"One must have all the virtues to sleep well. Shall I bear false witness? Shall I commit adultery? Shall I covet my neighbor's maid? All that would go ill with good sleep."

Truth

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Thematic Reflection

This quotation examines the core nature of Truth as articulated by Friedrich Nietzsche. Within historical and literary traditions, reflections on Truth provide actionable mental models, challenging individuals to evaluate personal ethics, self-discipline, and daily actions.

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About Friedrich Nietzsche

Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche was a German philosopher and writer who started his career as a classical philologist and turned to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, at age 24, he was appointed Professor of Classical Philology at the University of Basel. Plagued by health problems for most of his life, he resigned from the university in 1879. He afterward lived as an independent writer, spending much of his life in relative solitude and financial insecurity while moving between Switzerland, Italy, and southern France in search of climates that might alleviate his condition, and in the following decade, he completed much of his core writing. In 1889, aged 44, he suffered a neurological collapse, and thereafter a complete loss of his mental faculties, with paralysis and vascular dementia; he lived out his remaining 11 years, first under the care of his mother, and later his sister, until his death. His works and his philosophy have fostered not only extensive scholarship but also much popular interest.

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More by Friedrich Nietzsche

"It is good to express a thing twice right at the outset and so to give it a right foot and also a left one. Truth can surely stand on one leg, but with two it will be able to walk and get around."

— Friedrich Nietzsche
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"Whoever despises himself still esteems the despiser within himself."

— Friedrich Nietzsche
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"Rejoicing in our joy, not suffering over our suffering, makes someone a friend."

— Friedrich Nietzsche
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"Genteel women suppose that those things do not really exist about which it is impossible to talk in polite company."

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More about Truth

"Without tenderness, a man is uninteresting."

— Marlene Dietrich
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"Three chords and the truth - that's what a country song is."

— Willie Nelson
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"If you don't stand for something you will fall for anything."

— Malcolm X
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"I hate organized religion. I think you have to love thy neighbor as thyself. I think you have to pick your own God and be true to him. I always say 'him' rather than 'her.' Maybe it's because of my generation, but I don't like the idea of a female God. I see God as a benevolent male."

— Julia Child
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