Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
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Each one of us must carry within the proof of immortality, it cannot be given from outside of us. To be sure, everything in natureis change but behind the change there is something eternal.
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True art can only spring from the intimate linking of the serious and the playful.
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The person of analytic or critical intellect finds something ridiculous in everything. The person of synthetic or constructive intellect, in almost nothing.
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The philosophers must station themselves in the middle.
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In the realm of ideas everything depends on enthusiasm... in the real world all rests on perseverance.
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Magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.
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The flowers of life are but visionary. How many pass away and leave no trace behind! How few yield any fruit,--and the fruit itself, how rarely does it ripen! And yet there are flowers enough; and is it not strange, my friend, that we should suffer the little that does really ripen to rot, decay, and perish unenjoyed?
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The modern age has a false sense of superiority, because of the great mass of data at its disposal. But the valid criterion of distinction is rather the extent to which man knows how to form and master the material at his command.
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The coward only threatens when he is safe.
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Do thine own task, and be therewith content.
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What we agree with leaves us inactive, but contradiction makes us productive.
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Ich singe, wie der Vogel singtDer in den Zweigen wohnet.
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The formation of one's character ought to be everyone's chief aim.
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The bed of flowers Loosens amain, The beauteous snowdrops Droop o'er the plain. The crocus opens Its glowing bud, Like emeralds others, Others, like blood. With saucy gesture Primroses flare, And roguish violets, Hidden with care; And whatsoever There stirs and strives, The Spring's contented, If works and thrives.
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One cannot always be a hero, but one can always be a man.
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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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You must either conquer and rule or serve and lose, suffer or triumph, be the anvil or the hammer.
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I do not speak of what I cannot praise.
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I am not omniscient, but I know a lot.
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The greatest joy of a thinking man is to have searched the explored and to quietly revere the unexplored.
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It is one of Heaven's best gifts to hold such a dear creature in one's arms.
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Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they translate into their own language and forthwith it is something entirely different.
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The day is committed to error and floundering; success and achievement are matters of long range.
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The whole history of the Christian Church is a mixture of errors and violence.