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Man is a creative retrospection of nature upon itself.

Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

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Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
Age: 57 †
Born: 1772
Born: January 1
Died: 1829
Died: January 11
Art Theorist
Editor
Historian
Literary Critic
Literary Theorist
Novelist
Philosopher
Poet
Translator
University Teacher
Writer
Hanover
Germany
Karl Friedrich von Schlegel
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
Friedrich von Schlegel
Friedrich Karl Wilhelm von Schlegel
Creative
Literature
Upon
Nature
Men
Retrospection

More quotes by Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

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We do not see God, but everywhere we see something divine first and most typically in the center of a reasonable man, in the depth of a living human product. You can directly feel and think nature, the universe, but not the Godhead. Only the man among men can poetize and think divinely and live with religion.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Kant introduced the concept of the negative into philosophy. Would it not also be worthwhile to try to introduce the concept of the positive into philosophy?
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Every form of life is in its origin not natural, but divine and human for it must spring from love, just as there can be no reason without spirit.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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The whole history of modern poetry is a continuous commentary on the short text of philosophy: every art should become science, and every science should become art poetry and philosophy should be united.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Even a friendly conversation which cannot be at any given moment be broken off voluntarily with complete arbitrariness has something illiberal about it. An artist, however, who is able and wants to express himself completely, who keeps nothing to himself and would wish to say everything he knows, is very much to be pitied.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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The following are the universally fundamental laws of literary communication: 1. one must have something to communicate 2. one must have someone to whom to communicate it 3. one must really communicate it, not merely express it for oneself alone. Otherwise it would be more to the point to remain silent.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Just as a child is really a thing that wants to become a man, so is the poem an object of nature that wants to become an object ofart.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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To disrespect the masses is moral to honor them, lawful.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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I have expressed some ideas that point to the center I have saluted the dawn in my way, from my point of view. He who knows the way should do the same, in his way, and from his point of view.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Form your life humanly, and you have done enough: but you will never reach the height of art and the depth of science without something divine.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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As the ancient commander addressed his soldiers before battle, so should the moralist speak to men in the struggle of the era.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Wit is absolutely sociable spirit or aphoristic genius.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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It is as deadly for a mind to have a system as to have none. Therefore it will have to decide to combine both.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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One has only as much morality as one has philosophy and poetry.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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The naive is what is or appears to be natural, individual, or classical to the point of irony or to the point of continuous alternation of self-creation and self-destruction. If it is only instinct, then it is childlike, childish, or silly if it is only intention, it becomes affectation.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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The obsession with moderation is the spirit of castrated narrow-mindedness.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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If you want to see mankind fully, look at a family. Within the family minds become organically one, and for this reason the family is total poetry.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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What is called good society is usually nothing but a mosaic of polished caricatures.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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Many a witty inspiration is like the surprising reunion of befriended thoughts after a long separation.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
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The subject of history is the gradual realization of all that is practically necessary.
Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel