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What destroys a man more quickly than to work, think, and feel without inner necessity, without any deep personal desire, without pleasure — as a mere automaton of “duty.”

— Friedrich Nietzsche

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More quotes by Friedrich Nietzsche

The true man wants two things: danger and play. For that reason he wants woman, as the most dangerous toy.

Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883)

He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.

Beyond Good and Evil (1886)

The spiritualization of sensuality is called love.

Twilight of the Idols (1889)

Gradually it has become clear to me what every great philosophy has been: namely, the personal confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir.

Beyond Good and Evil (1886)

They are not clean enough for me, either: they all disturb their waters so that they may seem deep.

Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883)

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Men accept servility in order to acquire wealth; as if they could acquire anything of their own when they cannot even assert that they belong to themselves.

Étienne de La Boétie Discourse on Voluntary Servitude (1548)

The confusion of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.

George Bernard Shaw Man and Superman (1903)

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.

C. S. Lewis God in the Dock (1970)

Affectation hides three times as many virtues as charity does sins.

Horace Mann Thoughts Selected from the Writings of Horace Mann (1867)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Friedrich Nietzsche (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.