I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they are to get better.
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
Related
I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is that they must change if...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Whether women are better than men I cannot say, but I can say they are certainly no worse.
GOLDA MEIR Whether women are better than men I cannot say - but I can say they are certainly no worse.
GOLDA MEIR Some things never change, they just get better or worse.
STEVEN MONACO We cannot change trying to be better, it is our nature, but we can change what is important to us an...
JIM GENOVESE All organizations are perfectly designed to get the results they are now getting. If we want differe...
TOM NORTHUP I would say we're OK. I think we can get better. I like the tempo they had out there. I think the gu...
BARRY SMITH We cannot force others to behave differently if they disagree with us; but if we change what we are ...
NABIL N. JAMAL If my best thinking got me into this mess, then I better change it to what I want to get out.
JIM GENOVESE Although I long to get away from the typewriter, if I think I can produce a better opening or a bett...
CATHERINE GASKIN We cannot force others to behave differently if they disagree with us; but if we change what we are ...
NABIL N. JAMAL One of the things I like to imply is that they can change, and they can start right here. They don't...
JANE LARSON That is why I came to conclusion that the election must take place, so that the republic can have a ...
AKHMAD KADYROV People don't vote because they say they never get anything from the politicians, but I want that to ...
ABDUL LATIF I guarantee you it's going to change here, it will change. I believe it's going to get better. I rea...
ED POLAND If Nigeria will change for the better, then we must take responsibility for the changes in Nigeria.
SUNDAY ADELAJA I never say "If I were her, this is how I would have acted, this is what I would have done, etc. etc...
C. JOYBELL C. I cannot say who is better between Messi and Ronaldo. Because they are different players. Both are s...
ROBERT LEWANDOWSKI I want everyone to get their say, whether they say yes or no.
SABRINA DAVIS If you want things to stay as they are, things will have to change
GIUSEPPE TOMASI DI LAMPEDUSA Believe that change can happen, even after overwhelming evidence says things
never seem to get bette...
RICHARD A. MORAN Things will get worse before they get better.
LAUREN DESTEFANO Because things can get better, and if you give them a chance, they usually do.
STEPHEN KING They must say exactly what they saw here. In their reports I want them to tell me that they can impr...
GIDEON SAM To change what you get, you must change who you are.
VERNON HOWARD I think Armin is a better slider, but Georg is a better sled builder. If you combined the two, they'...
TONY BENSHOOF only if it didn't change the meaning of what I had to say.
DEBBIE ROWE They say stay in the lines, but there's always something better on the other side.
JOHN MAYER Something's got to change. We need to get better.
JAMON GORDON If women really wanted to change society, they could do it. I plan to change it. I just want to get ...
ALLY MCBEAL I think it's safe to say that our offense looked good. But we can also safely say we need to work on...
TY BELFORD I want to be clear here: It does not matter what you say in your will or trust; the beneficiary docu...
SUZE ORMAN I want a fair immigration reform. If we don't say anything, nothing will change. We want to protest ...
CARLOS VASQUEZ It is not enough to say that you are upset with something if you don't do anything to change it. If ...
JOHNNY CORN The more open shots they get, the better it is for us. If I can get to the basket and try to get tho...
MARQUIS DANIELS If things change then they will be different, but if they don't then things will stay the same.
PETER GILCREST If you can get students involved, they feel like they belong, and they are going to do better in sch...
MARK ZELLER Tomorrow will be a better day, we shall be safe ...only if we are safe today to reach tomorrow, thin...
OSCAR AULIQ-ICE Support (once they are released) is so helpful its almost the only thing that counts. Sincerity has ...
DARRELL ANGLEN You must constantly ask yourself these questions: Who am I around? What are they doing to me? What h...
JIM ROHN It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and t...
JACOB BRONOWSKI It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and t...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility; they must have action; and th...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and t...
CHARLOTTE BRONTË It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility; they must have action; and th...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE If I can recover the sovereignty, I think Europe will change completely. It will change radically. A...
MARINE LE PEN They say you have to hit rock bottom before you get better. Unfortunately, I hit it on TV.
DANNY BONADUCE We are addicted to our thoughts. We cannot change anything if we cannot change our thinking.
SANTOSH KALWAR They don't have a say. If they don't want to get up, get out of here. We'll get somebody who will ge...
DERECK WHITTENBURG It's a very unique situation. So we are kind of, in some ways, making it up as we go. We are trying ...
JANET PRICE If we can start to say that's not acceptable in town, we can change that culture.
ALICE JACKSON If consumers make better choices, the marketplace will change.
