Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
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The iron hand of necessity commands, and her stern decree is supreme law, to which the gods even must submit. In deep silence rules the uncounselled sister of eternal fate. Whatever she lays upon thee, endure; perform whatever she commands.
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The public wishes itself to be managed like a woman; one must say nothing to it except what it likes to hear.
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Life seems so vulgar, so easily content with the commonplace things of every day, and yet it always nurses and cherishes certain higher claims in secret, and looks about for the means of satisfying them.
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The real scholar learns how to evolve the unknown from the known, and draws near the master.
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A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.
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What one has wished for in youth, in old age one has in abundance.
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Look closely at those who patronize you. Half are unfeeling, half untaught.
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To think is easy. To act is hard. But the hardest thing in the world is to act in accordance with your thinking.
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So then the year is repeating its old story again. We are come once more, thank God! to its most charming chapter. The violets and the Mayflowers are as its inscriptions or vignettes. It always makes a pleasant impression on us, when we open again at these pages of the book of life.
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A king there was once reigning, Who had a goodly flea, Him loved he without feigning, As his own son were he!
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Rash combat oft immortalizes man; if he should fall, he is renowned in song; but after-ages reckon not the ceaseless tears which the forsaken woman sheds. Poets tell us not of the many nights consumed in weeping, or of the dreary days wherein her anguished soul vainly yearns to call her loved one back.
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People have a peculiar pleasure in making converts, that is, in causing others to enjoy what they enjoy, thus finding their own likeness represented and reflected back to them.
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Perseverance is a silent power that grows irresistibly greater with time.
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It is always a sign of an unproductive time when it concerns itself with petty and technical aspects [in philology], and likewiseit is a sign of an unproductive person to pursue such trifles.
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Every form correctly seen is beautiful.
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It is only necessary to grow old to become more charitable and even indulgent. I see no fault committed by others that I have not committed myself.
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The world is so great and rich, and life so full of variety, that you can never lack occasions for poems.
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Every man must form himself as a particular being, seeking, however, to attain that general idea of which all mankind are constituents.
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Everyone holds his fortune in his own hands, like a sculptor the raw material he will fashion into a figure. But it's the same with that type of artistic activity as with all others: We are merely born with the capability to do it. The Skill to mold the material into what we want must be learned and attentively cultivated.
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When you are in conflict with someone, there is one factor that can make the difference between damaging your relationship and deepening it. That factor is attitude. We don't get to know people when they come to us; we must go to them to find out what they are like.
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The best way to understand a painting is by drawing it.
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Faith is like private capital, stored in one's own house. It is like a public savings bank or loan office, from which individuals receive assistance in their days of need; but here the creditor quietly takes his interest for himself.
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Man can only endure a certain degree of unhappiness; what is beyond that either annihilates him or passes by him and leaves him apathetic.
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The greatest happiness for the thinking person is to have explored the explorable and to venerate in equanimity that which cannotbe explored.