Quotes About Men

A nation is a detour of nature to arrive at five or six great men- yes, and then to get around them.

The wisest man would be the one richest in contradictions, who has, as it were, antennae for all types of men---as well as his great moments of grand harmony---a rare accident even in us! A sort of planetary motion---

It is not the strength, but the duration, of great sentiments that makes great men.

Truth as Circe. - Error has transformed animals into men; is truth perhaps capable of changing man back into an animal?

With hard men intimacy is a thing of shame- and something precious.

This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering; it has not yet reached the ears of men. Lightning and thunder require time; the light on the stars requires time; deeds though done, still require time to be seen and heard. This deed is still more distant from them than the most distant stars - and yet they have done it themselves.

This book belongs to the most rare of men. Perhaps not one of them is yet alive. It is possible that they may be among those who understand my "Zarathustra": how could I confound myself with those who are now sprouting ears?—First the day after tomorrow must come for me. Some men are born posthumously.

Men need play & danger. Civilization gives them work and safety.

Not necessity, not desire - no, the love of power is the demon of men.

This crown of the laughter, the rosary crown: to you, my brothers, I throw this crown! I pronounced laughter holy: you higher men, learn — to laugh!

The men of the period of corruption are witty and calumnious; they know that there are yet other ways of murdering than by the dagger and ambush--they know also that all that is well said is believed in.

Error has turned animals into men; might truth be capable of turning man into an animal again?

Thus says the fool: Association with men spoils the character, especially when one has none.

To vigorous men intimacy is a matter of shame--and something precious.

The same causes which tend to promote the belittling of men, also force the stronger and rarer individuals upwards to greatness.

Thereby men do not flee from being deceived as much as from being damaged by deception: what they hate at this stage is basically not the deception but the bad, hostile consequences of certain kinds of deceptions. In a similarly limited way man wants the truth: he desires the agreeable life-preserving consequences of truth, but he is indifferent to pure knowledge, which has no consequences; he is even hostile to possibly damaging and destructive truths.

Not necessity, not desire - no, the love of power is the demon of men. Let them have everything - health, food, a place to live, entertainment - they are and remain unhappy and low-spirited: for the demon waits and waits and will be satisfied.

to be sure: except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter into that kingdom of heaven [and Zarathustra pointed upward with his hands]. but we have no wish whatever to enter into the kingdom of heaven: we have become men — so we want the earth.

God is dead;1 but given the way of men, there may still be caves for thousands of years in which his shadow will be shown. —And we—we still have to vanquish his shadow, too.

In all truly productive men instinct is the strong, affirmative force and reason the dissuader and critic.

Oh! Your poverty, ye men, and your sordidness of soul! As much as ye give to your friend, will I give even to my foe, and will not have become poorer thereby. There is comradeship: may there be friendship!

Bored and insecure men will loose arrows at dust motes.

Always it had been the same; leaders arose holding before men the illusion of vast, glorious promises while they carefully led them into hells of lost dreams and broken promises.

At Cold Corner in midwinter, the women of the Snow Clan were waging a cold war against the men. They trudged about like ghosts in their whitest furs, almost invisible against the new-fallen snow, always together in female groups, silent or at most hissing like angry shades. They avoided Godshall with its trees for pillars and walls of laced leather and towering pine-needle roof.