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The Trouble with Being Born
Emil M. Cioran
Top 10 Best Quotes
“The same feeling of not belonging, of futility, wherever I go: I pretend interest in what matters nothing to me, I bestir myself mechanically or out of charity, without ever being caught up, without ever being somewhere. What attracts me is elsewhere, and I don’t know where that elsewhere is.”
“Man accepts death but not the hour of his death. To die any time, except when one has to die!”
“A man who fears ridicule will never go far, for good or ill: he remains on this side of his talents, and even if he has genius, he is doomed to mediocrity.”
“What do you do from morning to night?” “I endure myself.”
“This is how we recognize the man who has tendencies toward an inner quest: he will set failure above any success, he will even seek it out, unconsciously of course. This is because failure, always essential, reveals us to ourselves, permits us to see ourselves as God sees us, whereas success distances us from what is most inward in ourselves and indeed in everything.”
“If it is true that by death we once more become what we were before being, would it not have been better to abide by that pure possibility, not to stir from it? What use was this detour, when we might have remained forever in an unrealized plenitude?”
“A work is finished when we can no longer improve it, though we know it to be inadequate and incomplete. We are so overtaxed by it that we no longer have the power to add a single comma, however indispensable. What determines the degree to which a work is done is not a requirement of art or of truth, it is exhaustion and, even more, disgust.”
“When someone tells us of an unfavorable opinion about ourselves, instead of being distressed, we should think of all the “evil” we have spoken of others, and realize that it is only justice that as much should be said of ourselves. Ironically, no one is more vulnerable, more susceptible, and less likely to acknowledge his own defects than the backbiter. Merely tell him about the slightest reservation someone has made in his regard, and he will lose countenance, lose his temper, and drown in his own bile.”
“Never judge a man without putting yourself in his place.” This old proverb makes all judgment impossible, for we judge someone only because, in fact, we cannot put ourselves in his place.”
“In permitting man, Nature has committed much more than a mistake in her calculations: a crime against herself.”
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Book Keywords:
pessimism, pretending-interest, not-belonging, antinatalism, death, existence, peace, somewhere-else, antinatalist, futility