The plot! The plot! What kind of plot could a poet possibly provide that is not surpassed by the thinking, feeling reader? Form alone is divine.

Man lives two lives, woe, were it otherwise! One is seized by death, the other one, his honor, remains.

Austrian soldiers are like horses: brave but easily frightened.

Drive the women from the bed just as you drove them from the choir; a eunuch sings in Rome, and the priests masturbate.

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

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

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.