Quotes from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A useless life is an early death. [Ger., Ein unnutz Leben ist ein fruher Tod.]

The dangers of life are infinite, and among them is safety.

It is not enough to take steps which may someday lead to a goal; each step must be itself a goal and a step likewise.

Human life runs its course in the metamorphosis between receiving and giving.

God help us -- for art is long, and life so short.

Plunge boldly into the thick of life!

One never goes so far as when one doesn't know where one is going.

Of all peoples the Greeks have dreamt the dream of life best.

On top of the world, or in the depths of despair.

If you've never eaten while crying you don t know what life tastes like.

Every author in some way portrays himself in his works, even if it be against his will.

I can tell you, honest friend, what to believe: believe life; it teaches better that book or orator.

The world is so great and rich, and life so full of variety, that you can never lack occasions for poems.

Superstition is the poesy of practical life; hence, a poet is none the worse for being superstitious.

Those who have no hope for a future life are already dead for the present one.

We lay aside letters never to read them again, and at last we destroy them out discretion, and so disappears the most immediate breath of life, irrecoverably for ourselves and for others.

Woman is mistress of the art of completely imbittering the life of the person on whom she depends.

In the colored reflection we have Life.

If a man or woman is born ten years sooner or later, their whole aspect and performance shall be different.

There is nothing so terrible as activity without insight.

The really unhappy person is the one who leaves undone what they can do, and starts doing what they don't understand; no wonder they come to grief.

By nature we have no defect that could not become a strength, no strength that could not become a defect.

To create something you must be something.

Prudent and active men, who know their strength and use it with limit and circumspection, alone go far in the affairs of the world.