Pessimism becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy it reproduces itself by crippling our willingness to act.

I have a pretty large experience of boys, and you're a bad set of fellows. Now mind!

I renounce the higher harmony altogether. It's not worth the tears of that one tortured child who...prayed..with...unexpiated tears to 'dear,kind God!

He wastes his time over his writing, trying to accomplish what geniuses and rare men with college educations sometimes accomplish.

There is not much to be got anywhere in the world. It is filled with misery and pain; if a man escapes these, boredeom lies in wait for him at every corner. Nay more; it is evil which generally has the upper hand, and folly that makes the most noise. Fate is cruel and mankind pitiable.

In fact, the balance wheel which maintains in motion the watch of metaphysics that never runs down, is the clear knowledge that this world's non-existence is just as possible as its existence.―from_The World as Will and Representation_. Translated from the German by E. F. J. Payne. In Two Volumes, Volume II, p. 171

What is more, in fact, we very soon look upon the world as something whose non-existence is not only conceivable, but even preferable to its existence. Therefore our astonishment at it easily passes into a brooding over that *fatality* which could nevertheless bring about its existence, and by virtue of which such an immense force as is demanded for the production and maintenance of such a world could be directed so much against its own interest and advantage.―from_The World as Will and Representation_. Translated from the German by E. F. J. Payne. In Two Volumes, Volume II, p. 171

For an author to write as he speaks is just as reprehensible as the opposite fault, to speak as he writes; for this gives a pedantic effect to what he says, and at the same time makes him hardly intelligible

See the moon? It hates us.

In my heart's most secret place,I pity them as angels do.

From a certain point onward there is no longer any turning back.

The best consolation in misfortune or affliction of any kind will be the thought of other people who are in a still worse plight than yourself; and this is a form of consolation open to every one. But what an awful fate this means for mankind as a whole! We are like lambs in a field, disporting themselves under the eye of the butcher, who chooses out first one and then another for his prey.

A pessimist is a man who thinks everybody is as nasty as himself, and hates them for it.

You'll never find a rainbow if you're looking down

If children were brought into the world by an act of pure reason alone, would the human race continue to exist? Would not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming generation as to spare it the burden of existence, or at any rate not take it upon himself to impose that burden upon it in cold blood?

You know how both life and porno movies end. The only difference is life starts with the orgasm.

Logic and sermons never convince, The damp of the night drives deeper into my soul.

He that hopes no good fears no ill.

To a profound pessimist about life, being in danger is not depressing.

A pessimist is a man who has been compelled to live with an optimist.