“Youth is an unpleasant period; for then it is not possible or not prudent to be productive in any sense whatsoever.”

“The great periods of our life occur when we gain the courage to rechristen what is bad about us as what is best.”

“The men of the period of corruption are witty and calumnious; they know that there are yet other ways of murdering than by the dagger and ambush--they know also that all that is well said is believed in.”

“The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.”

“But I am still far from them, and my sense does not speak to their sense. To men I am something between a fool and a corpse.”

“For this is how things are: the diminution and leveling of European man constitutes our greatest danger, for the sight of him makes us weary.—We can see nothing today that wants to grow greater, we suspect that things will continue to go down, down, to become thinner, more good-natured, more prudent, more comfortable, more mediocre, more indifferent, more Chinese, more Christian—there is no doubt that man is getting 'better' all the time.”

“Only Individuals have a sense of Responsibility”