Form In Which He Develops His Matter — That Is To Say, What He Has Thought About It.
Lying
Book
Matter
The Ultimate Foundation Of Honor Is The Conviction That Moral Character Is Unalterable: A Single Bad Action Implies That Future Actions Of The Same Kind Will, Under Similar Circumstances, Also Be Bad.
Character
Honor
Foundation
Truth That Is Naked Is The Most Beautiful, And The Simpler Its Expression The Deeper Is The Impression It Makes.
Beautiful
Writing
Expression
Vulgar People Take Huge Delight In The Faults And Follies Of Great Men.
Men
Greatness
People
Gaiety Alone, As It Were, Is The Hard Cash Of Happiness; Everything Else Is Just A Promissory Note.
Happiness And Love
Cash
Notes
When You Look Back On Your Life, It Looks As Though It Were A Plot, But When You Are Into It, It's A Mess: Just One Surprise After Another. Then, Later, You See It Was Perfect.
Perfect
Plot
Looks
(politeness Is) A Tacit Agreement That People's Miserable Defects, Whether Moral Or Intellectual, Shall On Either Side Be Ignored And Not Be Made The Subject Of Reproach.
Agreement
People
Intellectual
A Man Finds Himself, To His Great Astonishment, Suddenly Existing, After Thousands And Thousands Of Years Of Non-existence: He Lives For A Little While; And Then, Again, Comes An Equally Long Period When He Must Exist No More. The Heart Rebels Against This, And Feels That It Cannot Be True.
Heart
Men
Years
How Is It Possible That Suffering That Is Neither My Own Nor Of My Concern Should Immediately Affect Me As Though It Were My Own, And With Such Force That Is Moves Me To Action?
Moving
Suffering
Action
Hatred Is An Affair Of The Heart; Contempt That Of The Head.
Anger
Philosophical
Heart
Consciousness Makes The Individual Careful To Maintain His Own Existence; And If This Were Not So, There Would Be No Surety For The Preservation Of The Species. From All This It Is Clear That Individuality Is Not A Form Of Perfection, But Rather A Limitation; And So To Be Freed From It Is Not Loss But Gain.
Loss
Perfection
Individuality
It Is Not What Things Are Objectively And In Themselves, But What They Are For Us, In Our Way Of Looking At Them, That Makes Us Happy Or The Reverse.
Way
Reverse
Men Need Some Kind Of External Activity, Because They Are Inactive Within.
Men
Needs
Kind
This Is The Case With Many Learned Persons; They Have Read Themselves Stupid.
Stupid
Learned Person
Cases
In Our Monogamous Part Of The World, To Marry Means To Halve One's Rights And Double One's Duties.
Marriage
Mean
Rights
Indeed, Intolerance Is Essential Only To Monotheism; An Only God Is By Nature A Jealous God Who Will Not Allow Another To Live. On The Other Hand, Polytheistic Gods Are Naturally Tolerant, They Live And Let Live.
Jealous
Hands
Religion
No Doubt, When Modesty Was Made A Virtue, It Was A Very Advantageous Thing For The Fools, For Everybody Is Expected To Speak Of Himself As If He Were One.
Doubt
Fool
Modesty
...a Genuine Work Of Art, Can Never Be False, Nor Can It Be Discredited Through The Lapse Of Time, For It Does Not Present An Opinion But The Thing Itself.
Art
Doe
Lapses
Every Man Takes The Limits Of His Own Field Of Vision For The Limits Of The World.
Inspirational
Science
Men
This World Could Not Have Been The Work Of An All-loving Being, But That Of A Devil, Who Had Brought Creatures Into Existence In Order To Delight In The Sight Of Their Sufferings.
Sight
Order
Suffering
Truth Is No Harlot Who Throws Her Arms Round The Neck Of Him Who Does Not Desire Her; On The Contrary, She Is So Coy A Beauty That Even The Man Who Sacrifices Everything To Her Can Still Not Be Certain Of Her Favors.
Sacrifice
Men
Desire
Opinion Is Like A Pendulum And Obeys The Same Law. If It Goes Past The Centre Of Gravity On One Side, It Must Go A Like Distance On The Other; And It Is Only After A Certain Time That It Finds The True Point At Which It Can Remain At Rest.
Distance
Past
Law
If A Man Wants To Read Good Books, He Must Make A Point Of Avoiding Bad Ones; For Life Is Short, And Time And Energy Limited.
Book
Life Is Short
Men
Without Books The Development Of Civilization Would Have Been Impossible. They Are The Engines Of Change, Windows On The World, "lighthouses" As The Poet Said "erected In The Sea Of Time." They Are Companions, Teachers, Magicians, Bankers Of The Treasures Of The Mind, Books Are Humanity In Print.
Change
Teacher
Book
We Should Be Surprised That A Matter That Generally Plays Such An Important Part In The Life Of Man Has Hitherto Been Almost Entirely Disregarded By Philosophers, And Lies Before Us As Raw And Untreated Material.
Lying
Men
Play
For Whence Did Dante Take The Materials For His Hell But From This Our Actual World? And Yet He Made A Very Proper Hell Of It.
World
Death Penalty
Hell
The Business Of The Novelist Is Not To Relate Great Events, But To Make Small Ones Interesting.
Writing
Interesting
Novelists
However, For The Man Who Studies To Gain Insight, Books And Studies Are Merely Rungs Of The Ladder On Which He Climbs To The Summit Of Knowledge. As Soon As A Rung Has Raised Him Up One Step, He Leaves It Behind. On The Other Hand, The Many Who Study In Order To Fill Their Memory Do Not Use The Rungs Of The Ladder For Climbing, But Take Them Off And Load Themselves With Them To Take Away, Rejoicing At The Increasing Weight Of The Burden. They Remain Below Forever, Because They Bear What Should Have Bourne Them.
Memories
Book
Men
The Vanity Of Existence Is Revealed In The Whole Form Existence Assumes: In The Infiniteness Of Time And Space Contrasted With The Finiteness Of The Individual In Both; In The Fleeting Present As The Sole Form In Which Actuality Exists; In The Contingency And Relativity Of All Things; In Continual Becoming Without Being; In Continual Desire Without Satisfaction; In The Continual Frustration Of Striving Of Which Life Consists. . . Time Is That By Virtue Of Which Everything Becomes Nothingness In Our Hands And Loses All Real Value.
Real
Frustration
Vanity
To Expect A Man To Retain Everything That He Has Ever Read Is Like Expecting Him To Carry About In His Body Everything That He Has Ever Eaten.
Men
Body
Expecting
Any Book, Which Is At All Important, Should Be Reread Immediately
Book
Important
Should
A Man Of Talent Will Strive For Money And Reputation; But The Spring That Moves Genius To The Production Of Its Works Is Not As Easy To Name
Spring
Moving
Men
A Man Can Surely Do What He Wills To Do, But Cannot Determine What He Wills.
Men
Free Will
Determine
Money Is Human Happiness In The Abstract; He, Then, Who Is No Longer Capable Of Enjoying Human Happiness In The Concrete Devotes Himself Utterly To Money.
Happiness
Sad
Money
[t]he Moralists Of Europe [have] Pretended That Beasts Have No Rights... A Doctrine Revolting/gross/barbarous... On Which A Native Of The Asiatic Uplands Could Not Look Without Righteous Horror.
Animal
Rights
Europe
No One Knows What Capacities For Doing And Suffering He Has In Himself, Until Something Comes To Rouse Them To Activity: Just As In A Pond Of Still Water, Lying There Like A Mirror, There Is No Sign Of The Roar And Thunder With Which It Can Leap From The Precipice, And Yet Remain What It Is; Or Again, Rise High In The Air As A Fountain. When Water Is As Cold As Ice, You Can Have No Idea Of The Latent Warmth Contained In It.
Lying
Mirrors
Air
There Is Not Much To Be Got Anywhere In The World. It Is Filled With Misery And Pain; If A Man Escapes These, Boredeom Lies In Wait For Him At Every Corner. Nay More; It Is Evil Which Generally Has The Upper Hand, And Folly That Makes The Most Noise. Fate Is Cruel And Mankind Pitiable.
Pain
Lying
Fate
As The Biggest Library If It Is In Disorder Is Not As Useful As A Small But Well-arranged One, So You May Accumulate A Vast Amount Of Knowledge But It Will Be Of Far Less Value Than A Much Smaller Amount If You Have Not Thought It Over For Yourself.
Knowledge
Library
May
Truth Is Most Beautiful Undraped.
Beautiful
Truth Is
Exaggeration Of Every Kind Is As Essential To Journalism As It Is To Dramatic Art, For The Object Of Journalism Is To Make Events Go As Far As Possible.
Art
Events
Essentials
History Is The Long, Difficult And Confused Dream Of Mankind.
Dream
Confused
Long
Vengeance Taken Will Often Tear The Heart And Torment The Conscience.
Taken
Heart
Tears
It Is A Curious Fact That In Bad Days We Can Very Vividly Recall The Good Time That Is Now No More; But That In Good Days, We Have Only A Very Cold And Imperfect Memory Of The Bad.
Memories
Good Day
Bad Day
Man Shows His Character Best In Trifles.
Character
Men
Trifles
That A God Like Jehovah Should Have Created This World Of Misery And Woe, Out Of Pure Caprice, And Because He Enjoyed Doing It, And Should Then Have Clapped His Hands In Praise Of His Own Work, And Declared Everything To Be Very Good-that Will Not Do At All!
God
Religious
Hands
Genius And Madness Have Something In Common: Both Live In A World That Is Different From That Which Exists For Everyone Else.
Different
Genius
World
Satisfaction Consists In Freedom From Pain, Which Is The Positive Element Of Life.
Positive
Pain
Philosophical
...in The End Every One Stands Alone, And The Important Thing Is Who It Is That Stands Alone.
Important
Stand Alone
Ends
To Become Reconciled To A Friend With Whom You Have Broken, Is A Form Of Weakness; And You Pay The Penalty Of It When He Takes The First Opportunity Of Doing Precisely The Very Thing Which Brought About The Breach.
Opportunity
Broken
Weakness
Because Christian Morality Leaves Animals Out Of Account, They Are At Once Outlawed In Philosophical Morals; They Are Mere 'things,' Mere Means To Any Ends Whatsoever. They Can Therefore Be Used For Vivisection, Hunting, Coursing, Bullfights, And Horse Racing, And Can Be Whipped To Death As They Struggle Along With Heavy Carts Of Stone. Shame On Such A Morality That Is Worthy Of Pariahs, And That Fails To Recognize The Eternal Essence That Exists In Every Living Thing, And Shines Forth With Inscrutable Significance From All Eyes That See The Sun!
Christian
Horse
Struggle
We Can Regard Our Life As A Uselessly Disturbing Episode In The Blissful Repose Of Nothingness.
Existentialism
Episodes
Regard
It Is Difficult To Keep Quiet If You Have Nothing To Do
Keeping Quiet
Quiet
Difficult
The Inexpressible Depth Of Music, So Easy To Understand And Yet So Inexplicable, Is Due To The Fact That It Reproduces All The Emotions Of Our Innermost Being, But Entirely Without Reality And Remote From Its Pain… Music Expresses Only The Quintessence Of Life And Its Events, Never These Themselves.
Pain
Reality
Depth
The Difficulty Is To Try And Teach The Multitude That Something Can Be True And Untrue At The Same Time.
Education
Teacher
Trying
Style Is The Physiognomy Of The Mind. It Is More Infallible Than That Of The Body. To Imitate The Style Of Another Is Said To Be Wearing A Mask. However Beautiful It May Be, It Is Through Its Lifelessness Insipid And Intolerable, So That Even The Most Ugly Living Face Is More Engaging.
