Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
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Our friends show us what we can do; our enemies teach us what we must do.
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You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.
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God could cause us considerable embarrassment by revealing all the secrets of nature to us: we should not know what to do for sheer apathy and boredom.
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It is equally a mistake to hold one's self too high, or to rate one's self too cheap.
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Whatever we may say against collections, which present authors in a disjointed form, they nevertheless bring about many excellent results. We are not always so composed, so full of wisdom, that we are able to take in at once the whole scope of a work according to its merits. Do we not mark in a book passages which seem to have a direct reference to ourselves? Young people especially, who have failed in acquiring a complete cultivation of mind, are roused in a praiseworthy way by brilliant passages.
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People should talk less and draw more. Personally, I would like to renounce speech altogether and, like organic nature, communicate everything I have to say visually.
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Miracle is the pet child of faith.
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It is bad governments, not bad people, who cause revolutions.
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To quit smoking, you must first want to quit, but then you must also do the quitting.
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When an idea is wanting, a word can always be found to take its place.
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I am part of the part that once was everything, Part of the darkness which gave birth to light… Mephistopheles, from Faust.
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When ideas fail, words come in very handy.
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The older we grow, the greater become the ordeals.
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To witness two lovers is a spectacle for the gods.
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True works of art contain their own theory and give us the measurement according to which we should judge them.
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The best government is that which teaches us to govern ourselves.
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I think that I am better than the people who are trying to reform me.
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What am I then...? Everything that I have seen, heard, and observed I have collected and exploited. My works have been nourished by countless different individuals, by innocent and wise ones, people of intelligence and dunces. Childhood, maturity and old age all have brought me their thoughts....their perspectives on life. I have often reaped what others have sowed. My work is the work of a collective being that bears the name Goethe.
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Give shape, artist! don't talk! Your poem be but a breath.
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Tolerance should really be only a temporary attitude; it must lead to recognition. To tolerate means to offend.
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Truth must be repeated again and again, because error is constantly being preached round about.
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Who longs in solitude to live, Ah! soon his wish will gain: Men hope and love, men get and give, and leave him to his pain.
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Destiny grants us our wishes, but in its own way, in order to give us something beyond our wishes.
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Nature does not suffer her veil to be taken from her, and what she does not choose to reveal to the spirit, thou wilt not wrest from her by levers and screws.