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It is not what things are objectively and in themselves, but what they are for us, in our way of looking at them, that makes us happy or the reverse.

Arthur Schopenhauer

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Arthur Schopenhauer
Age: 72 †
Born: 1788
Born: February 22
Died: 1860
Died: September 21
Musicologist
Philosopher
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Danzig
Objectively
Reverse
Looking
Happy
Makes
Way
Things

More quotes by Arthur Schopenhauer

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There are three stages in the revelation of truth. The first is to be ridiculed, the second is to be resisted and the third is to be considered self-evident.
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This actual world of what is knowable, in which we are and which is in us, remains both the material and the limit of our consideration.
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Reading is equivalent to thinking with someone else's head instead of with one's own.
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Just as a stream flows smoothly on as long as it encounters no obstruction, so the nature of man and animal is such that we never really notice or become conscious of what is agreeable to our will if we are to notice something, our will has to have been thwarted, has to have experienced a shock of some kind.
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Life without pain has no meaning.
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History is the long, difficult and confused dream of Mankind.
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Honour is external conscience, and conscience is inward honour.
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There are, first of all, two kinds of authors: those who write for the subject's sake, and those who write for writing's sake. The first kind have had thoughts or experiences which seem to them worth communicating, while the second kind need money and consequently write for money.
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It is, indeed, only in old age that intellectual men attain their sublime expression, whilst portraits of them in their youth show only the first traces of it.
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To free a man from error is to give, not to take away. Knowledge that a thing is false is a truth. Error always does harm sooner or later it will bring mischief to the man who harbors it.
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There are 80,000 prostitutes in London alone and what are they, if not bloody sacrifices on the altar of monogamy?
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Wicked thoughts and worthless efforts gradually set their mark on the face, especially the eyes.
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There is one respect in which beasts show real wisdom... their quiet, placid enjoyment of the present moment.
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At bottom, every state regards another as a gang of robbers who will fall upon it as soon as there is an opportunity.
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Our first ideas of life are generally taken from fiction rather than fact.
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The world is not a factory and animals are not products for our use
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The life of every individual is really always a tragedy, but gone through in detail, it has the character of a comedy.
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Ignorance is degrading only when found in company with great riches.
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Just as the largest library, badly arranged, is not so useful as a very moderate one that is well arranged, so the greatest amount of knowledge, if not elaborated by our own thoughts, is worth much less than a far smaller volume that has been abundantly and repeatedly thought over.
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Every human perfection is linked to an error which it threatens to turn into
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