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It is as certain as it is strange that truth and error come from one and the same source. Thus it is that we are often not at liberty to do violence to error, because at the same time we do violence to truth.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Age: 82 †
Born: 1749
Born: August 22
Died: 1832
Died: March 22
Aphorist
Art Critic
Art Theorist
Autobiographer
Botanist
Composer
Diarist
Diplomat
Jurist
Lawyer
Librarian
Librettist
Literary
Frankfurt/Main
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Goethe
goethe
johann wolfgang von goethe
joh. wolfg. von goethe
j. w. von goethe
Truth
Error
Certain
Errors
Come
Thus
Time
Source
Strange
Violence
Liberty
Often

More quotes by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Deeply earnest and thoughtful people stand on shaky footing with the public.
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Whenever I hear people talking about liberal ideas, I am always astounded that men should love to fool themselves with empty sounds. An idea should never be liberal it must be vigorous, positive, and without loose ends so that it may fulfill its divine mission and be productive.
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Humans fear reason, but they ought to fear stupidity- for reason can be hard, but stupidity can be fatal.
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I have possessed that heart, that noble soul, in whose presence I seemed to be more than I really was, because I was all that I could be.
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There are but two roads that lead to an important goal and to the doing of great things: strength and perseverance. Strength is the lot of but a few privileged men but austere perseverance, harsh and continuous, may be employed by the smallest of us and rarely fails of its purpose, for its silent power grows irresistibly greater with time.
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For just when ideas fail, a word comes in to save the situation.
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The greatest evil that can befall man is that he should come to think ill of himself.
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We will burn that bridge when we come to it.
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A judge who cannot punish, in the end associates themselves with the criminal.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The mortal race is far too weak not to grow dizzy on unwonted brights. [Ger., Das sterbliche Geschlecht ist viel zu schwach In ungewohnter Hohe nicht zu schwindeln.]
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The day is of infinite length for him who knows how to appreciate and use it.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Nothing is more terrible than to see ignorance in action.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Who never ate his bread in sorrow, Who never spent the darksome hours Weeping, and watching for the morrow,- He knows you not, ye heavenly Powers.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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If you call a thing bad you do little, if you call a thing good you do much
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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The finished man, you know, is difficult to please a growing mind will ever show you gratitude. --Faust 1, lines 182-3
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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He who wishes to exert a useful influence must be careful to insult nothing. Let him not be troubled by what seems absurd, but concentrate his energies to the creation of what is good. He must not demolish, but build. He must raise temples where mankind may come and partake of the purest pleasure.
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Many hammer all over the wall and believe that with each blow they hit the nail on the head.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Where there are no women there are no good manners
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All intelligent thoughts have already been thought what is necessary is only to try to think them again.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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Man knows himself only insofar as he knows the world, becoming aware of it if only within himself, and of himself self only within it. Each new subject, well observed, opens up within us a new organ of thought.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe