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Ernst Junger Biography

Ernst Jünger (29 March 1895 – 17 February 1998) was a highly decorated German soldier, author, and entomologist who became publicly known for his World War I memoir Storm of Steel. The son of a successful businessman and chemist, Jünger rebelled against an affluent upbringing and sought adventure in the Wandervogel, before running away to briefly serve in the French Foreign Legion, an illegal act. Because he escaped prosecution in Germany due to his father's efforts, Jünger was able to enlist on the outbreak of war. During an ill-fated German offensive in 1918 Jünger's World War I career ended with the last and most serious of his many woundings, and he was awarded the Pour le Mérite, a rare decoration for one of his rank.

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Ernst Junger Quotes

Today only the person who no longer believes in a happy ending, only he who has consciously renounced it, is able to live. A happy century does not exist; but there are moments of happiness, and there is freedom in the moment.

Able, Believe, Believes, Century, Doe, Happiness

It has always been my ideal in war to eliminate all feelings of hatred and to treat my enemy as an enemy only in battle and to honour him as a man according to his courage.

According, Battle, Hatred, Men, War

A work of art wastes away and becomes lustreless in surroundings where it has a price but not a value. It radiates only when surrounded by love. It is bound to wilt in a world where the rich have no time and the cultivated no money. But it never harmonizes with borrowed greatness.

Art, Greatness, Love, Wilt, World

The anarch knows the rules. He has studied them as a historian and goes along with them as a contemporary. Wherever possible, he plays his own game within their framework; this makes the fewest waves.

Games, Play, Wave, Contemporary, Anarch, Historian

Although I am an anarch, I am not anti-authoritarian. Quite the opposite: I need authority, although I do not believe in it. My critical faculties are sharpened by the absence of the credibility that I ask for. As a historian, I know what can be offered.

Believe, Opposites, Needs, Absence, Historian, Sharpened

The (capital punishment) controversy passes the anarch by. For him, the linking of death and punishment is absurd. In this respect, he is closer to the wrongdoer than to the judge, for the high-ranking culprit who is condemned to death is not prepared to acknowledge his sentence as atonement; rather, he sees his guilt in his own inadequacy. Thus, he recognizes himself not as a moral but as a tragic person.

Acknowledge, Anarch, Atonement, Guilt, Judging, Punishment

The special trait making me an anarch is that I live in a world which I ‘ultimately’ do not take seriously. This increases my freedom; I serve as a temporary volunteer

Making, Special, Volunteer, World

The anarch is oriented to facts, not ideas. He fights alone, as a free man, and would never dream of sacrificing himself to having one inadequacy supplant another and a new regime triumph over the old one. In this sense, he is closer to the philistine; the baker whose chief concern is to bake good bread; the peasant, who works his plow while armies march across his fields.

Anarch, Army, Closer, Dream, Man, Sacrifice

Liberalism is to freedom as anarchism is to anarchy.

Anarchism, Anarchy, Freedom, Liberalism

The partisan wants to change the law, the criminal break it; the anarch wants neither. He is not for or against the law. While not acknowledging the law, he does try to recognize it like the laws of nature, and he adjusts accordingly.

Anarch, Break, Criminals, Law, Like, Trying

The political trend is always to be observed, partly as a spectacle, partly for one's own safety. The liberal is dissatisfied with regime; the anarch passes through their sequence - as inoffensively as possible - like a suite of rooms. This is the recipe for anyone who cares more about the substance of the world than its shadow - the philosopher, the artist, the believer.

Artist, Like, Political, Safety, Substance

Seen politically, systems follow one another, each consuming the previous one. They live on ever-bequeathed and ever-disappointed hope, which never entirely fades. Its spark is all that survives, as it eats its way along the blasting fuse. For this spark, history is merely an occasion, never a goal.

Goal, Occasion, Spark, Sparks, Survives, Way

The anarch wages his own wars, even when marching in rank and file

Anarchy, File, Marching, Rank, Wages, War

I came to realize that one single human being, comprehended in his depth, who gives generously from the treasures of his heart, bestows on us more riches than Caesar or Alexander could ever conquer. Here is our kingdom, the best of monarchies, the best republic. Here is our garden, our happiness.

Alexander, Conquer, Garden, Giving, Heart

Freedom is based on the anarch’s awareness that he can kill himself. He carries this awareness around; it accompanies him like a shadow that he can conjure up. “A leap from this bridge will set me free.

Awareness, Based, Bridges, Freedom, Kill, Shadow