James > James's Quotes

“Know thyself? If I knew myself, I'd run away.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Nothing shows a man's character more than what he laughs at.”
― Goethe

“I have so much in me, and the feeling for her absorbs it all; I have so much, and without her it all comes to nothing.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther

“Niemand ist mehr Sklave, als der sich für frei hält, ohne es zu sein.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Elective Affinities

“Age does not make us childish, as some say; it finds us true children.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Every day one should at least hear one little song, read one good poem, see one fine painting and -- if at all possible -- speak a few sensible words.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming.”
― Haim G. Ginott, Teacher and Child: A Book for Parents and Teachers

“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Nothing is so strong as gentleness, nothing so gentle as real strength.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“The world is so empty if one thinks only of mountains, rivers & cities; but to know someone who thinks & feels with us, & who, though distant, is close to us in spirit, this makes the earth for us an inhabited garden.”
― Goethe

“Divide and rule, a sound motto. Unite and lead, a better one.”
― Johann wolfgang von Goethe

“We are shaped and fashioned by what we love.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“This is the true measure of love: when we believe that we alone can love, that no one could ever have loved so before us, and that no one will ever love in the same way after us.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing; a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished.”
― Johann wolfgang von Goethe

“People who think honestly and deeply have a hostile attitude towards the public.”
― Wolfgang Goethe

“All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.”
― Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

“All truly wise thoughts have been thought already thousands of times; but to make them truly ours, we must think them over again honestly, until they take root in our personal experience.”
― Goethe

“Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“In all of eternity, no faery born has overcome me in anything.'

Aaah. Pride goeth before the fall, my friend"--Irial stood and clasped Devlin's hand--"but you've already fallen, haven't you?'

And to that, Devlin had no answer.”
― Melissa Marr, Radiant Shadows

“If you don't feel it, you'll never get it.”
― Goethe

“Let mental culture go on advancing, let the natural sciences progress in even greater extent and depth, and the human mind widen itself as much as it desires: beyond the elevation and moral culture of Christianity, as it shines forth in the Gospels, it will not go.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“One never goes so far as when one doesn't know where one is going.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves. ”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I have learned a deep respect for one of Goethe's couplets:
Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it!”
― William Hutchison Murray

“The intelligent man finds everything laughable, the sensible man hardly anything.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“At the moment of commitment the entire universe conspires to assist you.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“Every reader, if he has a strong mind, reads himself into the book, and amalgamates his thoughts with those of the author.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“The greatest evil that can befall man is that he should come to think ill of himself.”
― Goethe

“To be loved for what one is, that is the greatest exception. The great majority love in others only what they lend him; their own selves, their version of him.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“You can’t, if you can’t feel it, if it never
Rises from the soul, and sways
The heart of every single hearer,
With deepest power, in simple ways.
You’ll sit forever, gluing things together,
Cooking up a stew from other’s scraps,
Blowing on a miserable fire,
Made from your heap of dying ash.
Let apes and children praise your art,
If their admiration’s to your taste,
But you’ll never speak from heart to heart,
Unless it rises up from your heart’s space.”
― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust, First Part