Beautiful
Style
Mind
Happiness Belongs To Those Who Are Sufficient Unto Themselves. For All External Sources Of Happiness And Pleasure Are, By Their Very Nature, Highly Uncertain, Precarious, Ephemeral And Subject To Chance.
Inspirational
Self
Ephemeral
Genuine Contempt, On The Other Hand, Is The Unsullied Conviction Of The Worthlessness Of Another.
Hands
Conviction
Genuine
What A Man Can Do And Suffer Is Unknown To Himself Till Some Occasion Presents Itself Which Draws Out The Hidden Power. Just As One Sees Not In The Water Of An Unruffled Pond The Fury And Roar With Which It Can Dash Down A Steep Rock Without Injury To Itself, Or How High It Is Capable Of Rising; Or As Little As One Can Suspect The Latent Heat In Ice-cold Water.
Men
Ice
Rocks
The Composer Reveals The Innermost Nature Of The World, And Expresses The Profoundest Wisdom In A Language That His Reasoning Faculty Does Not Understand, Just As A Magnetic Somnambulist Gives Information About Things Of Which She Has No Conception When She Is Awake. Therefore In The Composer, More Than In Any Other Artist, The Man Is Entirely Separate And Distinct From The Artist.
Artist
Men
Giving
And Yet, Just As Our Body Would Burst Asunder If The Pressure Of The Atmosphere Were Removed From It, So Would The Arrogance Of Men Expand, If Not To The Point Of Bursting Then To That Of The Most Unbridled Folly, Indeed Madness, If The Pressure Of Want, Toil, Calamity And Frustration Were Removed From Their Life. One Can Even Say That We Require At All Times A Certain Quantity Of Care Or Sorrow Or Want, As A Ship Requires Ballast, In Order To Keep On A Straight Course.
Frustration
Men
Order
Das Ganze Der Erfahrung Gleicht Einer Geheimschrift Und Die Philosophie Der Entzifferung Derselben. The Whole Of Experience Is Like A Cryptograph, And Philosophy Is Like The Deciphering Of It.
Philosophy
Whole
Dies
Money Alone Is Absolutely Good, Because It Is Not Only A Concrete Satisfaction Of One Need In Particular; It Is An Abstract Satisfaction Of All.
Needs
Satisfaction
Abstract
In Youth It Is The Outward Aspect Of Things That Most Engages Us; While In Age, Thought Or Reflection Is The Predominating Qualityof The Mind. Hence, Youth Is The Time For Poetry, And Age Is More Inclined To Philosophy. In Practical Affairs It Is The Same: A Man Shapes His Resolutions In Youth More By The Impression That The Outward World Makes Upon Him; Whereas, When He Is Old, It Is Thought That Determines His Actions.
Philosophy
Men
Reflection
If God Made The World, I Would Not Be That God, For The Misery Of The World Would Break My Heart.
Heart
World
Misery
Most Men Are So Thoroughly Subjective That Nothing Really Interests Them But Themselves.
Men
Interest
Subjective
The Law Of Simplicity And Naïveté Applies To All Fine Art, For It Is Compatible With What Is Most Sublime.
Art
Law
Simplicity
If Children Were Brought Into The World By An Act Of Pure Reason Alone, Would The Human Race Continue To Exist? Would Not A Man Rather Have So Much Sympathy With The Coming Generation As To Spare It The Burden Of Existence, Or At Any Rate Not Take It Upon Himself To Impose That Burden Upon It In Cold Blood?
Children
Men
Race
Always To See The General In The Particular Is The Very Foundation Of Genius.
Education
Teacher
Learning
In Action A Great Heart Is The Chief Qualification. In Work, A Great Head.
Wisdom
Philosophical
Heart
Men Best Show Their Character In Trifles, Where They Are Not On Their Guard. It Is In The Simplest Habits, That We Often See The Boundless Egotism Which Pays No Regard To The Feelings Of Others And Denies Nothing To Itself.
Inspirational
Character
Men
The Greatest Wisdom Is To Make The Enjoyment Of The Present The Supreme Object Of Life; Because That Is The Only Reality, All Else Being Merely The Play Of Thought. On The Other Hand, Such A Course Might Just As Well Be Called The Greatest Folly: For That Which In The Next Moment Exists No More, And Vanishes Utterly, Like A Dream, Can Never Be Worth A Serious Effort.
Dream
Reality
Hands
Unrest Is The Mark Of Existence.
Unrest
Mark
Existence
How Very Paltry And Limited The Normal Human Intellect Is, And How Little Lucidity There Is In The Human Consciousness, May Be Judged From The Fact That, Despite The Ephemeral Brevity Of Human Life, The Uncertainty Of Our Existence And The Countless Enigmas Which Press Upon Us From All Sides, Everyone Does Not Continually And Ceaselessly Philosophize, But That Only The Rarest Of Exceptions Do.
Philosophy
Doe
Ephemeral
At Bottom, Every State Regards Another As A Gang Of Robbers Who Will Fall Upon It As Soon As There Is An Opportunity.
Fall
Opportunity
Politics
The Heavy Armor Becomes The Light Dress Of Childhood; The Pain Is Brief, The Joy Unending.
Pain
Light
Childhood
There Are Three Stages In The Revelation Of Truth. The First Is To Be Ridiculed, The Second Is To Be Resisted And The Third Is To Be Considered Self-evident.
Self
Three
Firsts
Patriotism Is The Passion Of Fools And The Most Foolish Of Passions.
Passion
Fool
Foolish
You Must Treat A Work Of Art Like A Great Man: Stand Before It And Wait Patiently Till It Deigns To Speak.
Art
Men
Waiting
The Eternal Being..., As It Lives In Us, Also Lives In Every Animal.
Animal
Eternal
There Is One Respect In Which Beasts Show Real Wisdom... Their Quiet, Placid Enjoyment Of The Present Moment.
Horse
Real
Quiet
Poetry Is Related To Philosophy As Experience Is Related To Empirical Science. Experience Makes Us Acquainted With The Phenomenon In The Particular And By Means Of Examples, Science Embraces The Whole Of Phenomena By Means Of General Conceptions. So Poetry Seeks To Make Us Acquainted With The Platonic Ideas Through The Particular And By Means Of Examples. Philosophy Aims At Teaching, As A Whole And In General, The Inner Nature Of Things Which Expresses Itself In These. One Sees Even Here That Poetry Bears More The Character Of Youth, Philosophy That Of Old Age.
Philosophy
Teaching
Character
Of All The Intellectual Faculties, Judgment Is The Last To Mature. A Child Under The Age Of Fifteen Should Confine Its Attention Either To Subjects Like Mathematics, In Which Errors Of Judgment Are Impossible, Or To Subjects In Which They Are Not Very Dangerous, Like Languages, Natural Science, History, Etc.
Children
Math
Maturity
We Must Set Limits To Our Wishes, Curb Our Desires, Moderate Our Anger, Always Remembering That An Individual Can Attain Only An Infinitesimal Share In Anything That Is Worth Having; And That On The Other Hand, Everyone Must Incur Many Of The Ills Of Life
Hands
Wish
Desire
Man Is The Only Animal Who Causes Pain To Others With No Other Object Than Wanting To Do So.
Pain
War
Animal
The Memory Should Be Specially Taxed In Youth, Since It Is Then That It Is Strongest And Most Tenacious. But In Choosing The Things That Should Be Committed To Memory The Utmost Are And Forethought Must Be Exercised; As Lessons Well Learnt In Youth Are Never Forgotten.
Memories
Lessons
Youth
Where There Is No Love, A Person's Faithfulness To The Marriage Bond Is Probably Against Nature.
