Impoliteness is frequently the sign of an awkward modesty that loses its head when surprised and hopes to conceal this with rudeness.

Good prose is written only face to face with poetry.

In the knowledge of truth, what really matters is the possession of it, not the impulse under which it was sought.

Lightning and thunder need time, the light of the stars needs time, deeds need time, even after they are done, to be seen and heard.

No artist tolerates reality.

How difficult it is to live when one feels that the judgment of many millenniums is around one and against one.

So far no one had had enough courage and intelligence to reveal me to my dear Germans. My problems are new, my psychological horizon frighteningly comprehensive, my language bold and clear; there may well be no books written in German which are richer in ideas and more independent than mine.