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1 " 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. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer
2 " 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? "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , Studies in Pessimism: The Essays
3 " We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness. "
4 " We forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people. "
5 " Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude "
6 " The person who writes for fools is always sure of a large audience. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , The Horrors and Absurdities of Religion
7 " It often happens that we blurt out things that may in some kind of way be harmful to us, but we are silent about things that may make us look ridiculous; because in this case effect follows very quickly on cause. "
8 " Happiness consists in frequent repetition of pleasure "
9 " 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. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , Parerga and Paralipomena
10 " Just as one spoils the stomach by overfeeding and thereby impairs the whole body, so can one overload and choke the mind by giving it too much nourishment. For the more one reads the fewer are the traces left of what one has read; the mind is like a tablet that has been written over and over. Hence it is impossible to reflect; and it is only by reflection that one can assimilate what one has read. If one reads straight ahead without pondering over it later, what has been read does not take root, but is for the most part lost. "
11 " 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. "
12 " The best consolation in misfortune or affliction of any kind will be the thought of other people who are in a still worse plight than yourself; and this is a form of consolation open to every one. But what an awful fate this means for mankind as a whole! We are like lambs in a field, disporting themselves under the eye of the butcher, who chooses out first one and then another for his prey. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , On the Suffering of the World
13 " The intellectual attainments of a man who thinks for himself resemble a fine painting, where the light and shade are correct, the tone sustained, the colour perfectly harmonised; it is true to life. On the other hand, the intellectual attainments of the mere man of learning are like a large palette, full of all sorts of colours, which at most are systematically arranged, but devoid of harmony, connection and meaning. "
14 " After your death, you will be what you were before your birth. "
15 " Compassion is the basis of all morality "
16 " Writers may be classified as meteors, planets, and fixed stars. They belong not to one system, one nation only, but to the universe. And just because they are so very far away, it is usually many years before their light is visible to the inhabitants of this earth. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , Essays and Aphorisms
17 " The fundament upon which all our knowledge and learning rests is the inexplicable. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , The Wisdom of Life and Counsels and Maxims
18 " 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. "
― Arthur Schopenhauer , The Wisdom of Life
19 " For an author to write as he speaks is just as reprehensible as the opposite fault, to speak as he writes; for this gives a pedantic effect to what he says, and at the same time makes him hardly intelligible "
20 " Qualsiasi uomo notevole, chiunque cioè non appartenga a quei 5/6 dell'umanità dotati tanto miseramente dalla natura, rimarrà dopo i quarant'anni difficilmente esente da una certa traccia di misantropia. "