Chemistry
Faithfulness
Persons
Genius Is Its Own Reward; For The Best That One Is, One Must Necessarily Be For Oneself. . . . Further, Genius Consists In The Working Of The Free Intellect., And As A Consequence The Productions Of Genius Serve No Useful Purpose. The Work Of Genius May Be Music, Philosophy, Painting, Or Poetry; It Is Nothing For Use Or Profit. To Be Useless And Unprofitable Is One Of The Characteristics Of Genius; It Is Their Patent Of Nobility.
Music
Philosophy
Useless
A Man Shows His Character Just In The Way In Which He Deals With Trifles, For Then He Is Off His Guard.
Character
Men
Way
Scholars Are Those Who Have Read In Books, But Thinkers, Men Of Genius, World-enlighteners, And Reformers Of The Human Race Are Those Who Have Read Directly In The Book Of The World.
Book
Men
Race
Thus, The Task Is Not So Much To See What No One Yet Has Seen, But To Think What Nobody Yet Has Thought About That Which Everybody Sees.
Thinking
Tasks
As A General Rule, The Longer A Man's Fame Is Likely To Last, The Later It Will Be In Coming; For All Excellent Products Require Time For Their Development.
Philosophical
Men
Lasts
Philosophy ... Is A Science, And As Such Has No Articles Of Faith; Accordingly, In It Nothing Can Be Assumed As Existing Except What Is Either Positively Given Empirically, Or Demonstrated Through Indubitable Conclusions.
Philosophy
Given
Conclusion
Mostly It Is Loss Which Teaches Us About The Worth Of Things.
Death
Loss
Teach
Before You Take Anything Away, You Must Have Something Better To Put In Its Place.
Something Better
Pantheism Is Only A Polite Form Of Atheism.
Atheism
Pantheism
Form
The Majority Of Men... Are Not Capable Of Thinking, But Only Of Believing, And... Are Not Accessible To Reason, But Only To Authority.
Believe
Men
Thinking
Wealth Is Like Sea-water; The More We Drink, The Thirstier We Become; And The Same Is True Of Fame.
Money
Philosophical
Sea
Apart From Man, No Being Wonders At Its Own Experience.
Men
Wonder
Every Hero Is A Samson. The Strong Man Succumbs To The Intrigues Of The Weak And The Many; And If In The End He Loses All Patience He Crushes Both Them And Himself.
Crush
Strong
Hero
The Two Enemies Of Human Happiness Are Pain And Boredom.
Happiness
Happy
Pain
The First Forty Years Of Life Give Us The Text; The Next Thirty Supply The Commentary On It.
Birthday
Philosophical
Years
Every Human Perfection Is Linked To An Error Which It Threatens To Turn Into
Errors
Perfection
Turns
A Man Never Is Happy, But Spends His Whole Life In Striving After Something Which He Thinks Will Make Him So; He Seldom Attains His Goal, And When He Does, It Is Only To Be Disappointed; He Is Mostly Shipwrecked In The End, And Comes Into Harbor With Mast And Rigging Gone. And Then, It Is All One Whether He Has Been Happy Or Miserable; For His Life Was Never Anything More Than A Present Moment Always Vanishing; And Now It Is Over.
Men
Thinking
Goal
Materialism Is The Philosophy Of The Subject Who Forgets To Take Account Of Himself.
Philosophy
Forget
Materialism
The Assumption That Animals Are Without Rights, And The Illusion That Our Treatment Of Them Has No Moral Significance, Is A Positively Outrageous Example Of Western Crudity And Barbarity. Universal Compassion Is The Only Guarantee Of Morality.
Positive
Philosophical
Compassion
Life Without Pain Has No Meaning.
Pain
Without Pain
The Tallest Oak Tree Once Was An Acorn That Any Pig Could Have Swallowed.
