Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
Karl Wilhelm FriedrichSchlegel, usually cited as Friedrich Schlegel, was a German poet, literary critic, philosopher, philologist and Indologist. With his older brother, August Wilhelm Schlegel, he was one of the main figures of the Jena romantics. He was a zealous promoter of the Romantic movement and inspired Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Adam Mickiewicz and Kazimierz Brodziński. Schlegel was a pioneer in Indo-European studies, comparative linguistics, in what became known as Grimm's law, and morphological typology. As a young man he was...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth10 March 1772
CountryGermany
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel quotes about
Religion can emerge in all forms of feeling: here wild anger, there the sweetest pain; here consuming hatred, there the childlike smile of serene humility.
If the essence of cynicism consists in preferring nature to art, virtue to beauty and science; in not bothering about the letter of things -- to which the Stoic strictly adheres -- but in looking up to the spirit of things; in absolute contempt of all economic values and political splendor, and in courageous defence of the rights of independent freedom; then Christianity would be nothing but universal cynicism.
What men are among the other formations of the earth, artists are among men.
Only he who possesses a personal religion, an original view of infinity, can be an artist.
What do the few existing mystics still do? -- They more or less mold the raw chaos of already existing religion. But only in an isolated, insignificant manner, through feeble attempts. Do it in a grand manner from all aspects with unified efforts, and let us awaken all religions from their graves, newly revivify and form the immortal ones through the omnipotence of art and science.
To disrespect the masses is moral; to honor them, lawful.
Poetry should describe itself, and always be simultaneously poetry and the poetry of poetry.
Laziness is the one divine fragment of a godlike existence left to man from paradise.
All artists are self-sacrificing human beings, and to become an artist is nothing but to devote oneself to the subterranean gods.
One of two things is usually lacking in the so-called Philosophy of Art: either philosophy or art.
When ideas become gods, consciousness of harmony becomes devotion, humility, and hope.
If you want to see mankind fully, look at a family. Within the family minds become organically one, and for this reason the family is total poetry.
Since philosophy now criticizes everything it comes across, a critique of philosophy would be nothing less than a just reprisal.
About no subject is there less philosophizing than about philosophy.