Quotes from book
Human, All Too Human

Friedrich Nietzsche Original title Menschliches, Allzumenschliches , Ein Buch für freie Geister (German, 1878)

Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits is a book by 19th-century philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, originally published in 1878. A second part, Assorted Opinions and Maxims , was published in 1879, and a third part, The Wanderer and his Shadow , followed in 1880.


Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“Essentially, we are still the same people as those in the period of the Reformation - and how should it be otherwise? But we no longer allow ourselves certain means to gain victory for our opinion: this distinguishes us from that age and proves that we belong to a higher culture. These days, if a man still attacks and crushes opinions with suspicions and outbursts of rage, in the manner of men during the Reformation, he clearly betrays that he would have burnt his opponents, had he lived in other times, and that he would have taken recourse to all the means of the Inquisition, had he lived as an opponent of the Reformation. In its time, the Inquisition was reasonable, for it meant nothing other than the general martial law which had to be proclaimed over the whole domain of the church, and which, like every state of martial law, justified the use of the extremest means, namely under the assumption (which we no longer share with those people) that one possessed truth in the church and had to preserve it at any cost, with any sacrifice, for the salvation of mankind. But now we will no longer concede so easily that anyone has the truth; the rigorous methods of inquiry have spread sufficient distrust and caution, so that we experience every man who represents opinions violently in word and deed as any enemy of our present culture, or at least as a backward person. And in fact, the fervor about having the truth counts very little today in relation to that other fervor, more gentle and silent, to be sure, for seeking the truth, a search that does not tire of learning afresh and testing anew.”

Wir sind im Wesentlichen noch dieselben Menschen, wie die des Zeitalters der Reformation: wie sollte es auch anders sein? Aber dass wir uns einige Mittel nicht mehr erlauben, um mit ihnen unsrer Meinung zum Siege zu verhelfen, das hebt uns gegen jene Zeit ab und beweist, dass wir einer höhern Cultur angehören. Wer jetzt noch, in der Art der Reformations-Menschen, Meinungen mit Verdächtigungen, mit Wuthausbrüchen bekämpft und niederwirft, verräth deutlich, dass er seine Gegner verbrannt haben würde, falls er in anderen Zeiten gelebt hätte, und dass er zu allen Mitteln der Inquisition seine Zuflucht genommen haben würde, wenn er als Gegner der Reformation gelebt hätte. Diese Inquisition war damals vernünftig, denn sie bedeutete nichts Anderes, als den allgemeinen Belagerungszustand, welcher über den ganzen Bereich der Kirche verhängt werden musste, und der, wie jeder Belagerungszustand, zu den äussersten Mitteln berechtigte, unter der Voraussetzung nämlich (welche wir jetzt nicht mehr mit jenen Menschen theilen), dass man die Wahrheit, in der Kirche, habe, und um jeden Preis mit jedem Opfer zum Heile der Menschheit bewahren müsse. Jetzt aber giebt man Niemandem so leicht mehr zu, dass er die Wahrheit habe: die strengen Methoden der Forschung haben genug Misstrauen und Vorsicht verbreitet, so dass Jeder, welcher gewaltthätig in Wort und Werk Meinungen vertritt, als ein Feind unserer jetzigen Cultur, mindestens als ein zurückgebliebener empfunden wird. In der That: das Pathos, dass man die Wahrheit habe, gilt jetzt sehr wenig im Verhältniss zu jenem freilich milderen und klanglosen Pathos des Wahrheit-Suchens, welches nicht müde wird, umzulernen und neu zu prüfen.
Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 633
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“Unhappiness. The distinction that lies in being unhappy is so great that when someone says, "But how happy you must be!" we usually protest.”

Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 534
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“Life is, after all, not a product of morality.”

Preface 1, tr. R.J. Hollingdale. The German original has slightly other meaning: "das Leben ist nun einmal nicht von der Moral ausgedacht" ("...and the life was not invented, one day, by morality").
Human, All Too Human (1878)

Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“Main deficiency of active people. Active men are usually lacking in higher activity--I mean individual activity. They are active as officials, businessmen, scholars, that is, as generic beings, but not as quite particular, single and unique men. In this respect they are lazy.”

283 http://books.google.com/books?id=_GLTsGHUxDgC&lpg=PA171&dq=Today%20as%20always%2C%20men%20fall%20into%20two%20groups&pg=PA171#v=onepage&q&f=false
Human, All Too Human (1878)

Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo
Friedrich Nietzsche photo

“Danger of our culture. We belong to a time in which culture is in danger of being destroyed by the means of culture.”

Section IX, "Man Alone with Himself" / aphorism 520
Human, All Too Human (1878), Helen Zimmern translation

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