Life
Pigs
Tree
Whoever Heard Me Assert That The Grey Cat Playing Just Now In The Yard Is The Same One That Did Jumps And Tricks There Five Hundred Years Ago Will Think Whatever He Likes Of Me, But It Is A Stranger Form Of Madness To Imagine That The Present-day Cat Is Fundamentally An Entirely Different One.
Cat
Thinking
Years
Every Truth Passes Through 3 Stages Before It Is Recognized 1)ridicule 2) Opposition 3) Accepted As Self-evident.
Inspirational
Self
Accepted
The Happiness Which We Receive From Ourselves Is Greater Than That Which We Obtain From Our Surroundings. . . . The World In Which A Person Lives Shapes Itself Chiefly By The Way In Which He Or She Looks At It.
Happiness
Way
Looks
A Happy Life Is Impos­si­ble; The Best That A Man Can Attain Is A Heroic Life.
Happy Life
Men
Heroic
The Beard, Being A Half-mask, Should Be Forbidden By The Police - It Is, Moreover, As A Sexual Symbol In The Middle Of The Face, Obscene: That Is Why It Pleases Women.
Police
Half
Beard
The More Unintelligent A Man Is, The Less Mysterious Existence Seems To Him.
Life
Wisdom
Philosophical
The Life Of Every Individual Is Really Always A Tragedy, But Gone Through In Detail, It Has The Character Of A Comedy.
Character
Tragedy
Details
Mensch Kann Tun Was Er Will; Er Kann Aber Nicht Wollen Was Er Will. (one Can Choose What To Do, But Not What To Want.)
Want
Journalists Are Like Dogs, When Ever Anything Moves They Begin To Bark.
Funny
Dog
Moving
Ordinary People Merely Think How They Shall 'spend' Their Time; A Man Of Talent Tries To 'use' It.
Time
Men
Thinking
It Is Difficult To Find Happiness Within Oneself, But It Is Impossible To Find It Anywhere Else.
Finding Happiness
Impossible
Difficult
A Poet Or Philosopher Should Have No Fault To Find With His Age If It Only Permits Him To Do His Work Undisturbed In His Own Corner; Nor With His Fate If The Corner Granted Him Allows Of His Following His Vocation Without Having To Think About Other People.
Fate
Thinking
Should Have
In Order To Increase His Pleasures, Man Has Intentionally Added To The Number And Pressure Of His Needs, Which In Their Original State Were Not Much More Difficult To Satisfy Than Those Of The Brute. Hence Luxury In All Its Forms; Delicate Food, The Use Of Tobacco And Opium, Spirituous Liquors, Fine Clothes, And The Thousand And One Things That He Considers Necessary To His Existence.
Men
Clothes
Numbers
There Is A Wide Difference Between The Original Thinker And The Merely Learned Man.
Men
Differences
Thinker
Style Is What Gives Value And Currency To Thoughts.
Giving
Style
Currency
One Can Never Read Too Little Of Bad, Or Too Much Of Good Books: Bad Books Are Intellectual Poison; They Destroy The Mind. In Order To Read What Is Good One Must Make It A Condition Never To Read What Is Bad; For Life Is Short, And Both Time And Strength Limited.
Book
Life Is Short
Order
We Seldom Think Of What We Have But Always Of What We Lack. Therefore, Rather Than Grateful, We Are Bitter.
Gratitude
Grateful
Thinking
Will Without Intellect Is The Most Vulgar And Common Thing In The World, Possessed By Every Blockhead, Who, In The Gratification Of His Passions, Shows The Stuff Of Which He Is Made.
Passion
World
Stuff
The Mother Of Useful Arts Is Necessity; That Of The Fine Arts Is Luxury. For Father The Former Has Intellect; The Latter Genius, Which Itself Is A Kind Of Luxury.
Mother
Art
Father
All Truth Passes Through Three Stages. First, It Is Ridiculed. Second, It Is Violently Opposed. Third, It Is Accepted As Being Self-evident.
