Emil Cioran Quotes

Emil Cioran

Profession : Philosopher

Birth : April 8, 1911

If we could see ourselves as others see us, we would vanish on the spot.

Emil Cioran

We are afraid of the enormity of the possible.

Emil Cioran

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

Emil Cioran

The fear of being deceived is the vulgar version of the quest for Truth.

Emil Cioran

Consciousness is much more than the thorn, it is the dagger in the flesh.

Emil Cioran

The task of the solitary man is to be even more solitary.

Emil Cioran

Man starts over again everyday, in spite of all he knows, against all he knows.

Emil Cioran

Anyone can escape into sleep, we are all geniuses when we dream, the butcher's the poet's equal there.

Emil Cioran

Insomnia is a vertiginous lucidity that can convert paradise itself into a place of torture.

Emil Cioran

The fanatic is incorruptible: if he kills for an idea, he can just as well get himself killed for one; in either case, tyrant or martyr, he is a monster.

Emil Cioran

Ennui is the echo in us of time tearing itself apart.

Emil Cioran

There is no means of proving it is preferable to be than not to be.

Emil Cioran

To want fame is to prefer dying scorned than forgotten.

Emil Cioran

Ambition is a drug that makes its addicts potential madmen.

Emil Cioran

Great persecutors are recruited among martyrs whose heads haven't been cut off.

Emil Cioran

Every thought derives from a thwarted sensation.

Emil Cioran

A golden rule: to leave an incomplete image of oneself.

Emil Cioran

When we cannot be delivered from ourselves, we delight in devouring ourselves.

Emil Cioran

We interest others by the misfortune we spread around us.

Emil Cioran

Word - that invisible dagger.

Emil Cioran