It is enough for me to hear someone talk sincerely about ideals, about the future, about philosophy, to hear him say “we" with a certain inflection of assurance, to hear him invoke "others" and regard himself as their interpreter - for me to consider him my enemy.

Emile M. Cioran

The desire to die was my one and only concern; to it I have sacrificed everything, even death.

Emile M. Cioran

my-one-and-only concern desire

The source of our actions resides in an unconscious propensity to regard ourselves as the center, the cause, and the conclusion of time. Our reflexes and our pride transform into a planet the parcel of flesh and consciousness we are.

Emile M. Cioran

ego pride flesh

I'm simply an accident. Why take it all so seriously?

Emile M. Cioran

accidents

We are all geniuses when we dream.

Emile M. Cioran

genius dream

A self-respecting man is a man without a country. A fatherland is birdlime.

Emile M. Cioran

self men country

Even when nothing happens, everything seems too much for me. What can be said, then, in the presence of an event, any event?

Emile M. Cioran

events too-much said

If we manage to last in spite of everything, it is because our infirmities are so many and so contradictory that they cancel each other out.

Emile M. Cioran

contradictory spite lasts

Whenever I happen to be in a city of any size, I marvel that riots do not break out everyday: Massacres, unspeakable carnage, a doomsday chaos. How can so many human beings coexist in a space so confined without hating each other to death?

Emile M. Cioran

hate space cities

By all evidence we are in the world to do nothing; but instead of nonchalantly promenading our own corruption, we exude our sweat and grow winded upon the fetid air.

Emile M. Cioran

sweat crazy air

Time is heavy sometimes; imagine how heavy eternity must be.

Emile M. Cioran

imagine eternity sometimes

If truth were not boring, science would have done away with God long ago. But God as well as the saints is a means to escape the dull banality of truth.

Emile M. Cioran

long-ago saint mean

We would not be interested in human beings if we did not have the hope of someday meeting someone worse off than ourselves.

Emile M. Cioran

meeting-someone someday meetings

My enthusiasms...constitute my reserves, my unexploited resources, perhaps my future.

Emile M. Cioran

my-future resources enthusiasm

Shame on the man who goes to his grave escorted by the miserable hopes that have kept him alive.

Emile M. Cioran

miserable alive men

Between Ennui and Ecstasy unwinds our whole experience of time.

Emile M. Cioran

unwind ecstasy bored

If I were to be totally sincere, I would say that I do not know why I live and why I do not stop living. The answer probably lies in the irrational character of life which maintains itself without reason.

Emile M. Cioran

answers character lying

A man who fears ridicule will never go far, for good or ill: he remains on this side of this talents, and even if he has genius, he is doomed to mediocrity.

Emile M. Cioran

genius sides men

There was a time when time did not yet exist. … The rejection of birth is nothing but the nostalgia for this time before time.

Emile M. Cioran

rejection nostalgia time

No one should forget: Eros alone can fulfill life; knowledge, never. Only Eros makes sense; knowledge is empty infinity; – for thoughts, there is always time; life has its time; there is no thought that comes too late; any desire can become a regret.

Emile M. Cioran

regret desire too-late

I am like a broken puppet whose eyes have fallen inside.

Emile M. Cioran

puppets eye broken