Emil Cioran Quotes
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Though we may prefer ourselves to the universe, we nonetheless loathe ourselves much more than we suspect. If the wise man is so rare a phenomenon, it is because he seems unshaken by the aversion which, like all beings, he must feel for himself.
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When you know quite absolutely that everything is unreal, you then cannot see why you should take the trouble to prove it.
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If you don't want to explode with rage, leave your memory alone, abstain from burrowing there.
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No one has the audacity to exclaim: 'I don’t want to do anything!' -we are more indulgent with a murderer than with a mind emancipated from actions.
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I feel safer with a Pyrrho than with a St. Paul, for a jesting wisdom is gentler than an unbridled sanctity.
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I'm simply an accident. Why take it all so seriously?
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Refinement is a sign of a deficient vitality, in art, in love, and in everything.
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It is an understatement to say that in this society injustices abound: in truth, it is itself the quintessence of injustice.
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Love of the absolute engenders a predilection for self-destruction. Hence the passion for monasteries and brothels. Cells and women, in both cases. Weariness with life fares well in the shadow of whores and saintly women.
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We are so lonely in life that we must ask ourselves if the loneliness of dying is not a symbol of our human existence.
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Everyone must destroy their life. According to the way they do it, they're either triumphants or failures.
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We understand God by everything in ourselves that is fragmentary, incomplete, and inopportune.
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How many disappointments are conducive to bitterness? One or a thousand, depending on the subject.
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The ideal being? An angel ravaged by humor.
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The moment we believe we've understood everything grants us the look of a murderer.
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I saw that philosophy had no power to make my life more bearable. Thus I lost my belief in philosophy.
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Only optimists commit suicide, the optimists who can no longer be...optimists. The others, having no reason to live, why should they have any to die?
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Except for music, everything is a lie, even solitude, even ecstasy. Music, in fact, is the one and the other, only better.
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Tell me how you want to die, and I'll tell you who you are.
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Ideas should be neutral. But man animates them with his passions and folly. Impure and turned into beliefs, they take on the appearance of reality. The passage from logic is consummated. Thus are born ideologies, doctrines, and bloody farce.
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There is no one whose death I have not longed for, at one moment or another.
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I foresee the day when we shall read nothing but telegrams and prayers.
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All philosophers should end their days at Pythia’s feet. There is only one philosophy, that of unique moments.
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There is no means of proving it is preferable to be than not to be.