“But thus do I counsel you, my friends: distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!”

“Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.”

“But thus I counsel you, my friends: Mistrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful. They are people of a low sort and stock; the hangmen and the bloodhound look out of their faces. Mistrust all who talk much of their justice! Verily, their souls lack more than honey. And when they call themselves the good and the just, do not forget that they would be pharisees, if only they had—power.”

“For man to be redeemed from revenge, that is for me the bridge to the highest hope, and a rainbow after long storms.Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!”

“I do not believe that an “impulseto knowledge” is the father of philosophy; but that another impulse, here as elsewhere, has only made use of knowledge (and mistaken knowledge!) as an instrument.But whoever considers the fundamental impulses of man with a view to determining how far they may have here acted as INSPIRING GENII (or as demons and cobolds), will find that they have all practiced philosophy at one time or another, and that each one of them would have been only too glad to look upon itself as the ultimate end of existence and the legitimate LORD over all the other impulses.”

“But let me reveal my heart to you entirely, my friends: if there were gods, how could I endure not to be a god! Hence there are no gods.”

“Joyous distrust is a sign of health. Everything absolute belongs to pathology.”