Gotthold Ephraim Lessing
A single grateful thought toward heaven is the most perfect prayer.Collection: Thankful
For me the greatest beauty always lies in the greatest clarity.Collection: Beauty
The most deadly fruit is borne by the hatred which one grafts on an extinguished friendship.Collection: Friendship
Let us be lazy in everything, except in loving and drinking, except in being lazy.
They make glorious shipwreck who are lost in seeking worlds.
A heretic is a man who sees with his own eyes.
It is not the truth that a man possesses, or believes that he possesses, but the earnest effort which he puts forward to reach the truth, which constitutes the worth of a man.
He who doesn't lose his wits over certain things has no wits to lose.
Think wrongly, if you please, but in all cases think for yourself.
If some things don't make you lose your sense of reason, then you have none to lose.
For the will and not the gift makes the giver.
One can drink too much, but one never drinks enough.
Would that we could at once paint with the eyes! In the long way from the eye through the arm to the pencil, how much is lost!
Absolute truth belongs to Thee alone.
Let the devil catch you but by a single hair, and you are his forever.
To look forward to pleasure is also a pleasure.Collection: Looks
The true value of man is not determined by his possession, supposed or real, of Truth, but rather by his sincere exertion to get to the Truth. It is not possession of Truth by which he extends his powers and in which his ever-growing perfectability is to be found. Possession makes one passive, indolent and proud. If God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left only the steady and diligent drive for Truth, albeit with the proviso that I would always and forever err in the process, and to offer me the choice, I would with all humility take the left hand.Collection: Real
The search for truth is more precious than its possession.Collection: Truth
Nature meant woman to be her masterpiece.Collection: Women
The superstition in which we were brought up never loses its power over us, even after we understand it.Collection: Superstitions
A blush is the sign which Nature hangs out to show where chastity and honor dwell.Collection: Honor
The more we see the more we must be able to imagine, and the more we imagine, the more we must think we see.Collection: Thinking
When the heart dares to speak, it needs no preparation.Collection: Heart
Yesterday I lived, today I suffer, tomorrow I die; but I still think fondly, today and tomorrow, of yesterday.Collection: Thinking
Pleasures, riches, honor and joy are sure to have care, disgrace, adversity and affliction in their train. There is no pleasure without pain, no joy without sorrow. O the folly of expecting lasting felicity in a vale of tears, or a paradise in a ruined world.Collection: Pain
Who cannot resolve upon a moment's notice To live his own life, he forever lives A slave to others.Collection: Forever
A heretic is a man who sees with his own eyesCollection: Wisdom
If the advice of a fool for once happens to be good, it requires a wise man to carry it out.Collection: Wise
The most agreeable of all companions is a simple, frank man, without any high pretensions to an oppressive greatness; one who loves life, and understands the use of it; obliging alike at all hours; above all, of a golden temper and steadfast as an anchor. For such an one we gladly exchange the greatest genius, the most brilliant wit, the profoundest thinker.Collection: Love Life
Did the Almighty, holding in his right hand truth, and in his left hand search after truth, deign to proffer me the one I might prefer, in all humility, but without hesitation, I should request search after truth.Collection: Truth
It is not children only that one feeds with fairy tales.Collection: Children
Borrowing is not much better than begging.Collection: Begging You
The searcher's eye Not seldom finds more than he wished to find.Collection: Eye
The lion is ashamed, it's true, when he hunts with the fox.Collection: Inspirational
It is not I who die, when I die, but my sin and misery.Collection: Death
Joy makes us giddy, dizzy.Collection: Joy
The true vagrant is the only king above all comparison.Collection: Kings
What education is to the individual man, revelation is to the human race. Education is revelation coming to the individual man, and revelation is education that has come, and is still coming to the human race.Collection: Education
Nature intended that woman should be her masterpiece.Collection: Women
What can the Creator see with greater pleasure than a happy creature?Collection: Pleasure
How can such deep-imprinted images sleep in us at times, till a word, a sound, awake them?Collection: Sleep
It is not the truth that a man possesses, or believes that he possesses, but the earnest effort which he puts forward to reach the truth, which constitutes the worth of a manCollection: Believe
Nothing under the sun is ever accidental.Collection: Sun
The most deadly fruit is borne by the hatred which one grafts on an extinguished friendshipCollection: Friendship
The superstition in which we grew up, Though we may recognize it, does not lose Its power over us.-Not all are free Who make mock of their chains.Collection: Doe
Why should not every individual man have existed more than once upon this world? Why should I not come back as often as I am capable of acquiring fresh knowledge? Is this hypothesis so laughable merely because it is the oldest? Because the human understanding, before the sophistries of the schools had dissipated and debilitated it, lighted upon it at once?Collection: School
With a clear sky, a bright sun, and a gentle breeze, you will have friends in plenty; but let fortune frown, and the firmament be overcast, and then your friends will prove like the strings of the lute, of which you will tighten ten before you find one that will bear the stretch and keep the pitch.Collection: Friendship
As the stag which the huntsman has hit flies through bush and brake, over stock and stone, thereby exhausting his strength but not expelling the deadly bullet from his body; so does experience show that they who have troubled consciences run from place to place, but carry with them wherever they go their dangerous wounds.Collection: Running
My God, grant that my bounty may be a clear and transparent river, flowing from pure charity, and uncontaminated by self-love, ambition, or interest. Thanks are due not to me, but Thee, from whom all I possess is derived. And what are the paltry gifts for which my neighbor forgets to thank me, compared with the immense blessings for which I have so often forgotten to be grateful to Thee!Collection: Grateful
Nothing under the sun is accidental, least of all that of which the intention is so clearly evident.Collection: Sun