The French Revolution, Fichte's Theory of Knowledge, and Goethe's Wilhelm Meister are the three greatest tendencies of the age. Whoever takes offence at this combination, and whoever does not consider a revolution important unless it is blatant and palpable, has not yet risen to the lofty and broad vantage point of the history of mankind.

Life is writing. The sole purpose of mankind is to engrave the thoughts of divinity onto the tablets of nature.

One should have wit, but not wish to have it; otherwise there will be witticism, the Alexandrian style of wit.

Most thoughts are only profiles of thoughts. They must be inverted and synthesized with their antipodes. Thus many philosophical writings become very interesting which would not have been so otherwise.

An aphorism ought to be entirely isolated from the surrounding world like a little work of art and complete in itself like a hedgehog.

Like Leibniz's possible worlds, most men are only equally entitled pretenders to existence. There are few existences.

In England, wit is at least a profession, if not an art. everything becomes professional there, and even the rogues of that islandare pedants. So are the "wits" there too. They introduce into reality absolute freedom whose reflection lends a romantic and piquant air to wit, and thus they live wittily; hence their talent for madness. They die for their principles.