“With regard to himself, Field Marshal Model allowed no compromise and was ruthless, but he was indulgent to the men in the front lines who adored him. He demanded nothing for himself.”

“Field Marshal Model was a bold, inexhaustible soldier, who knew the front well and who won the confidence of his men by his habitual disregard for his personal safety. He had no time for lazy or incompetent subordinates. He carried out his intentions in a most determined fashion. He was the best possible man to perform the fantastically difficult task of reconstructing a line in centre of the Eastern Front.”

“Therefore the Sage embraces the One,
And becomes the model of the world.
He does not reveal himself,
And is therefore luminous.
He does not justify himself,
And is therefore far-famed.
He does not boast himself,
And therefore people give him credit.
He does not pride himself,
And is therefore the ruler among men.
It is because he does not contend
That no one in the world can contend against him.”

“When he drapes himself in silence, as God himself dwells in a great silence, man is close to heaven, or, rather, he allows God to manifest himself in him.”

“Men are so simple, and so subject to present necessities, that he who seeks to deceive will always find someone who will allow himself to be deceived.”

“When a man begins to know himself a little he will see in himself many things that are bound to horrify him. So long as a man is not horrified at himself he knows nothing about himself.”

“…he who seeks to deceive will always find someone who will allow himself to be deceived.”

“He is demanding of his colleagues, but he is demanding of himself because he wants to change things for the better.”

“He who has no poetry in himself will find poetry in nothing.”

“What hurts me the most, personally, is that I still promoted him to field marshal. I wanted to give him this final satisfaction… a man like that besmirches the heroism of so many others at the last moment. He could have freed himself from all sorrow and ascended into eternity and national immortality, but he prefers to go to Moscow.”