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.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich SchlegelAn artist is he who has his center within himself. He who lacks this must choose a particular leader and mediator outside of himself, not forever, however, but only at first. For man cannot exist without a living center, and if he does not have it within himself, he may seek it only in a human being. Only a human being and his center can stimulate and awaken that of another.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich SchlegelThere are writers in Germany who drink the Absolute like water; and there are books in which even the dogs make references to the Infinite.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich SchlegelOne of the two is almost always a prevailing tendency of every author: either not to say some things which certainly should be said, or to say many things which did not need to be said. The first is the original sin of synthetic natures, the latter of analytical natures.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel