Sowing is not as difficult as reaping.

If you miss the first buttonhole, you will not succeed in buttoning up your coat.

New inventions can and will be made; however, nothing new can be thought of that concerns moral man. Everything has already been thought and said which at best we can express in different forms and give new expressions to.

Doesn't surprise me that Christ our Lord preferred to live with whores and sinners, seeing I go in for that myself.

Experience is only half of experience.

Every man has enough power left to carry out that of which he is convinced.

The sun had, in the meanwhile, sunk behind the Ettersberg. We felt in the wood the chill of the evening, and drove all the quicker to Wiemar, and to Goethe's house. Goethe urged me to go in with him for a while, and I did so. He was in an extremely engaging mood. He talked a great deal about his theory of colors, and of his obstinate opponents; remarking that he was sure that he had done something in this science.