16 quotes
Talent hits a target no one else can hit; genius hits a target no one else can see.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
All religions promise a reward for excellences of the will or heart, but none for excellences of the head or understanding.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
Reason is feminine in nature; it can only give after it has received. Of itself it has nothing but the empty forms of its operation.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
The effect of music is so very much more powerful and penetrating than is that of the other arts, for these others speak only of the shadow, but music of the essence.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
Life is a business that does not cover the costs.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
Just as the witticism brings two very different real objects under one concept, the pun brings two different concepts, by the assistance of accident, under one word.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
Every child is in a way a genius; and every genius is in a way a child.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
Every time a man is begotten and born, the clock of human life is wound up anew to repeat once more its same old tune that has already been played innumerable times, movement by movement and measure by measure, with insignificant variations.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
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.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
If a person is stupid, we excuse him by saying that he cannot help it; but if we attempted to excuse in precisely the same way the person who is bad, we should be laughed at.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
That books do not take the place of experience, and that learning is no substitute for genius, are two kindred phenomena; their common ground is that the abstract can never take the place of the perceptive.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
We see in tragedy the noblest men, after a long conflict and suffering, finally renounce forever all the pleasure of life and the aims till then pursued so keenly, or cheerfully and willingly give up life itself.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
...this our world, which is so real, with all its suns and milky ways is—nothing.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
My body and my will are one.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
The composer reveals the innermost nature of the world, and expresses the profoundest wisdom in a language that his reasoning faculty does not understand, just as a magnetic somnambulist gives information about things of which she has no conception when she is awake. Therefore in the composer, more than in any other artist, the man is entirely separate and distinct from the artist.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)
For what is modesty but hypocritical humility, by means of which, in a world swelling with vile envy, a man seeks to beg pardon for his excellences and merits from those who have none? For whoever attributes no merit to himself because he really has none is not modest, but merely honest.
The World as Will and Representation (1819)