Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes About Literature
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Where is the man who has the strength to be true, and to show himself as he is?
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Everyone believes in his youth that the world really began with him, and that all merely exists for his sake.
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To appreciate the noble is a gain which can never be torn from us.
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We can't form our children on our own concepts; we must take them and love them as God gives them to us.
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Good children's literature appeals not only to the child in the adult, but to the adult in the child.
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He who possesses art and science has religion; he who does not possess them, needs religion.
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Self-knowledge comes from knowing other men.
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Superstition is the poetry of life.
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Being brilliant is no great feat if you respect nothing.
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I will listen to anyone's convictions, but pray keep your doubts to yourself.
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Letters are among the most significant memorial a person can leave behind them.
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Objects in pictures should so be arranged as by their very position to tell their own story.
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If one has not read the newspapers for some months and then reads them all together, one sees, as one never saw before, how much time is wasted with this kind of literature.
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A person places themselves on a level with the ones they praise.
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Deeply earnest and thoughtful people stand on shaky footing with the public.
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Go to foreign countries and you will get to know the good things one possesses at home.
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Unlike grown ups, children have little need to deceive themselves.
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Girls we love for what they are; young men for what they promise to be.
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Piety is not a goal but a means to attain through the purest peace of mind the highest culture.
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What is uttered from the heart alone, Will win the hearts of others to your own.
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The coward only threatens when he is safe.
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There is a courtesy of the heart; it is allied to love. From its springs the purest courtesy in the outward behavior.
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It seems to never occur to fools that merit and good fortune are closely united.
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There is nothing in the world more shameful than establishing one's self on lies and fables.
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Divide and rule, the politician cries; unite and lead, is watchword of the wise.
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To hard necessity ones will and fancy must conform.
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Ignorant men raise questions that wise men answered a thousand years ago.
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Upon the creatures we have made, we are, ourselves, at last, dependent.
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I never knew a more presumptuous person than myself. The fact that I say that shows that what I say is true.
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All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.
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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
![](assets/images/authors/27/269/johann-wolfgang-von-goethe-avatar.jpg)
- Born: August 28, 1749
- Died: March 22, 1832
- Occupation: Writer