Quotes from Arthur Schopenhauer

I know of no more beautiful prayer than that which the Hindus of old used in closing: May all that have life be delivered from suffering.

Everybody's friend is nobody's.

I have long held the opinion that the amount of noise that anyone can bear undisturbed stands in inverse proportion to his mental capacity and therefore be regarded as a pretty fair measure of it.

Religion is the masterpiece of the art of animal training, for it trains people as to how they shall think.

There is one respect in which beasts show real wisdom... their quiet, placid enjoyment of the present moment.

It is difficult, if not impossible, to define the limit of our reasonable desires in respect of possessions.

Knowledge is to certain extent a second existence.

To free a person from error is to give, and not to take away.

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.

In the whole world there is no study so beneficial and so elevating as that of the Upanishads. It has been the solace of my life, it will be the solace of my death.

The alchemists in their search for gold discovered many other things of greater value.

When you look back on your life, it looks as though it were a plot, but when you are into it, it's a mess: just one surprise after another. Then, later, you see it was perfect.

The life of every individual is really always a tragedy, but gone through in detail, it has the character of a comedy.

Life swings like a pendulum backward and forward between pain and boredom.

Life is full of troubles and vexations, that one must either rise above it by means of corrected thoughts, or leave it.

We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness.

Our life is a loan received from death with sleep as the daily interest on this loan.

Man is never happy, but spends his whole life in striving after something which he thinks will make him so.

All religions promise a reward beyond life, in eternity, for excellences of the will or heart, but none for excellences of the head or understanding.

Life without pain has no meaning.

Life is a business that does not cover the costs.

If we were not all so interested in ourselves, life would be so uninteresting that none of us would be able to endure it.

The discovery of truth is prevented more effectively, not by the false appearance things present and which mislead into error, not directly by weakness of the reasoning powers, but by preconceived opinion, by prejudice.

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.