Christianity remains to this day the greatest misfortune of humanity.
We are, all of us, growing volcanoes that approach the hour of their eruption, but how near or distant that is, nobody knows- not even God.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote suggests that every person has the potential for explosive emotional or creative expression, but the timing of such eruptions is uncertain.
Friedrich Nietzsche's quote highlights the innate potential and latent emotions within individuals, comparing them to volcanoes that may erupt at any moment. He emphasizes the unpredictability of these emotional or creative outbursts, suggesting that even divine knowledge cannot ascertain when they will occur. This idea speaks to the complexity of human nature and the unseen forces that shape our behavior and experiences.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about personal growth, one might reference Nietzsche's quote to emphasize the hidden potential within everyone.
More from Friedrich Nietzsche
All quotes βThat which does not kill us makes us stronger.
Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.
Watch them clamber, these swift monkeys! They clamber over one another and thus drag one another into the mud and the depth. They all want to get to the throne: that is their madness β as if happiness sat on the throne. Often, mud sits on the throne β and often the throne also on mud. Mad they all appear to me, clambering monkeys and overardent. Foul smells their idol, the cold monster: foul, they smell to me altogether, these idolators.
Reason is the cause of our falsification of the evidence of the senses. In so far as the senses show becoming, passing away, change, they do not lie.
The anarchist and the Christian have a common origin.
Similar quotes
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We can't get at crime unless we know what language it speaks. Otherwise, we are just suppressing the cough, not curing the disease.
A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.
If we compare a severely defective human infant with a nonhuman animal, a dog or a pig, for example, we will often find the nonhuman to have superior capacities, both actual and potential, for rationality, self-consciousness, communication and anything else that can plausibly be considered morally significant.
I was raised to believe that other people's suffering was my responsibility.
Adulthood is the ever-shrinking period between childhood and old age. It is the apparent aim of modern industrial societies to reduce this period to a minimum.