Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
-
True works of art are a manifestation of the higher laws of nature.
-
There is nothing more fearful than imagination without taste. [Ger., Es ist nichts furchterlicher als Einbildungskraft ohne Geschmack.]
-
A flippant, frivolous man may ridicule others, may controvert them, scorn them; but he who has any respect for himself seems to have renounced the right of thinking meanly of others.
-
A human being needs only a small plot of ground on which to be happy, and even less to lie beneath.
-
Girls we love for what they are; young men for what they promise to be.
-
Hypotheses are lullabies for teachers to sing their students to sleep.
-
The arts are the salt of the earth; as salt relates to food, the arts relate to technology.
-
Man's highest merit always is, as much as possible, to rule external circumstances and as little as possible to let himself be ruled by them.
-
Secrecy has many advantages, for when you tell someone the purpose of any object right away, they often think there is nothing to it.
-
What a day it is when we must envy the men in their graves.
-
Our destiny often looks like a fruit-tree in winter. Who would think from its pitiable aspect that those rigid boughs, those rough twigs could next spring again be green, bloom, and even bear fruit? Yet we hope it, we know it.
-
The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never have otherwise occurred...unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.
-
People who think honestly and deeply have a hostile attitude towards the public.
-
The world is full of contradiction.
-
He alone deserves liberty and life who daily must win them anew.
-
It would not be worth your while to reach the age of seventy if all the wisdom of the world were to be foolishness before God.
-
As man is, so is his God. And thus is God oft strangely odd.
-
Boldness has power, magic and genius in it.
-
Oh God, how do the world and heavens confine themselves, when our hearts tremble in their own barriers!
-
Wine rejoices the heart of man and joy is the mother of all virtues.
-
From desire I plunge to its fulfilment, where I long once more for desire.
-
Just as, out of habit, one consults a run-down clock as though it were still going, so too one may look at the face of a beautiful woman as though he still loved her.
-
I have always paid attention to the merits of my enemies, and found it an advantage.
-
Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men.