I have great admiration for power, a great terror of weakness, especially in my own sex, yet feel that my love is for those who overcome the mental and moral suffering and temptation through excess of tenderness rather than through excess of strength.

Lavater told Goethe that on a certain occasion when he held the velvet bag in the church as collector of the offerings, he tried to observe only the hands; and he satisfied himself that in every individual the shape of the hand and of the fingers, the action and sentiment in dropping the gift into the bag, were distinctly different and individually characteristic.

In our relations with the people around us, we forgive them more readily for what they do, which they can help, than for what they are, which they cannot help.

Conflict, which rouses up the best and highest powers in some characters, in others not only jars the whole being, but paralyzes the faculties.

As what we call genius arises out of the disproportionate power and size of a certain faculty, so the great difficulty lies in harmonizing with it the rest of the character.

He that seeks popularity in art closes the door on his own genius: as he must needs paint for other minds, and not for his own.

Fame is that which is known to exist by the echo of its footsteps through congenial minds.