Arthur Schopenhauer Quotes: 261 Quotes on Talent, Solitude, Compassion, and the Pursuit of Truth

“The hazardous part of the business is also the mere possibility, still to be admitted, that the ultimate insight into the nature of things attainable by man, into his very being and that of the world, might not coincide exactly with the doctrines which were in part made known to the former little race of the Jews and in part appeared in Jerusalem eighteen hundred years ago.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Das Bedenkliche bei der Sache ist auch bloß die doch einzuräumende Möglichkeit, daß die letzte dem Menschen erreichbare Einsicht in die Natur der Dinge, in sein eigenes Wesen und das der Welt nicht gerade zusammenträfe mit den Lehren, welche theils dem ehemaligen Völkchen der Juden eröffnet worden, theils vor 1800 Jahren in Jerusalem aufgetreten sind.
Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, p. 154, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 142
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

World , Business , Nature , Appearance

“Dogma is intended for, and suited to, the great mass of the human race; and as such it can contain merely allegorical truth that it nevertheless has to pass off as truth sensu proprio [in the proper sense].”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Als auf die große Masse des Menschengeschlechts berechnet und derselben angemessen, kann bloß allegorische Wahrheit enthalten, welche sie jedoch als sensu proprio wahr geltend zu machen hat.
Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, p. 160, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 147
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

Truth , Sense

“Childish and altogether ludicrous is what you yourself are and all philosophers; and if a grown-up man like me spends fifteen minutes with fools of this kind, it is merely a way of passing the time. I've now got more important things to do. Goodbye!”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

"Thrasymachus", in "On the Indestructibility of our Essential Being by Death, in Essays and Aphorisms (1970) as translated by R. J. Hollingdale, p. 76
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Fools , Way , Time

“Intellect is invisible to the man who has none.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Our Relation to Others, § 23
Essays

“There is no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome — to be got over.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Allerdings ist das Leben nicht eigentlich da, um genossen, sondern um überstanden, abgethan zu werden...
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Life

“We see in tragedy the noblest men, after a long conflict and suffering, finally renounce forever all the pleasure of life and the aims till then pursued so keenly, or cheerfully and willingly give up life itself.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book The World as Will and Representation

Book 1
The World as Will and Representation (1819; 1844; 1859)

Life , Men , Pleasure , Suffering

“There is only one healing force, and that is nature; in pills and ointments there is none. At most they can give the healing force of nature a hint about where there is something for it to do.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Es gibt nur eine Heilkraft, und das ist die Natur; in Salben und Pillen steckt keine. Höchstens können sie der Heilkraft der Natur einen Wink geben, wo etwas für sie zu tun ist.
Neue Paralipomena
Essays

Nature

“Descartes is rightly regarded as the father of modern philosophy primarily and generally because he helped the faculty of reason to stand on its own feet by teaching men to use their brains in place whereof the Bible, on the one hand, and Aristotle, on the other, had previously served.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 3
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Sketch of a History of the Doctrine of the Ideal and the Real

Men , Help

“The view of things [called Pantheism] … — that all plurality is only apparent, that in the endless series of individuals, passing simultaneously and successively into and out of life, generation after generation, age after age, there is but one and the same entity really existing, which is present and identical in all alike; — this theory … may be carried back to the remotest antiquity. It is the alpha and omega of the oldest book in the world, the sacred Vedas, whose dogmatic part, or rather esoteric teaching, is found in the Upanishads. There, in almost every page this profound doctrine lies enshrined; with tireless repetition, in countless adaptations, by many varied parables and similes it is expounded and inculcated. That such was, moreover, the fount whence Pythagoras drew his wisdom, cannot be doubted … That it formed practically the central point in the whole philosophy of the Eleatic School, is likewise a familiar fact. Later on, the New Platonists were steeped in the same … In the ninth century we find it unexpectedly appearing in Europe. It kindles the spirit of no less a divine than Johannes Scotus Erigena, who endeavours to clothe it with the forms and terminology of the Christian religion. Among the Mohammedans we detect it again in the rapt mysticism of the Sufi. In the West Giordano Bruno cannot resist the impulse to utter it aloud; but his reward is a death of shame and torture. And at the same time we find the Christian Mystics losing themselves in it, against their own will and intention, whenever and wherever we read of them! Spinoza's name is identified with it.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book On the Basis of Morality

Part IV, Ch. 2, pp. 269 https://archive.org/stream/basisofmorality00schoiala#page/269/mode/2up-272
On the Basis of Morality (1840)

Life , Death , Wisdom , Books

“For a work to become immortal it must possess so many excellences that it will not be easy to find a man who understands and values them all; so that there will be in all ages men who recognise and appreciate some of these excellences; by this means the credit of the work will be retained throughout the long course of centuries and ever-changing interests, for, as it is appreciated first in this sense, then in that, the interest is never exhausted.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Essays, On Authorship and Style

Men , Age , Understanding , Sense

“All the cruelty and torment of which the world is full is in fact merely the necessary result of the totality of the forms under which the will to live is objectified.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Vol. 2, Ch. 14, § 164
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

World

“If at times I have thought myself unfortunate, it is because of a confusion, an error. I have mistaken myself for someone else… Who am I really? I am the author of The World as Will and Representation, I am the one who has given an answer to the mystery of Being that will occupy the thinkers of future centuries. That is what I am, and who can dispute it in the years of life that still remain for me?”

Arthur Schopenhauer

From The Total Library by Jorge Luis Borges, 1999
Other

Life , World , Error , Time

“…this our world, which is so real, with all its suns and milky ways is—nothing.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book The World as Will and Representation

The World as Will and Representation (1819; 1844; 1859)

World , Way , Sun

“Others … are in the habit of teaching that religion and philosophy are really the same thing. Such a statement, however, appears to be true only in the sense in which Francis I is supposed to have said in a very conciliatory tone with reference to Charles V: ‘what my brother Charles wants is also what I want’, namely Milan. Others again do not stand on such ceremony, but talk bluntly of a Christian philosophy, which is much the same as if we were to speak of a Christian arithmetic, and this would be stretching a point. Moreover, epithets taken from such dogmas are obviously unbecoming of philosophy, for it is devoted to the attempt of the faculty of reason to solve by its own means and independently of all authority the problem of existence.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Andere wieder, von diesen Wahrheitsforschern, schmelzen Philosophie und Religion zu einem Kentauren zusammen, den sie Religionsphilosophie nennen; Pflegen auch zu lehren, Religion und Philosophie seien eigentlich das Selbe;—welcher Sah jedoch nur in dem Sinne wahr zu seyn scheint, in welchem Franz I., in Beziehung auf Karl V., sehr versöhnlich gesagt haben soll: „was mein Bruder Karl will, das will ich auch,”—nämlich Mailand, Wieder andere machen nicht so viele Umstände, sondern reden geradezu von einer Christlichen Philosophie;—welches ungefähr so herauskommt, wie wenn man von einer Christlichen Arithmetik reden wollte, die fünf gerade seyn ließe. Dergleichen von Glaubenslehren entnommene Epitheta sind zudem der Philosophie offenbar unanständig, da sie sich für den Versuch der Vernunft giebt, aus eigenen Mitteln und unabhängig von aller Auktorität das Problem des Daseyns zu lösen.
Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, p. 155, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, pp. 142-143
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

Religion , Problem , Sense , Appearance

“The chief objection I have to Pantheism is that it says nothing. To call the world "God" is not to explain it; it is only to enrich our language with a superfluous synonym for the word "world."”

Arthur Schopenhauer

On Pantheism as quoted in Faiths of Famous Men in Their Own Words (1900) by John Kenyon Kilbourn; also in Religion: A Dialogue and Other Essays (2007), p. 40
Essays

God , World

“The brain may be regarded as a kind of parasite of the organism, a pensioner, as it were, who dwells with the body.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

“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.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Vol. 2, Ch. 3, § 39
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Life

“Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Unverified attribution noted in Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations (1993), ed. Suzy Platt, Library of Congress, p. 39; compare Heraclitus: Nothing endures but change.

Change

“In general admittedly the Wise of all times have always said the same thing, and the fools, that is to say the vast majority of all times, have always done the same thing, i. e. the opposite; and so it will remain in the future.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Im allgemeinen freilich haben die Weisen aller Zeiten immer dasselbe gesagt, und die Toren, d.h. die unermessliche Majorität aller Zeiten, haben immer dasselbe, nämlich das Gegenteil getan; und so wird es denn auch ferner bleiben.
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Fools , Time , Future

“To be a philosopher, that is to say, a lover of wisdom (for wisdom is nothing but truth), it is not enough for a man to love truth, in so far as it is compatible with his own interest, with the will of his superiors, with the dogmas of the church, or with the prejudices and tastes of his contemporaries; so long as he rests content with this position, he is only a philautos, not a philosophos [a lover of self, not a lover of wisdom]. For this title of honor is well and wisely conceived precisely by its stating that one should love the truth earnestly and with one’s whole heart, and thus unconditionally and unreservedly, above all else, and, if need be, in defiance of all else. Now the reason for this is the one previously stated that the intellect has become free, and in this state it does not even know or understand any other interest than that of truth.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, pp. 21–22
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Sketch of a History of the Doctrine of the Ideal and the Real

Love , Wisdom , Truth , Lovers

“Reading is merely a surrogate for thinking for yourself; it means letting someone else direct your thoughts. Many books, moreover, serve merely to show how many ways there are of being wrong, and how far astray you yourself would go if you followed their guidance. You should read only when your own thoughts dry up, which will of course happen frequently enough even to the best heads; but to banish your own thoughts so as to take up a book is a sin against the holy ghost; it is like deserting untrammeled nature to look at a herbarium or engravings of landscapes.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Vol. 2, Ch. 22, § 261
Variant translations:
Reading is thinking with some one else's head instead of one's own.
As translated by T. Bailey Saunders
Reading is equivalent to thinking with someone else’s head instead of with one’s own.
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Books , Way , Nature , Thinking

“Monotheistic religions alone furnish the spectacle of religious wars, religious persecutions, heretical tribunals, that breaking of idols and destruction of images of the gods, that razing of Indian temples and Egyptian colossi, which had looked on the sun 3,000 years: just because a jealous god had said, 'Thou shalt make no graven image.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Religion: A Dialogue

God , War , Religion , Sun

“In philosophy at the universities truth occupies only a secondary place and, if called upon, she must get up and make room for another attribute.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Man sieht daraus, daß in der Universitäts-philosophie die Wahrheit nur eine sekundäre Stelle einnimmt und, wenn es gefordert wird, aufstehn muß, einer andern Eigenschaft Platz zu machen.
Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, p. 152, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 140
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

Truth , Universe

“The method of viewing things which proceeds in accordance with the principle of sufficient reason is the rational method, and it alone is valid and of use in practical life and in science. The method which looks away from the content of this principle is the method of genius, which is only valid and of use in art.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book The World as Will and Representation

Die dem Satz vom Grunde nachgehende ist die vernünftige Betrachtungsart, welche im praktischen Leben, wie in der Wissenschaft, allein gilt und hilft: die vom Inhalt jenes Satzes wegsehende ist die geniale Betrachtungsart, welche in der Kunst allein gilt und hilft.
Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, Zweiter Band, Ergänzungen zum dritten Buch, para. 36 (1859)
The World as Will and Representation (1819; 1844; 1859)

Life , Art , Science

“Patriotism, when it wants to make itself felt in the domain of learning, is a dirty fellow who should be thrown out of doors.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Vol. 2, Ch. 21, § 255
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Learning

“The presence of a thought is like the presence of a lover.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Die Gegenwart eines Gedankens ist wie die Gegenwart einer Geliebten.
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Lovers

“A great affliction of all Philistines is that idealities afford them no entertainment, but to escape from boredom they are always in need of realities.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, p. 345
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Aphorisms on the Wisdom of Life

Reality , Affliction

“Every time a man is begotten and born, the clock of human life is wound up anew to repeat once more its same old tune that has already been played innumerable times, movement by movement and measure by measure, with insignificant variations.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book The World as Will and Representation

Vol. I, Ch. 4, The World As Will: Second Aspect, as translated by Eric F. J. Payne (1958) p. 322
The World as Will and Representation (1819; 1844; 1859)

Life , Time

“The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Der allgemeine Ueberblick zeigt uns, als die beiden Feinde des menschlichen Glückes, den Schmerz und die Langeweile.
Personality; or, What a Man Is
Essays

Pain , Happiness

“In youth it is the outward aspect of things that most engages us; while in age, thought or reflection is the predominating quality of the mind. Hence, youth is the time for poetry, and age is more inclined to philosophy. In practical affairs it is the same: a man shapes his resolutions in youth more by the impression that the outward world makes upon him; whereas, when he is old, it is thought that determines his actions.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Youth , Age , World , Time

“Great minds are related to the brief span of time during which they live as great buildings are to a little square in which they stand: you cannot see them in all their magnitude because you are standing too close to them.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Vol. 2, Ch. 20, § 242
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims

Time

“If from the wilderness the righteous and honest John were actually to come who, clothed in skins and living on locusts and untouched by all the terrible mischief, were meanwhile to apply himself with a pure heart and in all seriousness to the investigation of truth and to offer the fruits thereof, what kind of reception would he have to expect from those businessmen of the chair, who are hired for State purposes and with wife and family have to live on philosophy, and whose watchword is, therefore, Primum vivere, deinde philosophari [first live and then philosophize]? These men have accordingly taken possession of the market and have already seen to it that here nothing is of value except what they allow; consequently merit exists only in so far as they and their mediocrity are pleased to acknowledge it. They thus have on a leading rein the attention of that small public, such as it is, that is concerned with philosophy. For on matters that do not promise, like the productions of poetry, amusement and entertainment but only instruction, and financially unprofitable instruction at that, that public will certainly not waste its time, effort, and energy, without first being thoroughly assured that such efforts will be richly rewarded. Now by virtue of its inherited belief that whoever lives by a business knows all about it, this public expects an assurance from the professional men who from professor’s chairs and in compendiums, journals, and literary periodicals, confidently behave as if they were the real masters of the subject. Accordingly, the public allows them to sample and select whatever is worth noting and what can be ignored. My poor John from the wilderness, how will you fare if, as is to be expected, what you bring is not drafted in accordance with the tacit convention of the gentlemen of the lucrative philosophy? They will regard you as one who has not entered in the spirit of the game and thus threatens to spoil the fun for all of them; consequently, they will regard you as their common enemy and antagonist. Now even if what you bring were the greatest masterpiece of the human mind, it could never find favor in their eyes. For it would not be drawn up ad normam conventionis [according to the current pattern]; and so it would not be such as to enable them to make it the subject of their lectures from the chair in order to make a living from it. It never occurs to a professor of philosophy to examine a new system that appears to see whether it is true; but he at once tests it merely to see whether it can be brought into harmony with the doctrines of the established religion, with government plans, and with the prevailing views of the times.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Sämtliche Werke, Bd. 5, pp. 160-161, E. Payne, trans. (1974) Vol. 1, pp. 148-149
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), On Philosophy in the Universities

Men , Truth , Family , Religion

“Dissimulation is innate in woman, and almost as much a quality of the stupid as of the clever.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

"Of Women"
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Studies in Pessimism

Stupidity

“The chief sign that a man has any nobility in his character is the little joy he takes in other people’s company. ”

Arthur Schopenhauer

People , Joy

“No difference of rank, position, or birth, is so great as the gulf that separates the countless millions who use their head only in the service of their belly, in other words, look upon it as an instrument of the will, and those very few and rare persons who have the courage to say: No! my head is too good for that; it shall be active only in its own service; it shall try to comprehend the wondrous and varied spectacle of this world and then reproduce it in some form, whether as art or as literature, that may answer to my character as an individual.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

On Genius, Parerga and Paralipomena, Chapter III,
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851)

Courage , Personality , Art , Literature

“Christianity taught only what the whole of Asia knew already long before and even better.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

quoted in Londhe, S. (2008). A tribute to Hinduism: Thoughts and wisdom spanning continents and time about India and her culture. New Delhi: Pragun Publication.

“the teaching of my philosophy... that our whole existence is something which had better not have been, and that to disown and disclaim it is the highest wisdom.”

Arthur Schopenhauer book Parerga and Paralipomena

Ch 1
Parerga and Paralipomena (1851), Counsels and Maxims
Source: Counsels and Maxims http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/counsels/chapter1.html 2017-12-01 https://web.archive.org/web/20171201131253/http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/counsels/chapter1.html,

Wisdom

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

Arthur Schopenhauer

Sad , Loss

“In action a great heart is the chief qualification. In work, a great head.”

Arthur Schopenhauer

Heart

“The greatest of follies is to sacrifice health for any other kind of happiness.”

Arthur Schopenhauer