Allt lämnar jag ofullbordat efter mig. Men är det underligt? Det är ju människoödet. All mänsklig strävans, allt mänskligt verks oundvikliga öde. Är det någonsin mer än en ansats, en ansats till något som aldrig kan nås, som inte är avsett att kunna nås av oss. Hela den mänskliga kulturen är i själva verket blott en ansats till någonting ouppnåeligt, något som det långt överstiger vår förmåga att förverkliga. Den står där stympad, tragisk som en torso. Är inte människoanden själv en torso?

Eternity… It has nothing to do with life, I thought; it is the contrary to all life. It is something limitless, endless, a realm of death which the living must look into with horror. Was it here that I was to dwell?

Malevolence, like love, needs few words.

Love is something which dies and when dead it rots and becomes soil for a new love. The the dead love continues its secret life in the living one, and thus in reality there is no death in love.

Human beings like to see themselves reflected in clouded mirrors.

Only the gods have many destinies and need never die. They are filled with everything and experience everything. Everything - except human happiness. That they can never know and therefore they grudge it to men. Nothing makes them so evil and cruel as that men should presume to be happy and forget them for the sake of their earthly happiness.

Their eyelashes were moist, and small drops of sweat beaded their upper lips. I regarded their slumber, almost innocent in its foolish thoughtlessness and its oblivion of all danger and the outside world. Is this what human beings call happiness?

What would life be like if it were not futile? Futility is the foundation upon which it rests. On what other foundation could it have been based which would have held and never given way? A great idea can be undermined by another great idea and, in due course, be demolished by it. But futility is inaccessible, indestructible, immovable. It is a true foundation and that is why it has been chosen as such.

An enviable lunatic! One for whom a pebble has value must be surrounded by treasures wherever he goes.

It is difficult to understand those whom one does not hate, for then one is unarmed, one has nothing with which to penetrate into their being.