Man's main task is to give birth to himself.
Love is union with somebody, or something, outside oneself, under the condition of retaining the separateness and integrity of one's own self.
The most beautiful as well as the most ugly inclinations of man are not part of a fixed biologically given human nature, but result from the social process which creates man.
That man can destroy life is just as miraculous a feat as that he can create it, for life is the miracle, the inexplicable. In the act of destruction, man sets himself above life; he transcends himself as a creature. Thus, the ultimate choice for a man, inasmuch as he is driven to transcend himself, is to create or to destroy, to love or to hate.
The history of man is a graveyard of great cultures that came to catastrophic ends because of their incapacity for planned, rational, voluntary reaction to challenge.
Immature love says, "I love you because I need you." Mature love says, "I need you because I love you."
There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives to his life by the unfolding of his powers.
The successful revolutionary is a statesman, the unsuccessful one a criminal.
Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve.
There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by unfolding of his powers.