Chance arrives unannounced. It emerges, and when it leaves, we are lucky if the changes it has produced are only external.

How frightening it is to have reached the height of human accomplishment in art that must forever borrow from life's abundance.

What raises great poetry above all else--it is the entire person and also the entire world.

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.

Lap-dogs and blood-hounds enjoy the greatest respect at court; house-dogs and no dogs at all are not even considered.

A wise man can and should stand above his times, not so the poet, but he should be their apex.

Two soldiers and a villain are enough to blow up the rights of the citizens.