Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes - Famous Quotes by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Born: 1749-08-28
Died: 1832-03-22
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Biography
A clever man commits no minor blunders.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Mistake ] ***
A correct answer is like an affectionate kiss.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A life without love, without the presence of the beloved, is nothing but a mere magic-latern show. We draw out slide after slide, swiftly tiring of each, and pushing it back to make haste for the next.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A man can stand anything except a succession of ordinary days.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A man who does not know foreign language is ignorant of his own.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A man's errors are what make him amiable.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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A noble person attracts noble people, and knows how to hold on to them.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Against criticism a man can neither protest nor defend himself he must act in spite of it, and then it will gradually yield to him.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Age does not make us childish, as some say it only finds us true children still.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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All theory, dear friend, is gray, but the golden tree of life springs ever green.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, till they take root in our personal experience.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Anecdotes and maxims are rich treasures to the man of the world, for he knows how to introduce the former at fit place in conversation.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Art is long, life short judgment difficult, opportunity transient.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Trust ] ***
Beware of dissipating your powers strive constantly to concentrate them. Genius thinks it can do whatever it sees others doing, but is sure to repent of every ill-judged outlay.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Certain flaws are necessary for the whole. It would seem strange if old friends lacked certain quirks.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Character develops itself in the stream of life.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Character, in great and little things, means carrying through what you feel able to do.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Correction does much, but encouragement does more.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Courage and modesty are the most unequivocal of virtues, for they are of a kind that hypocrisy cannot imitate they too have this quality in common, that they are expressed by the same color.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Death is Nature's expert advice to get plenty of Life.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Difficulties increase the nearer we approach our goal.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Divide and rule, a sound motto. Unite and lead, a better one.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Enjoy when you can, and endure when you must.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Everybody wants to be somebody nobody wants to grow.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Everything a human being wants can be divided into four components love, adventure, power and fame.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Everything in the world may be endured except continued prosperity.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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First and last, what is demanded of genius is love of truth.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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For a man to achieve all that is demanded of him he must regard himself as greater than he is.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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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.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace in his home.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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He who seizes the right moment is the right man.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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He who wishes to exert a useful influence must be careful to insult nothing. Let him not be troubled by what seems absurd, but concentrate his energies to the creation of what is good. He must not demolish, but build. He must raise temples where mankind may come and partake of the purest pleasure.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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How can you come to know yourself Never by thinking, always by doing. Try to do your duty, and you'll know right away what you amount to.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I call architecture frozen music.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I can tell you, honest friend, what to believe believe life it teaches better than book or orator.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I do not know everything; still many things I understand.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I do not know myself, and God forbid that I should.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I find the great thing in this world is, not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I love the deep quiet in which I live and grow against the world and harvest what they cannot take from me by fire or sword.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I love those who yearn for the impossible.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I never believed in trying to do anything. Whatever I set out to do I found I had already accomplished.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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I respect the man who knows distinctly what he wishes. The greater part of all mischief in the world arises from the fact that men do not sufficiently understand their own aims. They have undertaken to build a tower, and spend no more labor on the foundation than would be necessary to erect a hut.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If a man writes a book, let him set down only what he knows. I have guesses enough of my own.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If any man wish to write in a clear style, let him be first clear in his thoughts and if any would write in a noble style, let him first possess a noble soul.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If children grew up according to early indications, we should have nothing but geniuses.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If God had wanted me otherwise, He would have created me otherwise.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If I love you, what business is it of yours
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If you must tell me your opinions, tell me what you believe in. I have plenty of doubts of my own.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If you treat an individual as he is, he will remain as he is. But if you treat him as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought and could be.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If your treat an individual ... as if he were what he ought to be and could be, he will become what he ought to be and could be.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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It is a mistake for a taciturn, serious-minded woman to marry a jovial man, but not for a serious-minded man to marry a lighthearted woman.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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It is not enough to have knowledge, one must also apply it. It is not enough to have wishes, one must also accomplish.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Just trust yourself, then you will know how to live.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Know'st thou the land where the lemon-trees bloom, Where the gold orange glows in the deep thicket's gloom, Where a wind ever soft from the blue heaven blows, And the groves are of laurel and myrtle and rose
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Knowing is not enough we must apply. Willing is not enough we must do.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Life belongs to the living, and he who lives must be prepared for changes.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Change ] ***
Life can only be understood backwards but it must be lived forwards.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Life is not anything, but an opportunity for something.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Life is the childhood of our immortality.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Live dangerously and you live right.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Love and desire are the spirit's wings to great deeds.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Love does not dominate; it cultivates.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Love grants in a moment what toil can hardly achieve in an age.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Man is not born to solve the problem of the universe, but to find out what he has to do and to restrain himself within the limits of his comprehension.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Man supposes that he directs his life and governs his actions, when his existence is irretrievably under the control of destiny.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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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.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Men show their characters in nothing more clearly than in what they think laughable.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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More light! Give me more light!
