Franz Grillparzer Quotes

I notice well that one stray step from the habitual path leads irresistibly into a new direction. Life moves forward, it never reverses its course.

The sun of a prince's good graces resembles that in the skies in that it shines most kindly upon the blackest people.

What a pathetic creature is man! His senses are awakened by the hope for the very thing whose consummation puts him to sleep.

Just as the queen bee, the highest-ranking, peerless creature of her hive, is surrounded by lowly drones to please her, whereas the workers produce honey, the same way is the one who sits on the throne an equal only to himself, and no one's companion.

Finally and long overdue, your people, oppressed and disgraced by hatred and maliciousness, have achieved justice: now you enjoy full citizen's rights, but you'll remain Jews nonetheless.

It is open to question whether the highly individualized characters we find in Shakespeare are perhaps not detrimental to the dramatic effect. The human being disappears to the same degree as the individual emerges.

The graceful flowers of innocence are more valuable than the laurel crown of fame.

Perhaps the most embarrassing experience is being caught at a lie by a simpleton who sneers at our asinine cleverness.

Recently, the Germans have developed a tendency to prefer the so-called first (youthful) style of great artists to their mature works. Could it be that they do not realize that their aesthetic criteria, generally speaking, are juvenile?

North and West have always vied for power and territory, but their recent competition as to which one is more insidious of the twohas been more peaceful.

It is the emotions to which one objects in Germany most of all.

Much as I honor the wisdom of the princess--there is something more dashing about a man.

A tailor can adapt to any medium, be it poetry, be it criticism. As a poet, he can mend, and with the scissors of criticism he candivide.

Disregard for the consequences and for right and wrong nowadays passes as energy.

It's the misfortune of German authors that not a single one of them dares to expose his true character. Everyone thinks that he has to be better than he is.

Right and proof are two crutches for everything bent and crooked that limps along.

A heart that overflows may seek out merrymaking and boisterous festivities to quietly rejoice, unnoticed amidst the reveling crowds.

Only by himself, with one acre and a house, will a dunce be a dunce. Once he manages to gain power, he'll turn into a scoundrel.

I would love to be able to write a tragedy in my imagination--it would turn into a masterpiece.

What are the characteristics of today's world so that one may recognize it by them?" It pays pensions and borrows money: credit and monuments.

Swear words and profanities are mere abbreviations of speech, similar to the abbreviations in writing.

German radicalism: freedom-masturbation.

Bunglers and pedants judge art according to genre; they approve of this and dismiss that genre, but instead of genres, the open-minded connoisseur appreciates only individual works.

The most irascible person is most likely to become apathetic in dangerous situations.

Love! Hate! Is there no third?

Art compares to nature like wine to the grape.

Profundity easily turns into dullness and astuteness deteriorates into wit. Be guided by natural common sense and it will accommodate great and small.

The ideas of an age are most abundant where they are not crowded by original ideas.

Today is, after all, today, but yesterday is of the same substance as tomorrow.

Whoever considers morality the main objective of human existence, seems to me like a person who defines the purpose of a clock asnot going wrong. The first objective for a clock, is, however, that it does run; not going wrong is an additional regulative function. If not a watch's greatest accomplishment were not going wrong, unwound watches might be the best.

An uprising would punish only the country, and that is out of the question. But there is yet another approach, the most effectiveform of resistance: contemptuous compliance.

The courts used to be, fair and square, the avengers of secular crimes; but nowadays they demand respect even for the criminal.

Do hurry and proclaim the concordat. Then castrate yourselves to keep from sinning.

Why does the past look so enticing to us? For the same reason why from a distance a meadow with flowers looks like a flower bed.

A pious woman's neighbor, a philanthropist's child, a liberal's servant--these three have a hard life.

Critics are reprimanded when they get sarcastic. How absurd! Is the torch of criticism supposed to shine without burning?

The ramparts of Vienna are crumbling into the sand; no one wants to live so confined, however, the entire country is already surrounded by a Chinese wall!

The military and the clergy cause us much annoyance; the clergy and the military, they empty our wallets and rob our intelligence.

A man may welcome his beloved with circumstance, but a woman's love and her concern for his well-being are discreet.

Dilettantes appreciate the work, professors the master at the same time.

Turning popular opinion upside down does not make an original.

Isn't it awful that cold feet make for a cold imagination and that a pair of woollen socks induce good thoughts!

Do you think that it is possible to have a mere taste of commonness? Either one hates it or makes common cause with it.

Christianity is the religion of melancholy and hypochondria. Islam, on the other hand, promotes apathy, and Judaism instills its adherents with a certain choleric vehemence, the heathen Greeks may well be called happy optimists.

It is not a matter of desire, but of coercion and duty.

The state has no religion for the simple reason that it has each and everyone.

I love the pride whose measure is its own eminence and not the insignificance of someone else.

I cannot be exacting because I respect myself.