Inspirational
Witty
Truth
If At Times I Have Thought Myself Unfortunate, It Is Because Of A Confusion, An Error. I Have Mistaken Myself For Someone Else... Who Am I Really? I Am The Author Of The World As Will And Representation, I Am The One Who Has Given An Answer To The Mystery Of Being That Will Occupy The Thinkers Of Future Centuries. That Is What I Am, And Who Can Dispute It In The Years Of Life That Still Remain For Me?
Errors
Years
Confusion
In Early Youth, As We Contemplate Our Coming Life, We Are Like Children In A Theatre Before The Curtain Is Raised, Sitting There In High Spirits And Eagerly Waiting For The Play To Begin. It Is A Blessing That We Do Not Know What Is Really Going To Happen. Could We Foresee It, There Are Times When Children Might Seem Like Innocent Prisoners, Condemned, Not To Death, But To Life, And As Yet All Unconscious Of What Their Sentence Means.
Children
Mean
Blessing
Life Is Neither To Be Wept Over Nor To Be Laughed At But To Be Understood.
True Life
Life Is
Understood
With Health, Everything Is A Source Of Pleasure; Without It, Nothing Else, Whatever It May Be, Is Enjoyable...healt H Is By Far The Most Important Element In Human Happiness.
Important
Elements
May
Reading Is Merely A Surrogate For Thinking For Yourself; It Means Letting Someone Else Direct Your Thoughts.
Reading
Mean
Thinking
The Man Who Goes Up In A Balloon Does Not Feel As If He Were Ascending; He Only Sees The Earth Sinking Deeper Below Him.
Men
Doe
Earth
Reason Deserves To Be Called A Prophet; For In Showing Us The Consequence And Effect Of Our Actions In The Present, Does It Not Tell Us What The Future Will Be?
Doe
Our Actions
Reason
To Repeat Abstractly, Universally, And Distinctly In Concepts The Whole Inner Nature Of The World , And Thus To Deposit It As A Reflected Image In Permanent Concepts Always Ready For The Faculty Of Reason , This And Nothing Else Is Philosophy.
Philosophy
World
Reason
One Can Forget Everything, Everything, Only Not Oneself, One's Own Being.
Forget Everything
Forget
Oneself
If We Were Not All So Interested In Ourselves, Life Would Be So Uninteresting That None Of Us Would Be Able To Endure It.
Selfish People
Psychology
Selfishness
Great Men Are Like Eagles, And Build Their Nest On Some Lofty Solitude.
Philosophical
Greatness
Men
Everything That Happens, Happens Of Necessity.
Happens
Scoundrels Are Always Sociable.
Scoundrels
Human Condition
Sociable
What A Person Is For Himself, What Abides With Him In His Loneliness And Isolation, And What No One Can Give Or Take Away From Him, This Is Obviously More Essential For Him Than Everything That He Possesses Or What He May Be In The Eyes Of Others.
Loneliness
Eye
Giving
Empirical Sciences Prosecuted Purely For Their Own Sake, And Without Philosophic Tendency Are Like A Face Without Eyes.
Philosophy
Eye
Science
Something Of Great Importance Now Past Is Inferior To Something Of Little Importance Now Present, In That The Latter Is A Reality, And Related To The Former As Something To Nothing.
Past
Reality
Littles
Almost All Of Our Sorrows Spring Out Of Our Relations With Other People.
Relationship
Sympathy
Money
Just As The Witticism Brings Two Very Different Real Objects Under One Concept, The Pun Brings Two Different Concepts, By The Assistance Of Accident, Under One Word.
Real
Two
Different
A Man's Face As A Rule Says More, And More Interesting Things, Than His Mouth, For It Is A Compendium Of Everything His Mouth Will Ever Say, In That It Is The Monogram Of All This Man's Thoughts And Aspirations.
Men
Interesting
Mouths
Trending Author
Jamie Bell
Louis Althusser
Jane Austen
Jon Kabat-Zinn
Brad Paisley
Victoria Principal
Category
Information