If we notice a few errors in the work of a proven master, we may and even will often be correct; if we believe, however, that he is completely and utterly mistaken, we are in danger of missing his entire concept.

When we interpret nature, we refer phenomena that are rarely entirely unintelligible back to something that actually exists, but is equally unintelligible.

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

The office of the prince and that of the writer are defined and assigned as follows: the nobleman gives rank to the written work,the writer provides food for the prince.

Whoever places his trust into a system will soon be without a home. While you are building your third story, the two lower ones have already been dismantled.

Without a notion of the transcendental, human beings would, indeed, be animals; however, only fools can be convinced of it, and only degenerates need such a conviction.

Schiller moves upward. Goethe comes from up above.