He who serves the public is a poor animal; he worries himself to death and no one thanks him for it.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheIf you miss the first buttonhole, you will not succeed in buttoning up your coat.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheSound and sufficient reason falls, after all, to the share of but few men, and those few men exert their influence in silence.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheThe thinking person has the strange characteristic to like to create a fantasy in the place of the unsolved problem, a fantasy that stays with the person even when the problem has been solved and truth made its appearance.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheHappy is it, indeed, for me that my heart is capable of feeling the same simple and innocent pleasure as the peasant whose table is covered with food of his own rearing, and who not only enjoys his meal, but remembers with delight the happy days and sunny mornings when he planted it, the soft evenings when he watered it, and the pleasure he experienced in watching its daily growth.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe