Quotations from

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Picture of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German polymath who is widely regarded as the most influential writer in the German language. His work has had a wide-ranging influence on literary, political, Christian views, and philosophical thought in the Western world from the late 18th century to the present. A poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre-director, and critic, Goethe wrote a wide range of works, including plays, poetry and aesthetic criticism, as well as treatises on botany, anatomy, and colour.

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Quotes from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Few people have the imagination for reality.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The intelligent man finds almost everything ridiculous, the sensible man hardly anything.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

There is nothing more dreadful than imagination without taste.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The right man is the one who seizes the moment.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Girls we love for what they are; young men for what they promise to be.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A man can stand anything except a succession of ordinary days.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

To witness two lovers is a spectacle for the gods.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

In art the best is good enough.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Love and desire are the spirit's wings to great deeds.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Everything in the world may be endured except continued prosperity.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

One must ask children and birds how cherries and strawberries taste.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

All theory, dear friend, is gray, but the golden tree of life springs ever green.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The mediator of the inexpressible is the work of art.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

So divinely is the world organized that every one of us, in our place and time, is in balance with everything else.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe