I had the whole sky in my eyes and it was blue and gold.
At that time, I often thought that if I had had to live in the trunk of a dead tree, with nothing to do but look up at the sky flowing overhead, little by little I would have gotten used to it.
If Nietzsche is correct, that to shame a man is to kill him, then any honest attempt at autobiography will be an act of self-destruction.
Big tears of frustration and exhaustion were streaming down his cheeks. But because of all the wrinkles, they weren’t dripping off. They spread out and ran together again, leaving a watery film over his ruined face.
Empires and churches are born under the sun of death.
No ends, simply means.
And it was like knocking four quick times on the door of unhappiness.
What is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying.
But too many people now climb onto the cross merely to be seen from a greater distance, even if they have to trample somewhat on the one who has been there so long.
Thus I draw from the absurd three consequences, which are my revolt, my freedom, and my passion. By the mere activity of consciousness I transform into a rule of life what was an invitation to death – and I refuse suicide.
O light! This the cry of all the characters of ancient drama brought face to face with their fate. This last resort was ours, too, and I knew it now. In the middle of winter I at last discovered that there was in me an invincible summer.
What made me run away was doubtless not so much the fear of settling down, but of settling down permanently in something ugly.
I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again. For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone, I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate.
I continue to believe that this world has no ultimate meaning. But I know that something in it has a meaning and that is man, because he is the only creature to insist on having one.
Without giving up anything on the plane of justice, yeild nothing on the plane of freedom.
In normal times all of us know, whether consciously or not, that there is no love which can’t be bettered; nevertheless, we reconcile ourselves more or less easily to the fact that ours has never risen above the average.
I felt the urge to reassure him that I was like everybody else, just like everybody else.
Our civilization survives in the complacency of cowardly or malignant minds – a sacrifice to the vanity of aging adolescents.
A craving for freedom and independence is generated only in a man still living on hope.
At one time or another all normal people have wished their loved ones were dead.