Z

“We take pleasure in the negation of the hero, the supreme appearance of the Will, because he is, after all, mere appearance, and because the eternal life of the Will is not affected by his annihilation.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy and Other Writings

“Let us imagine a rising generation with this fearless gaze, with this heroic attraction to what is monstrous, let us imagine the bold stride of these dragon-killers, the proud recklessness with which they turn their backs on all the enfeebled doctrines of scientific optimism so that they may 'live resolutely', wholly and fully; would not the tragic man of this culture, given that he has trained himself for what is grave and terrifying, be bound to desire a new form of art, the art of metaphysical solace, in fact to desire tragedy as his very own Helen, and to call out along with Faust:

And shall I not, with all my longing's vigour,
Draw into life that peerless, lovely figure?”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“And a people - or, for that matter, a human being - only has value to the extent that it is able to put the stamp of the eternal on its experiences; for in doing so it sheds, one might say, its worldliness and reveals its unconscious, inner conviction that time is relative and that the true meaning oflife is metaphysical.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy and Other Writings

“Oh, those who know hearts can guess how impoverished, stupid, helpless, presumptuous, and mistaken even the best and deepest love really is – how much more likely it is to destroy than to rescue!”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil