Top 500 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Quotes (2026 Update)
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201. “Only the soul that loves is happy.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

202. “Be always resolute with the present hour. Every moment is of infinite value.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

203. “All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

204. “The important thing in life is to have a great aim, and to possess the aptitude and perseverance to attain it.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

205. “It is said, that no one is a hero to their butler. The reason is, that it requires a hero to recognize a hero. The butler, however, will probably know well how to estimate his equals.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

206. “Good children’s literature appeals not only to the child in the adult, but to the adult in the child.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

207. “The history of mankind is his character.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

208. “When you lose interest in anything, you also lose the memory for it.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

209. “Everywhere, we learn only from those whom we love.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

210. “Without haste! without rest! Bind the motto to thy breast! Bear it with thee as a spell; Storm or sunshine, guard it well.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

211. “When a wife has a good husband, it is easily seen on her face.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

212. “A person hears only what they understand.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

213. “He only earns his freedom and his life Who takes them every day by storm.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

214. “Blood is a very special juice.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

215. “Misunderstandings and neglect create more confusion in this world than trickery and malice. At any rate, the last two are certainly much less frequent.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

216. “Look closely at those who patronize you. Half are unfeeling, half untaught.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

217. “It is said that no man is a hero to his valet. That is because a hero can be recognized only by a hero.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

218. “Great thoughts and a pure heart, that is what we should ask from God.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

219. “On every mountain height is rest.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

220. “Experience is only half of experience.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

221. “Common sense is the genius of humanity.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

222. “Life is the childhood of our immortality.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

223. “We talk too much. We should talk less and draw more.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

224. “Art is long, life short, judgment difficult, opportunity transient. To act is easy, to think is hard; to act according to our thought is troublesome. Every beginning is cheerful: the threshold is the place of expectation.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

225. “The day is of infinite length for him who knows how to appreciate and use it.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

227. “No man learns to know his inmost nature by introspection, for he rates himself sometimes too low, and often too high, by his own measurement. Man knows himself only by comparing himself with other men; it is life that touches his genuine worth.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

228. “A wife is a gift bestowed upon a man to reconcile him to the loss of paradise.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

229. “The soul is indestructible and its activity will continue through eternity. It is like the sun, which, to our eyes, seems to set at night; but it has in reality only gone to diffuse its light elsewhere.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

230. “Fresh activity is the only means of overcoming adversity.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

231. “There is no past we can bring back by longing for it. There is only an eternal now that builds and creates out of the past something new and better.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

232. “The older I get the more I trust in the law according to which the rose and the lily bloom.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

233. “We know accurately only when we know little, with knowledge doubt increases.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

234. “Those that are firm in their will mold the world to themselves.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

235. “Classicism is health, romanticisim is sickness.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

236. “What one doesn’t understand one doesn’t possess.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

237. “Excellence is rarely found, more rarely valued.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

238. “It is the color closest to light. In its utmost purity it always implies the nature of brightness and has a cheerful, serene, gently stimulating character. Hence, experience teaches us that yellow makes a thoroughly warm and comforting impression.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

239. “Night is the other half of life, and the better half.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

240. “Collectors are happy people.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

242. “Too many parents make life hard for their children by trying, too zealously, to make it easy for them.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

243. “For many people, one of the most frustrating aspects of life is not being able to understand other people’s behavior.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

244. “Let us live, while we are alive!”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

245. “I am certain that I have been here as I am now a thousand times before, and I hope to return a thousand times.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

246. “As long as you are not aware of the continual law of Die and Be Again, you are merely a vague guest on a dark Earth.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

247. “Death is Nature’s expert advice to get plenty of Life.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

248. “One lives but once in the world.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

249. “Kindness is the golden thread that holds society together.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

250. “Noble be man, helpful and good!”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe