Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes

One does not get to know that one exists until one rediscovers oneself in others.

Whoever wishes to keep a secret must hide the fact that he possesses one.

People should talk less and draw more. Personally, I would like to renounce speech altogether and, like organic nature, communicate everything I have to say visually.

There are men who never err, because they never propose anything rational.

I don't know a greater advantage, than to appreciate the worth of an enemy.

Man is not born to solve the problem of the universe, but to find out what he has to do; and to restrain himself within the limits of his comprehension.

No wise combatant underestimates their antagonist.

How circumscribed is woman's destiny!

Our destiny often looks like a fruit-tree in winter. Who would think from its pitiable aspect that those rigid boughs, those rough twigs could next spring again be green, bloom, and even bear fruit? Yet we hope it, we know it.

I treat my heart like a sick child and gratify its every fancy

Time does not relinquish its rights, either over human beings or over mountains.

To be sure, a good work of art can and will have moral consequences, but to demand of the artists moral intentions, means ruiningtheir craft.

Certain flaws are necessary for the whole. It would seem strange if old friends lacked certain quirks.

A man is really alive only when he delights in the good-will of others.

The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man hardly anything.

All perishable is but an allegory.

Music is so elevated that it is beyond the reach of intellect and there flows from it an influence which is all-potent, and which noone can explain.

Sameness leaves us in peace but it is contradiction that makes us productive.

I am what I am, so take me as I am!.

The finished man, you know, is difficult to please; a growing mind will ever show you gratitude. --Faust 1, lines 182-3

The important thing is not to know more than all men, but to know more at each moment than any particular man.

The greatest piece of folly is that every man thinks himself compelled to hand down what people think they have known.

What you can do, or think you can, begin it.

Man's highest merit always is, as much as possible, to rule external circumstances and as little as possible to let himself be ruled by them.

It is only in misery that we recognize the hand of God leading good men to good.

The ground that a good man treads is hallowed.

When you take a man as he is, you make him worse. When you take a man as he can be, you make him better.

Don't say that you want to give, but go ahead and give! You'll never catch up with a mere hope.

Great possessions and great want of them are both strong temptations.

Love, whose power youth feels, is not suitable for the elderly, just as little as anything that presupposes productivity. It is rare that productivity lasts through the years.

The Christian religion, though scattered and abroad will in the end gather itself together at the foot of the cross.

Let us live in as small a circle as we will, we are either debtors or creditors before we have had time to look around.

One can stand anything except a succession of ordinary days

The greatest difficulties lie where we are not looking for them.

The day is for mistake and error, sequence of time for success and carrying out. The one who anticipates is master of the day.

It is in self-limitation that a master first shows himself.

One should not wish anyone disagreeable conditions of life; but for him who is involved in them by chance, they are touchstones of characters and of the most decisive value to man.

Do not hurry; do not rest.

The world sees only the reflection of merit; therefore when you come to know a really great man intimately, you may as often find him above as below his reputation.

Men are so constituted that every one undertakes what he sees another successful in, whether he has aptitude for it or not.

The suffering may be moral or physical; and in my opinion it is just as absurd to call a man a coward who destroys himself, as to call a man a coward who dies of a malignant fever.

Only the heart without a stain knows ease.

The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never have otherwise occurred...unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.

A stated truth loses its grace, but a repeated error appears insipid and ridiculous.

To be loved for what one is, that is the greatest exception. The great majority love in others only what they lend him; their own selves, their version of him.

Nothing is worth more than this day.

One glance, one word from you gives more pleasure than all the wisdom of this world.

Ye great teachers: listen to what you say!