Natural science does not simply describe and explain nature; it is a part of the interplay between nature and ourselves.
Mere goodness can achieve little against the power of nature.
Men are by nature merely indifferent to one another; but women are by nature enemies.
Man wishes concord, but nature, knowing better what is good for his species, wishes discord.[Der Mensch will Eintracht; aber die Natur weiß besser, was für seine Gattung gut ist: sie will Zwietracht.]
Man selects only for his own good; Nature only for that of the being which she tends.
Man is the servant of nature, and the institutions of society are grafts, not spontaneous growths of nature.
Man is fully responsible for his nature and his choices.
Man is born as a freak of nature, being within nature and yet transcending it. He has to find principles of action and decision-making which replace the principles of instincts.
Life can’t really be solved by admirable maxims out of modern literature. Nature’s red in tooth and claw, remember.
Knowledge of human nature is the beginning and end of political education.
It is the same with mathematics, which would certainly not have arisen if it had been known from the beginning that in Nature there are no exactly straight lines, no real circle, no absolute standard of size.
It is the nature of truth in general, as of some ores in particular, to be richest when most superficial.
