Johann Wolfgang von Goethe citations

Page 6

“C'est lui, l'auteur de Werther et de Faust, et qui s'y connaissait, qui a dit ce mot si juste : J'appelle le classique le sain, et le romantique le malade.”

“Écraser l'innocent qui résiste, c'est un moyen que les tyrans emploient pour se faire place en mainte circonstance.”

“De ce lieu et de ce jour date une nouvelle ère dans l'histoire du monde et vous pourrez dire : J'y étais!”

“Tout ce qui est isolé est mauvais.”

“Aie confiance en toi-même, et tu sauras vivre.”

“À vrai dire, la tolérance ne devrait être qu'une attitude temporaire : elle doit conduire à la reconnaissance. Souffrir autrui, c'est l'outrager.”

“Toute théorie est sèche, et l'arbre précieux de la vie est fleuri.”

“Ce qui importe c'est que l'homme croie; ce qu'il croie est absolument indifférent.”

“Qui ne connaît pas de langues étrangères ne sait rien de la sienne.”

“You often say to yourself in the course of your life that you ought to avoid having too much business, 'polypragmosyne' [incessant activity], and, more especially, that the older you get, the more you ought to avoid entering on new business. But it's all very well saying this, and giving yourself andothers good advice. The very fact of growing older means taking up a new business; all our circumstances change, and we must either stop doing anything at all or else willing and consciously take on the new role we have to play on life’s stage.”

“I feel I'm happily inspired now on Classical soil:
The Past and Present speak louder, more charmingly.
Here, as advised, I leaf through the works of the Ancients
With busy hands, and, each day, with fresh delight.
But at night Love keeps me busy another way:
I become half a scholar but twice as contented.
And am I not learning, studying the shape
Of her lovely breasts: her hips guiding my hand?”

“You’ve only got to grow old to be more lenient; I see no fault committed of which I too haven’t been guilty.”

“Translators are like busy match-makers: they sing the praises of some half-veiled beauty, and extol her charms, and arouse an irresistible longing for the original.”

“What's it to you if I love you?”

“Of freedom and of life he only is deserving
Who every day must conquer them anew.”

“Patriotism ruins history.”

“He who seizes the right moment is the right man.”

“Wie viele Sprachen du sprichst, sooft mal bist du Mensch.”

“The child’s desire to have distinctions made in his ideas grew stronger every day. Having learned that things had names, he wished to hear the name of every thing supposing that there could be nothing which his father did not know. He often teased him with his questions, and caused him to inquire concerning objects which, but for this, he would have passed without notice. Our innate tendency to pry into the origin and end of things was likewise soon developed in the boy. When he asked whence came the wind, and whither went the flame, his father for the first time truly felt the limitation of his own powers, and wished to understand how far man may venture with his thoughts, and what things he may hope ever to give account of to himself or others. The anger of the child, when he saw injustice done to any living thing, was extremely grateful to the father, as the symptom of a generous heart. Felix once struck fiercely at the cook for cutting up some pigeons. The fine impression this produced on Wilhelm was, indeed, erelong disturbed, when he found the boy unmercifully tearing sparrows in pieces and beating frogs to death. This trait reminded him of many men, who appear so scrupulously just when without passion, and witnessing the proceedings of other men. The pleasant feeling, that the boy was producing so fine and wholesome an influence on his being, was, in a short time, troubled for a moment, when our friend observed, that in truth the boy was educating him more than he the boy.”

“Art is long, life short, judgment difficult, opportunity transient. To act is easy, to think is hard; to act according to our thought is troublesome. Every beginning is cheerful: the threshold is the place of expectation. The boy stands astonished, his impressions guide him: he learns sportfully, seriousness comes on him by surprise. Imitation is born with us: what should be imitated is not easy to discover. The excellent is rarely found, more rarely valued. The height charms us, the steps to it do not: with the summit in our eye, we love to walk along the plain. It is but a part of art that can be taught: the artist needs it all. Who knows it half, speaks much, and is always wrong: who knows it wholly, inclines to act, and speaks seldom or late. The former have no secrets and no force : the instruction they can give is like baked bread, savory and satisfying for a single day; but flour cannot be sown, and seed-corn ought not to be ground. Words are good, but they are not the best. The best is not to be explained by words. The spirit in which we act is the highest matter. Action can be understood and again represented by the spirit alone. No one knows what he is doing while he acts aright, but of what is wrong we are always conscious. Whoever works with symbols only is a pedant, a hypocrite, or a bungler. There are many such, and they like to be together. Their babbling detains the scholar: their obstinate mediocrity vexes even the best. The instruction which the true artist gives us opens the mind; for, where words fail him, deeds speak. The true scholar learns from the known to unfold the unknown, and approaches more and more to being a master.”

“Nun aber wird der einsichtige Leser, welcher fähig ist, zwischen diese Zeilen hineinzulesen, was nicht geschrieben steht, aber angedeutet ist, sich eine Ahnung der ernsten Gefühle gewinnen, mit welchen ich damals Emmendingen betrat.”

“People have to become really bad before they care for nothing but mischief, and delight in it.”

“It is not enough to have knowledge, one must also apply it. It is not enough to have wishes, one must also accomplish.”

“Ignorant men raise questions that wise men answered a thousand years ago.”

“A man sees in the world what he carries in his heart.”

“Mountains cannot be surmounted except by winding paths.”

“Character develops itself in the stream of life.”

“Wisdom is found only in truth.”

“People are so constituted that everybody would rather undertake what they see others do, whether they have an aptitude for it or not.”

“Difficulties increase the nearer we get to the goal.”

“If you must tell me your opinions, tell me what you believe in. I have plenty of douts of my own.”

“In the end we retain from our studies only that which we practically apply.”

“Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being.”

“The really unhappy person is the one who leaves undone what they can do, and starts doing what they don't understand; no wonder they come to grief.”

“Wherever a man may happen to turn, whatever a man may undertake, he will always end up by returning to the path which nature has marked out for him.”

“Knowing is not enough; we must apply!”

“The way you see people is the way you treat them, and the way you treat them is what they become.”

“What is not started today is never finished tomorrow.”