Woe to falsehood! it affords no relief to the breast, like truth; it gives us no comfort, pains him who forges it, and like an arrow directed by a god flies back and wounds the archer.

Man knows himself only insofar as he knows the world, becoming aware of it if only within himself, and of himself self only within it. Each new subject, well observed, opens up within us a new organ of thought.

What is the destiny of man, but to fill up the measure of his sufferings, and to drink his allotted cup of bitterness?

What I possess I would gladly retain. Change amuses the mind, yet scarcely profits.

Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiss nichts von seiner eigenen.He who is ignorant of foreign languages, knows not his own.

Nature understands no jesting. She is always true, always serious, always severe. She is always right, and the errors are always those of man.

The coward only threatens when he is safe.