Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann WolfgangGoethetə/; German: ; 28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German writer and statesman. His body of work includes epic and lyric poetry written in a variety of metres and styles; prose and verse dramas; memoirs; an autobiography; literary and aesthetic criticism; treatises on botany, anatomy, and colour; and four novels. In addition, numerous literary and scientific fragments, more than 10,000 letters, and nearly 3,000 drawings by him exist...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth28 August 1749
CountryGermany
It used to happen, and still happens, to me to take no pleasure in a work of art at the first sight of it, because it is too much for me; but if I suspect any merit in it, I try to get at it; and then I never fail to make the most gratifying discoveries--to find new qualities in the work itself and new faculties in myself.
Thou tremblest before anticipated ills, and still bemoanest what thou never losest.
I always had an aversion to your apostles of freedom; each but sought for himself freedom to do what he liked.
The main thing is to have a soul that loves the truth and harbours it where he finds it. And another thing: truth requires constant repetition, because error is being preached about us all the time, and not only by isolated individuals but by the masses. In the newspapers and encyclopedias, in schools and universities, everywhere error rides high and basks in the consciousness of having the majority on its side.
Lose this day loitering 'Twill be the same old story, Tomorrow and the next, Even more dilatory. Whatever you would do, Or dream of doing, begin it! Boldness has power, genius, and magic in it. Begin it now.
Without haste! without rest! Bind the motto to thy breast! Bear it with thee as a spell; Storm or sunshine , guard it well.
If I work incessantly to the last, nature owes me another form of existence when the present one collapses.
What you have inherited from your forefathers, it takes work to make it your own.
One is never satisfied with the portrait of a person that one knows.
Modern poets add a lot of water to their ink.
Life is but a preparation for what there is to come.
There is nothing new on earth / For a person who lives long and experiences much. / In my years of youthful wandering / I have seen crystallized people.
Those who have no hope for a future life are already dead for the present one.
Experience is only half of experience.