“We are, all of us, growing volcanoes that approach the hour of their eruption; but how near or distant that is, nobody knows — not even God.”

Sec. 9
The Gay Science (1882)

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Friedrich Nietzsche655

German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and cl… 1844–1900

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“He knows how what is distant lies in what is near. He knows where the wind proceeds from. He knows how what is minute becomes manifested. Such a one, we may be sure, will enter into virtue.”

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“Stand up, damned of the Earth
Stand up, prisoners of starvation
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This is the eruption of the end.
Of the past let us make a clean slate
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Debout, les damnés de la terre
Debout, les forçats de la faim
La raison tonne en son cratère
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“Nobody looks good in their darkest hours. But it's those hours that make us what we are.”

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“After a volcano has erupted our landscape is filled with silence. A moment ago it was on fire, now the rapid ashes are warming our feet. a moment ago it was dazzlingly light, now it is blessed twilight, kind to our eyes. All is at rest. The volcano is asleep, even our poor nerves are asleep. We are not happy, but we have a momentary peace. A moment ago we have seen the desert of our life in all its appalling vastness, now we see that the desert is in flower. The oases are few are afar between, but they do exist; we know that the desert is vast, but we also know that in the biggest deserts are the most oases. To gain this knowledge we must pay dearly, and an eruption is the price; it is high; but there is no lower one. That is why we should bless the volcanoes, thank them because their glare is so strong and their first so hot. Thank them for having dazzled us, for only then do we acquired our full sight; thank them, too, for having burnt us, for only as burnt children can we warm each other.But moments of peace are short. All other moments are much longer, and to know this is also wisdom. But because they are so short we must life in those moments as thought it were only then we lived. They knew this too.”

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“Some revolutions are inevitable. There are moral eruptions, just as the outbreak of volcanoes are physical eruptions. When the chemical combinations which produce them are complete, the volcanic eruptions burst forth, just as revolutions do when the moral factors are in the right state. In order to foresee them the trend of ideas must be understandingly observed.”

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“When the hour of reality approaches, the zero hour, wholeheartedly welcome death for the sake of God.”

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The Last Night (2001) https://web.archive.org/web/20140610204712/http://college.cengage.com/history/primary_sources/world/the_last_night.htm <br class="br">Context: When the hour of reality approaches, the zero hour, wholeheartedly welcome death for the sake of God. Always be remembering God. Either end your life while praying, seconds before the target, or make your last words: There is no God but God, Muhammad is his messenger.

“We are, all of us, growing volcanoes that approach the hour of their eruption; but how near or distant that is, nobody knows — not even God.”

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Friedrich Nietzsche655

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