All one needs to do is declare oneself free and one will immediately feel dependent. If you dare to declare yourself dependent, you feel independent.

There 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.

Daily life is more instructive than the most effective book.

Hatred is something peculiar. You will always find it strongest and most violent where there is the lowest degree of culture.

Fools and wise men are equally harmless. It is the half-fools and half-wise that are dangerous.

Nothing will change the fact that I cannot produce the least thing without absolute solitude.

Certain faults are necessary for the existence of the individual. We would resent it if old friends were to get rid of certain peculiarities.