How prone poor Humanity is to dam up the minutest remnants of its freedom, and build an artificial roof to prevent it looking up to the clear blue sky.
E. T. A. HoffmannThere are men from whom nature or some peculiar destiny has removed the cover beneath which we hide our own madness. They are likethin-skinned insects whose visible play of muscles seem to make them deformed, though in fact, everything soon turns to its normal shape again.
E. T. A. HoffmannEvery year lays more earth upon us, which weighs us down from aerial regions, till we go under the earth at last.
E. T. A. HoffmannIt is useless to contend with the irresistible power of Time, which goes on continually creating by a process of constant destruction.
E. T. A. HoffmannEverything here below beneath the sun is subject to continual change; and perhaps there is nothing which can be called more inconstant than opinion, which turns round in an everlasting circle like the wheel of fortune. He who reaps praise today is overwhelmed with biting censure tomorrow; today we trample under foot the man who tomorrow will be raised far above us.
E. T. A. Hoffmann