From the middle of life onward, only he remains vitally alive who is ready to die with life.

The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there’s no risk of accident for someone who’s dead.

When you give, it comes back to you.

Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.

When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.

The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives.

Life’s a fight. It’s a good fight of faith.

Such as we are made of, such we be.

Truth is always in harmony with herself, and is not concerned chiefly to reveal the justice that may consist with wrong-doing.

Whatever must happen ultimately should happen immediately.

Non-violence is the article of faith.

Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.

My personal telephone book is a book of the dead now. I’m so old. Almost all of my friends have died, and I don’t have the guts to take their names out of the book.

And yet it moves.

One of my favorite philosophical tenets is that people will agree with you only if they already agree with you. You do not change people’s minds.

Most of the change we think we see in life is due to truths being in and out of favor.

The philosophical idea that there are no more distances, that we are all just one world, that we are all brothers, is such a drag! I like differences.

All variety of created objects which represent order and life in the universe could happen only by the willful reasoning of its original Creator, whom I call the ‚Lord God.‘

Happiness is a ball after which we run wherever it rolls, and we push it with our feet when it stops.

Nothing can have value without being an object of utility.

Paradise was made for tender hearts; hell, for loveless hearts.

To have no time for philosophy is to be a true philosopher.

Thought must be divided against itself before it can come to any knowledge of itself.

It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly. And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.

Those whom the gods love grow young.

‚I wish life was not so short,‘ he thought. ‚Languages take such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about.‘

If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.

The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Whoever will be born must destroy a world.

The superior man thinks always of virtue; the common man thinks of comfort.

But at any rate, the point is that God is what nobody admits to being, and everybody really is.

What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

We often want one thing and pray for another, not telling the truth even to the gods.

When the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.

Knowing that you are going to die is, I suspect, the beginning of wisdom.

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.

Nor shall derision prove powerful against those who listen to humanity or those who follow in the footsteps of divinity, for they shall live forever. Forever.

There is no value in life except what you choose to place upon it and no happiness in any place except what you bring to it yourself.

And die of nothing but a rage to live.

I will govern my life and thoughts as if the whole world were to see the one and read the other, for what does it signify to make anything a secret to my neighbor, when to God, who is the searcher of our hearts, all our privacies are open?

Those who have knowledge, don’t predict. Those who predict, don’t have knowledge.

There’s place and means for every man alive.

No one can outrun death. It will catch up to all of us eventually.

No man lives without jostling and being jostled; in all ways he has to elbow himself through the world, giving and receiving offence.

When a man bleeds inwardly, it is a dangerous thing for himself; but when he laughs inwardly, it bodes no good to other people.

An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it.

This has always been my life and no one else’s, and that’s how it’s always been since the day I came in it.

No man enjoys the true taste of life, but he who is ready and willing to quit it.

It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.

The finite is annihilated in the presence of the infinite, and becomes a pure nothing. So our spirit before God, so our justice before divine justice.

The body politic, as well as the human body, begins to die as soon as it is born, and carries itself the causes of its destruction.

If it is surely the means to the highest end we know, can any work be humble or disgusting? Will it not rather be elevating as a ladder, the means by which we are translated?

I have such incredible experiences in my life.

Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits.

Your life is like a play with several acts. Some of the characters who enter have short roles to play, others, much larger. Some are villains and others are good guys. But all of them are necessary; otherwise, they wouldn’t be in the play. Embrace them all, and move on to the next act.

We occasionally stumble over the truth but most of us pick ourselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor.

The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time.

Happy is the hearing man; unhappy the speaking man.

There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.

To depend upon a profession is a less odious form of slavery than to depend upon a father.

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.