Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche... one man who never ceases to amaze me with his countless quotes and observations on mankind. Its almost incredible to believe the guy fathomed so much way back in 1880, his philosophy takes extremity to a whole new level.

His quotes have very deep issues, and being one among the countless layman, I can understand only a layer of what he's trying to convey. But they have a tendency to present different meanings to different persons based on their outlook and mindset.

Who would have known, the guy called for education and social elevation of women much before it became a raging issue!

I've samples a few of his quotes... try googling the rest if interested.---

Whoever has overthrown an existing law of custom has always first been accounted a bad man: but when, as did happen, the law could not afterwards be reinstated and this fact was accepted, the predicate gradually changed; - history treats almost exclusively of these bad men who subsequently became good men!

-from Nietzsche's Daybreak,s. 20, R.J. Hollingdale transl.

What is new, however, is always evil, being that which wants to conquer and overthrow the old boundary markers and the old pieties; and only what is old is good. The good men are in all ages those who dig the old thoughts, digging deep and getting them to bear fruit - the farmers of the spirit. But eventually all land is depleted, and the ploughshare of evil must come again and again.

-from Nietzsche's The Gay Science, s. 4, Walter Kaufmann transl.

Truth as Circe.-- Error has transformed animals into men; is truth perhaps capable of changing man back into an animal?

-from Nietzsche's Human, all too Human, s.519, R.J. Hollingdale transl.

Not enough!-- It is not enough to prove something, one also has to seduce or elevate people to it. That is why the man of knowledge should learns how to speak his wisdom: and often in such a way that it sounds like folly!

-from Nietzsche's Daybreak, s. 330, R.J. Hollingdale transl

The vain.-- We are like shop windows in which we are continually arranging, concealing or illuminating the supposed qualities other ascribe to us - in order to deceive ourselves.

-from Nietzsche's Daybreak, s. 385, R.J. Hollingdale transl

It is not things, but opinions about things that have absolutely no existence, which have so deranged mankind!

-from Nietzsche's Daybreak, s. 563, R.J. Hollingdale transl

Will and willingness.-- Someone took a youth to a sage and said: "Look, he is being corrupted by women." The sage shook his head and smiled. "It is men," said he, "that corrupt women; and all the failings of women should be atoned by and improved in men. For it is man who creates for himself the image of woman, and woman forms herself according to this image."
"You are too kind-hearted about women," said one of those present; "you do not know them." The sage replied: "Will is the manner of men; willingness that of women. That is the law of the sexes - truly, a hard law for women. All of humanity is innocent of its existence; but women are doubly innocent. Who could have oil and kindness enough for them?"
"Damn oil! Damn kindness!" someone shouted out of the crowd; "Women need to be educated better!" - "Men need to be educated better," said the sage and beckoned to the youth to follow him. - The youth, however, did not follow him.

-from Nietzsche's The Gay Science, s. 68, Walter Kaufmann transl.

We have arranged for ourselves a world in which we can live - by positing bodies, lines, planes, causes and effects, motion and rest, form and content; without these articles of faith nobody could now endure life. But that does not prove them. Life is no argument. The conditions of life might include error.

-from Nietzsche's The Gay Science, s.121, Walter Kaufmann transl.

Cause and effect: such a duality probably never exists; in truth we are confronted by a continuum out of which we isolate a couple of pieces, just as we perceive motion only as isolated points and then infer it without ever actually seeing it. The suddenness with which many effects stand out misleads us; actually, it is sudden only for us. In this moment of suddenness there are an infinite number of processes which elude us. An intellect that could see cause and effect as a continuum and a flux and not, as we do, in terms of an arbitrary division and dismemberment, would repudiate the concept of cause and effect and deny all conditionality.

-from Nietzsche's The Gay Science, s.112, Walter Kaufmann transl.

Until next time... free.. peace.