Quotes from Goethe

You at -all things considered- what you are. Put on your head perukes with myriad curls, stalk about on foot-high stilts, still what you are, you must always remain.

The likeness of a man is quite independent; everywhere that it stands, it stands for itself, and we do not require it to mark the site of a particular grave. But I must acknowledge to you to having a strange feeling; even to likenesses I have a kind of disinclination. Whenever I see them they seem to be silently reproaching me. They point to something far away from us,—gone from us; and they remind me how difficult it is to pay right honor to the present.

There is no patriotic art and no patriotic science.

There is nothing worse than imagination without taste.

For as human beings who may be well inclined to each other by nature, yet hold more firmly together when the law cements them, so are stones also, whose forms may already fit together, united far better by these binding forces.

Talih onun gö?süne bir ruh koymu? ki Onu hep ç?lg?nca yönetir ara vermeden, Ve acele eden ve hemen buyuransa Atlar yeryüzünün sevinçlerini ve do?an?n yasalar?n?.

So vertraulich, so heimlich hab' ich nicht leicht ein Plätzchen gefunden, und dahin lass' ich mein Tischchen aus dem Wirtshause bringen und meinen Stuhl, trinke meinen Kaffee da und lesen meinen Homer.

?nsan?n ba??na gelebilecek en büyük kötülük kendi hakk?ndaki dü?üncesinin kötü olmas?d?r herhalde.

What we know we do not need; what we need, we know not...

Adam's wife, his first. Beware of her. Her beauty's one boast is her dangerous hair. When Lilith winds it tight around young men She doesn't soon let go of them again.

Eines Tages klopfte die Angst an die Tür. Der Mut stand auf und öffnete. Aber da war keiner.

Before you can do something you must first be something.

Willst du die Blüte des frühen, die Früchte des späteren Jahres, Willst du, was reizt und entzückt, Willst du, was sättigt und nährt, Willst du den Hummel, die erde mit Einem Namen begreifen, Nenn' ich, Sakuntala, dich, und dann ist alles gesagt.

Ein Jahrhundert, das sich bloß auf die Analyse verlegt und sich vor der Synthese gleichsam fürchtet, ist nicht auf dem rechten Wege; denn nur beide zusammen, wie Aus- und Einatmen, machen das Leben der Wissenschaft. 1829, "Analyse und Synthese

Gut verloren – etwas verloren! Mußt rasch dich besinnen Und neues gewinnen. Ehre verloren – viel verloren! Mußt Ruhm gewinnen, Da werden die Leute sich anders besinnen. Mut verloren – alles verloren! Da wär es besser: nicht geboren.

Courage, strength and hope possess my soul…I will stand firmly and without fear.

O Sibyl excellent, enough of adjuration! But hither bring us thy potation, And quickly fill the beaker to the brim! This drink will bring my friend no injuries: He is a man of manifold degrees, And many draughts are known to him.

Life lies before us, as a huge quarry lies before the architect: he deserves not the name of architect, except when, out of this fortuitous mass, he can combine, with the greatest economy and fitness and durability, some form, the pattern of which originated in his spirit.

Aus "Zueignung" Ich kenne dich, ich kenne deine Schwächen, Ich weiß, was Gutes in dir lebt und glimmt! – So sagte sie, ich hör sie ewig sprechen – Empfange hier, was ich dir lang bestimmt; Dem Glücklichen kann es an nichts gebrechen, Der dies Geschenk mit stiller Seele nimmt: Aus Morgenduft gewebt und Sonnenklarheit, Der Dichtung Schleier aus der Hand der Wahrheit.

From early on I have suspected that the so important-sounding task "Know thyself" is a ruse of a cabal of priests. They are trying to seduce man from activity in the outside world, to distract him with impossible demands; they seek to draw him into a false inner contemplation. Man only knows himself insofar as he knows the world - the world which he only comes to know in himself and himself only in it.

Ich ging im Walde so für mich hin, und nichts zu suchen, das war mein Sinn.

Wer Perlen will, der muß ins Meer sich stürzen.

Faydas?z bir hayat, erken bir ölümdür.

When you don't have this dying and becoming, You are only a sad guest on the dark Earth.