All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Opinion is like a pendulum and obeys the same law. If it goes past the centre of gravity on one side, it must go a like distance on the other; and it is only after a certain time that it finds the true point at which it can remain at rest.
Arthur Schopenhauer

It is a clear gain to sacrifice pleasure in order to avoid pain.
Arthur Schopenhauer

With people of limited ability modesty is merely honesty. But with those who possess great talent it is hypocrisy.
Arthur Schopenhauer

As the biggest library if it is in disorder is not as useful as a small but well-arranged one, so you may accumulate a vast amount of knowledge but it will be of far less value than a much smaller amount if you have not thought it over for yourself.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Rascals are always sociable, more's the pity! and the chief sign that a man has any nobility in his character is the little pleasure he takes in others' company.
Arthur Schopenhauer

To buy books would be a good thing if we also could buy the time to read them.
Arthur Schopenhauer

It is with trifles, and when he is off guard, that a man best reveals his character.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax.
Arthur Schopenhauer

If we were not all so interested in ourselves, life would be so uninteresting that none of us would be able to endure it.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Sleep is the interest we have to pay on the capital which is called in at death; and the higher the rate of interest and the more regularly it is paid, the further the date of redemption is postponed.
Arthur Schopenhauer

In our monogamous part of the world, to marry means to halve one's rights and double one's duties.
Arthur Schopenhauer

There is no absurdity so palpable but that it may be firmly planted in the human head if you only begin to inculcate it before the age of five, by constantly repeating it with an air of great solemnity.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Men are by nature merely indifferent to one another; but women are by nature enemies.
Arthur Schopenhauer

The word of man is the most durable of all material.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Newspapers are the second hand of history. This hand, however, is usually not only of inferior metal to the other hands, it also seldom works properly.
Arthur Schopenhauer

The difficulty is to try and teach the multitude that something can be true and untrue at the same time.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Religion is the masterpiece of the art of animal training, for it trains people as to how they shall think.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal.
Arthur Schopenhauer

The first forty years of life give us the text; the next thirty supply the commentary on it.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Boredom is just the reverse side of fascination: both depend on being outside rather than inside a situation, and one leads to the other.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Satisfaction consists in freedom from pain, which is the positive element of life.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude.
Arthur Schopenhauer

The brain may be regarded as a kind of parasite of the organism, a pensioner, as it were, who dwells with the body.
Arthur Schopenhauer

Great minds are related to the brief span of time during which they live as great buildings are to a little square in which they stand: you cannot see them in all their magnitude because you are standing too close to them.
Arthur Schopenhauer

A man's delight in looking forward to and hoping for some particular satisfaction is a part of the pleasure flowing out of it, enjoyed in advance. But this is afterward deducted, for the more we look forward to anything the less we enjoy it when it comes.
Arthur Schopenhauer