I know that we often tremble at an empty terror; yet the false fancy brings a real misery.
The first great law is to obey.
Life is earnest, art is gay.
The hat is the pride of man; for he who cannot keep his hat on before kings and emperors is no free man.
Rarely do we arrive at the summit of truth without running into extremes; we have frequently to exhaust the part of error, and even of folly, before we work our way up to the noble goal of tranquil wisdom.
Truth suffers no loss if a vehement youth fails in finding it, in the same way that virtue and religion suffer no detriment if a criminal denies them.
I speak with the Eternal through the instrument of nature, through the world’s history: I read the soul of the artist in his Apollo.
He, that noble prize possessing He that boasts a friend that’s true, He whom woman’s love is blessing, Let him join the chorus too!
It is through beauty that we arrive at freedom.
What is the short meaning of the long speech?
Man is made of ordinary things, and habit is his nurse.
Courage, ne’er by sorrow broken! Aid where tears of virtue flow; Faith to keep each promise spoken! Truth alike to friend and foe!
Joy, thou spark from Heav’n immortal, Daughter of Elysium! Drunk with fire, toward Heaven advancing Goddess, to thy shrine we come. Thy sweet magic brings together What stern Custom spreads afar; All men become brothers Where thy happy wing-beats are.
The lemonade is weak, like your soul.
O jealousy! thou magnifier of trifles.
Sentimental poetry differs from naive poetry in that it relates the real state at which the latter stops to ideas and applies ideas to that reality.
I feel an army in my fist.
Virtue is no empty echo.
Appearance should never attain reality, And if nature conquers, then must art retire.
Don’t let your heart depend on things That ornament life in a fleeting way! He who possesses, let him learn to lose, He who is fortunate, let him learn pain.
I am called The richest monarch in the Christian world; The sun in my dominion never sets.