Selections from the Writings of Kierkegaard

"Come hither unto me!" Strange! For human compassion also, and willingly, does something for them that labor and are heavy laden; one feeds the hungry, clothes the naked, makes...

When Cockatoo[18] all at once begins to plume himself like a duck which is gorged with food, and then emits the word "Marian," everybody will laugh, and so will I. I suppose the...

As I have said, it is through woman that ideality is born into the world and--what were man without her! There is many a man who has become a genius through a woman, many a one...

Only once did Constantin abandon his omnipresence in which one actually lost sight of his presence. At the very beginning he got them to sing one of the old drinking songs, "by...

History you may read and hear about as a matter of the past. Within its realm you can, if you so care, judge actions by their results. But in Christ's life here on earth there i...

Let others complain that the times are wicked. I complain that they are paltry; for they are without passion. The thoughts of men are thin and frail like lace, and they themselv...

We read in Scripture: "And God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold here I am.[3]" You, whom I am now addressing did you do likewise? When you saw...

Or he may reason as follows: "That there is something extraordinary about this person--even if one reserves the right, both one's own and that of common sense, to refrain from v...

Who he is, one can recognize more easily now when the powerful ones and the respected ones, and all the precautionary measures of those upholding the existing order, have correc...

In our times, as was remarked, no one is content with faith, but "goes right on." The question as to whither they are proceeding may be a silly question; whereas it is a sign of...

In vain; for the fault lies in the edifice. The whole ramshackle pile of a State Church which has not been aired, spiritually speaking, in times out of mind--the air in it has d...

Let me admit frankly that I have not in my experience encountered any certain specimen of this type; but I do not refuse to admit that as far as I know, every other person may b...

Jesus Christ is, then, the same; yet lived he 1800 years ago in debasement, and is transfigured only at his return. As yet he has not returned; therefore he is still the one in...

What luxury it is to relish the ruse without being duped, only the erotic nature comprehends. And how blissful it is to be seduced, woman alone knows. I know that from woman, ev...

This will never happen among men. If a man should sputter off in this fashion I would scorn him. If he should fool me by his cleverness I need but apply the ethical category to...

So immense is the power of reflection needed to fathom a woman's thought that only a man who dedicates himself wholly to the task will succeed, and even then only if gifted to s...

Creditable as have been the contributions of Scandinavia to the cultural life of the race in well-nigh all fields of human endeavor, it has produced but one thinker of the first...

About a year afterwards (1843) there appeared his first great work, "Either-Or," which at once established his fame. As in the case of most of his works it will be impossible to...

There could be no thought now of retiring to a peaceful charge in the country. That would have been fleeing from persecution. Besides, unbeknown perhaps to himself, his pugnacit...

But precisely this is the misfortune, and has been the misfortune, in Christendom that Christ is neither the one nor the other--neither the one he was when living on earth, nor...

Excellently fitting. Oh yes if, as was remarked above, divine worship serves a double purpose, viz., to render God ridiculous in a very adroit manner--if you may call it so--and...