Friedrich Nietzsche Quotes on Knowledge

Quotes

• Attributed to Friedrich Nietzsche:

  “All truly great thoughts are conceived while walking.”

• “Postcard to Franz Overbeck , Sils-Maria (30 July 1881), tr. Walter Kaufmann , The Portable Nietzsche (1954)”

  I am utterly amazed, utterly enchanted! I have a precursor , and what a precursor! I hardly knew Spinoza : that I should have turned to him just now , was inspired by "instinct." Not only is his overtendency like mine—namely to make all knowledge the most powerful affect — but in five main points of his doctrine I recognize myself; this most unusual and loneliest thinker is closest to me precisely

• “Against that positivism which stops before phenomena, saying "there are only facts," I should say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist, only interpretations.”

  Notebooks (Late 1886 – Spring 1887) | Popular usage: "There are no facts, only interpretations.

• “Notebooks (Late 1886 – Spring 1887)”

  Against that positivism which stops before phenomena, saying "there are only facts," I should say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist, only interpretations.

• “Popular usage: "There are no facts, only interpretations.”

  Against that positivism which stops before phenomena, saying "there are only facts," I should say: no, it is precisely facts that do not exist, only interpretations.

• “In Germany there is much complaining about my "eccentricities." But since it is not known where my center is, it won't be easy to find out where or when I have thus far been "eccentric." That I was a philologist , for example, meant that I was outside my center (which fortunately does not mean that I was a poor philologist). Likewise, I now regard my having been a Wagnerian as eccentric. It was a highly dangerous experiment; now that I know it did not ruin me, I also know what significance it had for me — it was the most severe test of my character.”

  Letter to Carl Fuchs (14 December 1887)

• “Letter to Carl Fuchs (14 December 1887)”

  In Germany there is much complaining about my "eccentricities." But since it is not known where my center is, it won't be easy to find out where or when I have thus far been "eccentric." That I was a philologist , for example, meant that I was outside my center (which fortunately does not mean that I was a poor philologist). Likewise, I now regard my having been a Wagnerian as eccentric. It was a

• “I now myself live, in every detail, striving for wisdom, while I formerly merely worshipped and idolized the wise.”

  Letter to Mathilde Mayer, July 16, 1878, cited in Karl Jaspers , Nietzsche (Baltimore: 1997), p. 46

• “Letter to Mathilde Mayer, July 16, 1878, cited in Karl Jaspers , Nietzsche (Baltimore: 1997), p. 46”

  I now myself live, in every detail, striving for wisdom, while I formerly merely worshipped and idolized the wise.