Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe Quotes

Yet here I stand poor fool what more, not one wit wiser than before.

The fine emotions whence our lives we mold Lie in the earthly tumult dumb and cold.

My worthy friend, gray are all theories And green alone Life's golden tree.

Sing it not in mournful numbers.

In society every man is taken for what he gives himself out to be; but he must give himself out to be something. Better to be slightly disagreeable than altogether insignificant.

The rose is wont with pride to swell, and ever seeks to rise.

The angles even Draw strength from gazing on its glance, Though none its meaning fathom may; The world's unwither'd countenance Is bright as at creation's day.

A king there was once reigning, Who had a goodly flea, Him loved he without feigning, As his own son were he!

The close and thoughtful observer more and more learns to recognize his limitations. He realizes that with the steady growth of knowledge more and more new problems keep on emerging.

Everything has been thought of before, but the problem is to think of it again.

Art is constitutive-the artist determines beauty. He does not take it over.

Toleration ought in reality to be merely a transitory mood. It must lead to recognition. To tolerate is to affront.

If I say to the moment: 'Stay now! You are so beautiful'!

I wish the crowd to feel itself well treated, Especially since it lives and lets me live.

Art will always be art.

True works of art are a manifestation of the higher laws of nature.

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

The best benefit we derive from history is the enthusiasm it excites.

The one who acts is always without conscience; nobody has a conscience but the contemplative person.

One of the most striking signs of the decay of art is the intermixing of different genres.

The most congenial social occasions are those ruled by cheerful deference of each for all.

At the end of life thoughts hitherto impossible come to the collected mind, like good spirits which let themselves down from the shining heights of the past.

Talent is nurtured in solitude; character is formed in the stormy billows of the world. [Ger., Es bildet ein talent sich in der Stille, Sich ein Charakter in dem Strom der Welt.]

It is better to do the smallest thing in the world than to hold half an hour to be too small a thing.

Accepting good advice means nothing other than to strengthen one's own ability.

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

Man errs as long as he strives.

Help me to discover Thy truth, O Lord, and preserve me from those who have already found it

My poor head is in such a whirl, my mind is all in bits.

On every mountain height is rest.

The phrases that men hear or repeat continually, end by becoming convictions and ossify the organs of intelligence.

The best genius is that which absorbs and assimilates everything without doing the least violence to its fundamental destiny.

We are the slaves of objects around us, and appear little or important according as these contract or give us room to expand.

The highest problem of any art is to cause by appearance the illusion of a higher reality.

First let a man teach himself, and then he will be taught by others.

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

It has been said that figures rule the world. Maybe. But I am sure that figures show us whether it is being ruled well or badly.

Our mistakes and failures are always the first to strike us, and outweigh in our imagination what we have accomplished and attained.

Man would not be the finest creature in the world if he were not too fine for it.

I never believed in trying to do anything. Whatever I set out to do I found I had already accomplished.

These auspicious aspects, which the astrologers subsequently interpreted for me, may have been the causes of my preservation.

Never let a day pass without looking at some perfect work of art, hearing some great piece of music and reading, in part, some great book.

Noble be man, helpful and good!

Every decided colour does a certain violence to the eye, and forces the organ to opposition.

Could we perfect human nature, we might also expect a perfect state of things.

It is natural to man to regard himself as the final cause of creation.

A noble man is led by woman's gentle words.

The few of understanding, vision rare, Who veiled not from the herd their hearts, but tried, Poor generous fools, to lay their feelings bare, Them have men always burnt and crucified.

The spirit from which we act is the principal matter.

Nothing is good for a nation but that which arises from its own core and its own general wants, without apish imitation of another.