Blessed be, the genius who never knew good fortune! Genius in itself already means so much; what meaning does luck still hold for him?

I have long been convinced that my artistic ideal stands or falls with Germany. Only the Germany that we love and desire can help us achieve that ideal.

The whole duty of a conductor is comprised in his ability to indicate the right tempo.

I know absolutely nothing about music.

What Music expresses is eternal, infinite, and ideal; she expresses not the passion, love, desire, of this or that individual in this or that condition, but Passion, Love, Desire itself, and in such infinitely varied phases as lie in her unique possession and are foreign and unknown to any other tongue...So...Here's to Victory, gained by our higher sense over the worthlessness of the vulgar! To Love, which crowns our courage...To the day, to the night!...And three cheers for Music.

Human dignity begins to assert itself only at the point where man is distinguishable from the beast by pity for it.

The purpose of art: to make the unconscious conscious.