All ages have said and repeated that one should strive to know one's self. This is a strange demand which no one up to now has measured up to and, strictly considered, no one should. With all their study and effort, people are directed to what is outside, to the world about them, and they are kept busy coming to know this and to master it to the extent that their purposes require. . . . How can you come to know yourself? Never by thinking, always by doing. Try to do your duty, and you'll know right away what you amount to. And what is your duty? Whatever the day calls for.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheVery few people love others for what they are; rather, they love what they lend them, their own selves, their own idea of them.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheIt is not enough to have knowledge; one must apply it. It is not enough to have wishes; one must also accomplish it.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheMan 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.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe