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whatever is profound loves masks; what is most profound even hates image and parable.
Friedrich Nietzsche
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Interpretation

What this quote means

Deep truths often hide behind appearances, and the most profound thoughts may reject superficial interpretations.

Friedrich Nietzsche suggests that true profundity resists simple representation and may actually despise the very images and narratives we use to express it. This highlights the complexity of understanding deep ideas, as they may not fit neatly into our traditional frameworks of explanation.

Themes

ProfoundMasksTruthImageParable

In practice

Example use cases

In a philosophical discussion about the nature of truth, this quote could illustrate how deeper meanings often evade representation.

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Christianity remains to this day the greatest misfortune of humanity.
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Hope in reality is the worst of all evils because it prolongs the torments of man.
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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.
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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.
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The anarchist and the Christian have a common origin.
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