If children grew up according to early indications, we should have nothing but geniuses.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheThere is a great difference, whether the poet seeks the particular for the sake of the general or sees the general in the particular. From the former procedure there ensues allegory, in which the particular serves only as illustration, as example of the general. The latter procedure, however, is genuinely the nature of poetry; it expresses something particular, without thinking of the general or pointing to it.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheYou canโt, if you canโt feel it, if it never Rises from the soul, and sways The heart of every single hearer, With deepest power, in simple ways. Youโll sit forever, gluing things together, Cooking up a stew from otherโs scraps, Blowing on a miserable fire, Made from your heap of dying ash. Let apes and children praise your art, If their admirationโs to your taste, But youโll never speak from heart to heart, Unless it rises up from your heartโs space.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe