Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe Quotes

A man's foibles are what makes him lovable.

Man can only endure a certain degree of unhappiness; what is beyond that either annihilates him or passes by him and leaves him apathetic

A person hears only what they understand.

Never by reflection, but only by doing is self- knowledge possible to one.

I do not know myself, and God forbid that I should.

Gifts come from above in their own peculiar forms.

What then is your duty? What the day demands.

The Evil One has left, the evil ones remain.

I love those who yearn for the impossible.

Against criticism a man can neither protest nor defend himself; he must act in spite of it, and then it will gradually yield to him.

Science has been seriously retarded by the study of what is not worth knowing and of what is not knowable.

All professional men are handicapped by not being allowed to ignore things which are useless.

One glance, one word from you gives more pleasure than all the wisdom of this world.

It seems to never occur to fools that merit and good fortune are closely united.

Everywhere, we learn only from those whom we love.

And with a measured haste propel
Yourselves from heaven through the world to hell.

The highest happiness, the purest joys of life, wear out at last.

Everything is both simpler than we can imagine and more entangled than we can conceive.

One says a lot in vain, refusing; The other mainly hears the No.

Men in a state of nature, uncivilized nations, children, have a great fondness for colors in their utmost brightness, and especially for yellow-red.

Our wishes are presentiments of the abilities that lie in us, harbingers of what we will be able to accomplish.

I have possessed that heart, that noble soul, in whose presence I seemed to be more than I really was, because I was all that I could be.

The happiest man is the one who finds happiness at home.

Love does not dominate; it cultivates.

A great deal may be done by severity, more by love, but most by clear discernment and impartial justice.

If ever the Divine appeared on earth, it was in the person of Christ.

There are men who love their like and seek it; others love their opposite and follow after it.

There is a courtesy of the heart; it is allied to love. From its springs the purest courtesy in the outward behavior.

Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never spent the darksome hours Weeping, and watching for the morrow,- He knows you not, ye heavenly Powers.

What we do not understand we do not possess.

Where I cannot be moral, my power is gone.

Those who have never seen themselves surrounded on all sides by the sea can never possess an idea of the world, and of their relation to it.

To think is easy. To act is difficult. To act as one thinks is the most difficult.

The new vulcanism is really a daring attempt to connect the present, incomprehensible world to a past, unknown one.

When we have lost ourselves, we have lost everything.

He who can not learn to love must flatter.

One should not search for anything behind the phenomena. They themselves are the message.

Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though 'twere his own.

Each traveler should know what he has to see, and what properly belongs to him, on a journey.

Where a man has a passion for meditating without the capacity of thinking, a particular idea fixes itself fast, and soon creates a mental disease.

Age merely shows what children we remain.

It is unpleasant to miss even the most trifling thing to which we have been accustomed.

A talent is formed in stillness, a character in the world's torrent.

What one has wished for in youth, in old age one has in abundance.

The eternal feminine draws us up.

Beauty can never really understand itself.

Nothing is so hard to bear as a train of happy days

We must be young to do great things.

I let everyone follow his own bent, that I may be free to follow mine.

Time is my estate: to Time I'm heir.

A true German can't stand the French,
Yet willingly he drinks their wines.

Tolerance comes of age. I see no fault committed that I myself could not have committed at some time or other.

Everything we do has a result. But that which is right and prudent does not always lead to good, nor the contrary to what is bad.

Modern poets add a lot of water to their ink.

Every one has something in his nature which, if he were to express it openly, would of necessity give offence.

What is predestination? Answer: God is more powerful and wiser than we are, therefore he deals with us according to his pleasure.

Whoso is content with pure experience and acts upon it has enough of truth.

That which thy fathers have bequeathed to thee, earn it anew if thou wouldst possess it.

Life belongs to the living, and he who lives must be prepared for changes.

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

If nature is your teacher, your soul will awaken.

Nature reacts not only to physical disease, but also to moral weakness; when the danger increases; she gives us greater courage

The things I know, every man can know, but, oh, my heart is mine alone!

Enjoy what you can, endure what you must.

The most happy man is he who knows how to bring into relation the end and beginning of his life.

Man is made by his belief. As he believes, so he is.

Du hast so viele Leben, wie du Sprachen sprichst. (You have as many lives as the number of languages you speak.)

Life's objective is life itself.

Daring ideas are like chessmen moved forward. They may be beaten, but they may start a winning game.

Let your trouble be Light will follow dark Though the heaven falls You may hear the lark.

The credit of advancing science has always been due to individuals and never to the age.

Two things children shall receive from their parents: roots and wings

Enthusiasm is of the greatest value, so long as we are not carried away by it.

He is the happiest man who can see the connection between the end and the beginning of life.

We all of us live upon the past, and through the past we are destroyed.

If you wish a wise answer, you must put a rational question.

Memory extends as far as our self-interest.

Our hands we open of our own free will, and the good flies, which we can never recall.

When two men quarrel, who owns the cooler head is the more to blame.

For those ashamed of him Cupid reserves the bitterest passions.

The written word has this advantage, that it lasts and can await the time when it is allowed to take effect.

Who are you then?"
"I am part of that power which eternally wills evil and eternally works good.

Few men have imagination enough for reality.

It's in the anomalies that nature reveals its secrets.

4Often do I strive to allay the burning
fever of my blood; and you have never witnessed anything so
unsteady, so uncertain, as my heart.

There is a politeness of the heart; this is closely allied to love.

All things transient are but a parable.

Nature knows no pause in progress and development, and attaches her curse on all inaction.

One never goes further than when they do not know where they are going.

Everything is simpler than one can imagine, and yet complicated and inter-twined beyond comprehension.

To witness two lovers is a spectacle for the gods.

The heights charm us, but the steps do not; with the mountain in our view we love to walk the plains.

For the nature of women is closely allied to art

We rather confess our moral errors, faults, and crimes than our ignorance.

Those who make use of devotion as a means and end generally are hypocrites.

We talk too much. We should talk less and draw more.

Your messages I hear, but faith has not been given; The dearest child of Faith is Miracle.

Three things are to be looked to in a building: that it stand on the right spot; that it is securely founded; that it be successfully executed.

It is the strange fate of man, that even in the greatest of evils the fear of the worst continues to haunt him.

You shall abstain, shall abstain. That is the eternal song.