Life is all too wondrous sweet, and the world is so beautifully bewildered; it is the dream of an intoxicated divinity.
Heinrich HeineOur sweetest hopes rise blooming. And then again are gone, They bloom and fade alternate, And so it goes rolling on. I know it, and it troubles My life, my love, my rest, My heart is wise and witty, And it bleeds within my breast.
Heinrich HeineThe men of action are, after all, only the unconscious instruments of the men of thought.
Heinrich HeinePhychical pain is more easily borne than physical; and if I had my choice between a bad conscience and a bad tooth, I should choose the former.
Heinrich HeineLife is the greatest of blessings and death the worst of evils.... all great, powerful souls love life.
Heinrich HeineThe great pulsation of nature beats too in my breast, and when I carol aloud, I am answered by a thousand-fold echo. I hear a thousand nightingales. Spring hath sent them to awaken Earth from her morning slumber, and Earth trembles with ecstasy, her flowers are hymns, which she sings in inspiration to the sun.
Heinrich HeineA pine tree standeth lonely In the North on an upland bare; It standeth whitely shrouded With snow, and sleepeth there. It dreameth of a Palm tree Which far in the East alone, In the mournful silence standeth On its ridge of burning stone.
Heinrich HeineThe stones here speak to me, and I know their mute language. Also, they seem deeply to feel what I think. So a broken column of the old Roman times, an old tower of Lombardy, a weather- beaten Gothic piece of a pillar understands me well. But I am a ruin myself, wandering among ruins.
Heinrich HeineIt must require an inordinate share of vanity and presumption, too, after enjoying so much that is good and beautiful on earth, to ask the Lord for immortality in addition to it all.
Heinrich HeineSleep is good, death is better; but of course, the best thing would to have never been born at all.
Heinrich HeineThe real madness probably is not another thing that the wisdom itself that, tired of discovering the shames of the world, has taken the intelligent resolution to become mad
Heinrich HeineWhether a revolution succeeds or fails people of great hearts will always be sacrificed to it.
Heinrich HeineThe negro king desired to be portrayed as white. But do not laugh at the poor African; for every man is but another negro king, and would like to appear in a color different from that with which Fate has bedaubed him.
Heinrich HeineOn the waves of the brook she dances by, The light, the lovely dragon-fly; She dances here, she dances there, The shimmering, glimmering flutterer fair. And many a foolish young beetle's impressed By the blue gauze gown in which she is dressed; They admire the enamel that decks her bright, And her elegant waist so slim and slight.
Heinrich HeineTerrible as is war, it yet displays the spiritual grandeur of man daring to defy his mightiest hereditary enemy--death.
Heinrich HeineThere is no Sixth Commandment in art. The poet is entitled to lay his hands on whatever material he finds necessary for his work.
Heinrich HeineThe foolish race of mankind are swarming below in the night; they shriek and rage and quarrel - and all of them are right.
Heinrich HeineThe beauteous dragonfly's dancing By the waves of the rivulet glancing; She dances here and she dances there, The glimmering, glittering flutterer fair. Full many a beetle with loud applause Admires her dress of azure gauze, Admires her body's bright splendour, And also her figure so slender...
Heinrich HeineI care little in the existence of a heaven or hell; self respect does not allow me to guide my acts with an eye toward heavenly salvation or hellish punishment. I pursue the good in life because it is beautiful and attracts me; and shun the bad because it is ugly and repulsive. All our acts should originate from the spring of unselfish love, whether there be a continuation after death or not.
Heinrich HeineIt is a common phenomenon that just the prettiest girls find it so difficult to get a man.
Heinrich HeinePhotography is a witness against the mistaken opinion that art is an imitation of nature.
Heinrich HeineLyrical poetry is much the same an every age, as the songs of the nightingales in every spring-time.
Heinrich HeineEvery period of time is a sphinx that throws itself into the abyss as soon as its riddle has been solved.
Heinrich HeineIn earlier religions the spirit of the time was expressed through the individual and confirmed by miracles. In modern religions the spirit is expressed through the many and confirmed by reason.
Heinrich HeineSociety is a republic. When an individual endeavors to lift himself above his fellows, he is dragged down by the mass, either by means of ridicule or of calumny. No one shall be more virtuous or more intellectually gifted than others. Whoever, by the irresistable force of genius, rises above the common herd is certain to be ostracized by society, which will pursue him with such merciless derision and detraction that at last he will be compelled to retreat into the solitude of his thoughts.
Heinrich HeineThe butterfly long loved the beautiful rose, And flirted around all day; While round him in turn with her golden caress, Soft fluttered the sun's warm ray.... I know not with whom the rose was in love, But I know that I loved them all. The butterfly, rose, and the sun's bright ray, The star and the bird's sweet call.
Heinrich HeineBut a day must come when the fire of youth will be quenched in my veins, when winter will dwell in my heart, when his snow flakes will whiten my locks, and his mists will dim my eyes. Then my friends will lie in their lonely grave, and I alone will remain like a solitary stalk forgotten by the reaper.
Heinrich Heine