Quotes from Franz Grillparzer

Jason: Auf Wiedersehn! (Springt von einer Klippe ins Meer)

Unser Wille will oft, weil er muss

If someone were to think that trees are made to support the sky, they would all seem too short.

Mankind is getting smarter every day. Actually, it only seems so. At least we are making progress. We're progressing, to be sure, ever more deeply into the forest.

I know how ingratitude burns, how falsehood tortures, for I have been deceived in friendship and in love; I have learned to lose and to resign myself.

Pity, but never love bestows kind words upon the slave.

My anger thought you too ignoble for my love, and close examination finds you too magnificent, and only equals are joined together smoothly.

Love! Hate! Is there no third?

It's the misfortune of German authors that not a single one of them dares to expose his true character. Everyone thinks that he has to be better than he is.

Love wants to be confirmed with concrete symbols, but recklessness loves instability.

Doubt breeds doubt.

A wise man can and should stand above his times, not so the poet, but he should be their apex.

The uneducated person perceives only the individual phenomenon, the partly educated person the rule, and the educated person the exception.

A woman's passion is not the measure of a man's love.

To test a modest man's modesty do not investigate if he ignores applause, find out if he abides criticism.

The main reason why men and women make different aesthetic judgments is the fact that the latter, generally incapable of abstraction, only admire what meets their complete approval.

At certain times, men regard poetry merely as a bright flame, but to women it was, and always will be, a warm fire.

Women, children, Tyroleans and preachers want to create a new kingdom of God, but the God of their kingdom looks like women, children, preachers, and Tyrolians.

Praised be the good willing women who understand and take part in the fun--the body is an exacting beater, and even the heart is made of flesh.

I understand the phrase "Honor the Women" all too well: the poet has probably a wife of his own, but he prefers to honor another.

Before passing different laws for different people, I'd relinquish myself unto you as your slave.

Poetry, it is often said and loudly so, is life's true mirror. But a monkey looking into a work of literature looks in vain for Socrates.

The ideas of an age are most abundant where they are not crowded by original ideas.

If we notice a few errors in the work of a proven master, we may and even will often be correct; if we believe, however, that he is completely and utterly mistaken, we are in danger of missing his entire concept.