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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My poor head is in such a whirl, my mind is all in bits.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nature knows no pause in progress and development, and attaches her curse on all inaction.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nature understands no jesting. She is always true, always serious, always severe. She is always right, and the errors are always those of man.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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No one would talk much in society, if he knew how often he misunderstood others.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Noble be man,
Helpful and good!
For that alone
Sets him apart
From every other creature
On earth.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nothing is as terrible to see as ignorance in action.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nothing is more damaging to a new truth than an old error.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nothing shows a man's character more than what he laughs at.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Oh God, how do the world and heavens confine themselves, when our hearts tremble in their own barriers!
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Old age, believe me, is a good and pleasant thing. It is true you are gently shouldered off the stage, but then you are given such a comfortable front stall as spectator.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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One man's word is no man's word we should quietly hear both sides.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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One must ask children and birds how cherries and strawberries taste.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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One never goes so far as when one doesn't know where one is going.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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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.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Only learn to seize good fortune, for good fortune is always here.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Our friends show us what we can do our enemies teach us what we must do.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Plunge boldly into the thick of life
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Reason can never be popular. Passions and feelings may become popular, but reason will always remain the sole property of a few eminent individuals.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Rest not Life is sweeping by go and dare before you die. Something mighty and sublime, leave behind to conquer time.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Science and art belong to the whole world, and before them vanish the barriers of nationality.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Science ] [ Art ] ***
So divinely is the world organized that every one of us, in our place and time, is in balance with everything else.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Talent develops in tranquillity, character in the full current of human life.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Talents are best nurtured in solitude character is best formed in the stormy billows of the world.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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That is the true season of love, when we believe that we alone can love, that no one could ever have loved so before us, and that no one will love in the same way after us.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The artist alone sees spirits. But after he has told of their appearing to him, everybody sees them.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The beginning of faith is the beginning of fruitfulness but the beginning of unbelief, however glittering, is empty.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The best fortune that can fall to a man is that which corrects his defects and makes up for his failings.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The first and last thing required of genius is the love of truth.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The ground that a good man treads is hallowed.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The highest happiness of man ... is to have probed what is knowable and quietly to revere what is unknowable.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man almost nothing.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The man of understanding finds everything laughable.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The man who acts never has any conscience no one has any conscience but the man who thinks.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The most original authors are not so because they advance what is new, but because they put what they have to say as if it had never been said before.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The phrases that men hear or repeat continually, end by becoming convictions and ossify the organs of intelligence.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The society of women is the element of good manners.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The true, prescriptive artist strives after artistic truth; the lawless artist, following blind instinct, after an appearance of naturalness. The one leads to the highest peaks of art, the other to its lowest depths.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The unnatural, that too is natural.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The work of art may have a moral effect, but to demand moral purpose from the artist is to make him ruin his work.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Art ] ***
There is a courtesy of the heart it is allied to love. From it springs the purest courtesy in the outward behavior.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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There is nothing more dreadful than imagination without taste.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which matter least.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Thinking is easy, acting is difficult, and to put one's thoughts into action is the most difficult thing in the world.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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To be loved for what one is, is the greatest exception. The great majority love in others only what they lend him, their own selves, their version of him.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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To be pleased with one's limits is a wretched state.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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To know someone here or there with whom you can feel there is understanding in spite of distances or thoughts expressed
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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To live as one likes is plebian the noble man aspires to order and law.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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To rule is easy, to govern difficult.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Treat a man as he appears to be, and you make him worse. But treat a man as if he were what he potentially could be, and you make him what he should be.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be, and he will become as he can and should be.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and you help them to become what they are capable of being.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Trust yourself, then you will know how to live.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Viewed from the summit of reason, all life looks like a malignant disease and the world like a madhouse.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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We are never deceived we deceive ourselves.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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We are shaped and fashioned by what we love.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
More quotations on: [ Love ] ***
We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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We know accurately only when we know little with knowledge doubt increases.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves otherwise we harden.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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What government is the best That which teaches us to govern ourselves.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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What is not fully understood is not possessed.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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When an idea is wanting, a word can always be found to take its place.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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When ideas fail, words come in very handy.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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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.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Whenever I hear people talking about 'liberal ideas,' I am always astounded that men should love to fool themselves with empty sounds. An idea should never be liberal it must be vigorous, positive, and without loose ends so that it may fulfill its divine mission and be productive. The proper place for liberality is in the realm of the emotions.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never spent the darksome hours Weeping, and watching for the morrow,-- He knows ye not, ye gloomy Powers.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Whoever, in middle age, attempts to realize the wishes and hopes of his early youth, invariably deceives himself. Each ten years of a man's life has its own fortunes, its own hopes, its own desires.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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You will always find [hatred] strongest and most violent where there is the lowest degree of culture.
- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
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