A definition of poetry can only determine what poetry should be and not what poetry actually was and is; otherwise the most concise formula would be: Poetry is that which at some time and some place was thus named.

All the classical genres are now ridiculous in their rigorous purity.

A so-called happy marriage corresponds to love as a correct poem to an improvised song.

Irony is a clear consciousness of an eternal agility, of the infinitely abundant chaos.

The subject of history is the gradual realization of all that is practically necessary.

The German national character is a favorite subject of character experts, probably because the less mature a nation, the more she is an object of criticism and not of history.

Every complete man has his genius. True virtue is genius.