Arthur Schopenhauer Quotes

• “Compassion is the basis of morality.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “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.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Happiness consists in frequent repetition of pleasure”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “The person who writes for fools is always sure of a large audience.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “It is difficult to find happiness within oneself, but it is impossible to find it anywhere else.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “They tell us that Suicide is the greatest piece of Cowardice... That Suicide is wrong; when it is quite obvious that there is nothing in this world to which every man has a more unassailable title than to his own life and person.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud, adopts as a last resource pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and happy to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Compassion for animals is intimately associated with goodness of character, and it may be confidently asserted that he who is cruel to animals cannot be a good man.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “One should use common words to say uncommon things”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “When we read, another person thinks for us: we merely repeat his mental process. In learning to write, the pupil goes over with his pen what the teacher has outlined in pencil: so in reading; the greater part of the work of thought is already done for us. This is why it relieves us to take up a book after being occupied with our own thoughts. And in reading, the mind is, in fact, only the playground of another’s thoughts. So it comes about that if anyone spends almost the whole day in reading, and by way of relaxation devotes the intervals to some thoughtless pastime, he gradually loses the capacity for thinking; just as the man who always rides, at last forgets how to walk. This is the case with many learned persons: they have read themselves stupid.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Der Mensch kann tun was er will; er kann aber nicht wollen was er will.
  
  Man can do what he wills but he cannot will what he wills.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “... that when you're buying books, you're optimistically thinking you're buying the time to read them.
  (Paraphrase of Schopenhauer)”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “The art of not reading is a very important one. It consists in not taking an interest in whatever may be engaging the attention of the general public at any particular time. When some political or ecclesiastical pamphlet, or novel, or poem is making a great commotion, you should remember that he who writes for fools always finds a large public. A precondition for reading good books is not reading bad ones: for life is short.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “Life is a constant process of dying.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “We forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “A sense of humour is the only divine quality of man”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “We will gradually become indifferent to what goes on in the minds of other people when we acquire a knowledge of the superficial nature of their thoughts, the narrowness of their views and of the number of their errors. Whoever attaches a lot of value to the opinions of others pays them too much honor.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “It is a wise thing to be polite; consequently, it is a stupid thing to be rude. To make enemies by unnecessary and willful incivility, is just as insane a proceeding as to set your house on fire. For politeness is like a counter--an avowedly false coin, with which it is foolish to be stingy.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “A high degree of intellect tends to make a man unsocial.”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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• “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

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• “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

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• “It would be better if there were nothing. Since there is more pain than pleasure on earth, every satisfaction is only transitory, creating new desires and new distresses, and the agony of the devoured animal is always far greater than the pleasure of the devourer”

  Arthur Schopenhauer

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