Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes
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As for what I have done as a poet, I take no pride in whatever. Excellent poets have lived at the same time with me, poets more excellent lived before me, and others will come after me. But that in my country I am the only person who knows the truth in the difficult science of colors-of that, I say, I am not a little proud, and here have a consciousness of superiority to many.
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If I accept you as you are, I will make you worse; however, if I treat you as though you are what you are capable of becoming, I help you become that.
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Don't say that you want to give, but go ahead and give! You'll never catch up with a mere hope.
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No limit, no definition, may restrict the range or depth of the human spirit's passage into its own secrets or the world's.
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A man is not little when he finds it difficult to cope with circumstances, but when circumstances overmaster him.
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You can’t, if you can’t feel it, if it never Rises from the soul, and sways The heart of every single hearer, With deepest power, in simple ways. You’ll sit forever, gluing things together, Cooking up a stew from other’s scraps, Blowing on a miserable fire, Made from your heap of dying ash. Let apes and children praise your art, If their admiration’s to your taste, But you’ll never speak from heart to heart, Unless it rises up from your heart’s space.
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He only earns his freedom and his life Who takes them every day by storm.
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I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
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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.
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Boldness has power, magic and genius in it.
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He is dead in this world who has no belief in another.
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Truth must be repeated again and again, because error is constantly being preached round about.
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Nature is, after all, the only book that offers important content on every page.
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Not the maker of plans and promises, but rather the one who offers faithful service in small matters. This is the person who is most likely to achieve what is good and lasting.
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He is the happiest man who can see the connection between the end and the beginning of life.
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It is a great error to take oneself for more than one is, or for less than one is worth.
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Ye great teachers: listen to what you say!
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All of us, just because we are able to talk, also believe we are able to talk about language.
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It is not doing the thing we like to do, but liking the thing we have to do, that makes life blessed.
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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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Let there be truth between us.
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We rather confess our moral errors, faults, and crimes than our ignorance.
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Death is Nature's expert advice to get plenty of Life.
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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.