Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
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The words you've bandied are sufficient; 'Tis deeds that I prefer to see.
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There is nothing insignificant in the world. It all depends on how one looks at it.
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Marriage is the beginning and pinnacle of civilization.
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Energy will do anything that can be done in this world.
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When toward the Devil's Hose we tread, Woman's a thousand steps behind.
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There is but one poetry-true poetry.
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Yes! to this thought I hold with firm persistence; The last result of wisdom stamps it true; He only earns his freedom and existence Who daily conquers them anew.
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Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again.
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For the butterfly, mating and propagation involve the sacrifice of life, for the human being, the sacrifice of beauty.
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The Evil One has left, the evil ones remain.
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We can most safely achieve truly universal tolerance when we respect that which is characteristic in the individual and in nations, clinging, though, to the conviction that the truly meritorious is unique by belonging to all of mankind.
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Impotent hatred is the most horrible of all emotions; one should hate nobody whom one cannot destroy.
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Those who have no hope for a future life are already dead for the present one.
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When we treat man as he is, we make him worse than he is; when we treat him as if he already were what he potentially could be, we make him what he should be.
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Men are so inclined to content themselves with what is commonest; the spirit and the senses so easily grow dead to the impressions of the beautiful and perfect, that every one should study, by all methods, to nourish in his mind the faculty of feeling these things. ...For this reason, one ought every day at least, to hear a little song, read a good poem, see a fine picture, and, if it were possible, to speak a few reasonable words.
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Were the eye not of the sun, How could we behold the light? If God's might and ours were not as one, How could His work enchant our sight?
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The history of mankind is his character.
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Duration in change.
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Letters are among the most significant memorial a person can leave behind them.
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When the healthy nature of man acts as a whole, when he feels himself to be in the world as in a great, beautiful, noble, and valued whole, when harmonious ease affords him a pure and free delight, then the universe, if it could experience itself, would exult, as having attained its goal, and admire the climax of its own becoming and essence.
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What I possess I would gladly retain. Change amuses the mind, yet scarcely profits.
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Let no one be like another, yet everyone like the highest. How is this done? Be each one perfect in himself.
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Truth is a torch but a tremendous one. That is why we hurry past it, shielding our eyes, indeed, in fear of getting burned.
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If you lay duties upon people and give them no rights, you must pay them well.