The author of the article analyzes influence of Friedrich Nietzsche’s idea of the eternal return on philosophy and poetry of Russian symbolists. It is stated that this idea is concordant to Vladimir Solovyov’s philosophy of unitotality. The artistic implementation of the idea of the eternal return is considered in the poetry of Dmitry Merezhkovsky, Zinaida Gippius, Valery Bryusov, Fyodor Sologub, Konstantin Balmont, Alexander Blok, Vyacheslav Ivanov, Andrey Bely. The models of time varied and changed in the poetry of Russian symbolists. They are represented by the motives of closed circle or labyrinth (Gippius, Sologub, Blok), sacred time of history, culture, religion (Merezhkovsky, Bryusov, Blok, Ivanov), death and resurrection (Ivanov), mystic reincarnation (Bely). Motives of lost paradise and the eternal return become dominant in the Balmont’s poetry, archetype of the divine child and cosmic world play the main role. Ivanov’s works mainly have motives of soul returning to the existence (God), ritual and mythological motives of death and resurrection. It is concluded that Nietzsche's idea influenced the poetic thinking and mythopoetic strategies of symbolists. Nietzsche's idea in the philosophy and poetry of symbolists approached Christian religion and esoteric theories.