MIKE HUCKABEE Say you're going to close your account unless I get a better deal. In most cases, they will lower th...
DAVID BACH I feel like every year we're going to be there, it's whether we're going to be good enough to win it...
BRIAN HUCKS Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail, no one will say, "She doesn...
CLARE BOOTHE LUCE Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail, no one will say, 'She doesn...
CLARE BOOTH LUCE Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail, no one will say, 'She doesn...
CLARE BOOTHE LUCE Our dilemma is that we hate change and love it at the same time; what we really want is for things t...
SYDNEY J. HARRIS What can they tell us? They cannot give you any strong medicine because they drug test you and when ...
JAROMIR JAGR It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; an...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility: they must have action; and...
CHARLOTTE BRONTë It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquility: they must have action; and...
CHARLOTTE BRONTE If we cannot see things better, we will never make things better. Optimism fueled by passion is alwa...
BRANDON A. TREAN Let us take things as we find them: let us not attempt to distort them into what they are not. We ca...
JOHN HENRY CARDINAL NEWMAN Let us take things as we find them: let us not attempt to distort them into what they are not... We ...
JOHN HENRY NEWMAN Things are always different than what they might be...If you wait for them to change, you will never...
HENRY JAMES Why try to fit in when you were born to stand out?” “I’m nothing special. I’m drowning,” I...
IF I WAKE I’d scream, but I have no voice. The bullies stole it from me
IF I WAKE You said I don’t exist in one life. What if each of these lives are designed to teach you a lesson...
IF I WAKE I’m William James Carter. My friends call me Will,” he says. “I’m Lucy Janette Phillips,” ...
IF I WAKE She has a long journey ahead of her. She doesn’t need to hear she will lose before she even begins
IF I WAKE Artists, whether they're Tom Cruise or John Waters or Ron Howard or Oliver Stone, you can empowe...
BRIAN GRAZER To change and change for the better are two different things
PROVERB We cannot eliminate bird flu in our poultry flocks in 2006 because we haven't been able yet to chang...
HOANG VAN NAM When adults say, "Teenagers think they are invincible" with that sly, stupid smile on their faces, t...
JOHN GREEN When adults say, 'Teenagers think they are invincible' with that sly, stupid smile on their faces, t...
JOHN GREEN I want them to get the basic concepts: What is soil? How is it important? How does it change? If the...
AMY PRICE I'm comfortable with what they are doing and where they are at, ... Obviously things change if Vince...
GREG DAVIS I think it shows demand is better than expected. If they can get a premium elsewhere, why would they...
JESSE TOPRAK We will have coaches come and go. The better coaches we bring in, the more guys will end up leaving....
MARK FARLEY To change and to change for the better are two different things.
GERMAN PROVERB They say it's the woman's prerogative to change her mind. But that's wrong. Guys are the one who get...
HOLLY SCHINDLER People don't say what they mean very often. You have to read between the lines of their behavior, of...
M.C. FRANK I always say the greats just get better.
RANDY JACKSON You can't govern against the people. One must have the humility to say: If the text is being misunde...
NADINE MORANO I want to say to the world:you must try to get an education because it is very important. If the new...
MALALA YOUSAFZAI Change. Change. Change. Change … change. Change. Chaaange. When you say words a lot they don't mea...
NEIL GAIMAN I'm gullible. I think people mean what they say.
COLIN TREVORROW I am, as they say, the classic starving artist.
CHERYL STRAYED We have to be able to criticise what we love, to say what we have to say 'cause if your not tryi...
ANI DIFRANCO IF SOMEONE KEEPS DOING WHAT THEY'RE DOING
THEY WILL GET BETTER AT IT,
BUT....
THEY ...
QWANA REYNOLDS-FRASIER One of the great things about music is that you can really help other people through rough times. If...
JT WOODRUFF They say I'm a revolutionary, but they're all wrong.
RALPH BAKSHI They say miracles are past.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Sometimes I think people get into trouble because they can't say what they want to.
QUENTIN BLAKE If you have aphasia, going to the store is a nightmare. If you have to ask for something, if you hav...
JOAN PETERS Because I am a woman, I must make unusual efforts to succeed. If I fail, no one will say, "She doesn...
CLARE BOOTHE LUCE If the margins are not improved [at AT&T Broadband] then there is more justification for Comcast to ...
PAT COMACK We're coming or you whether the Muggles like it or not, you can't miss the World Cup, only Mum and D...
J.K. ROWLING
More Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG To do just the opposite is also a form of imitation.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG With most men, unbelief in one thing springs from blind belief in another.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer t...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG One's first step in wisdom is to question everything - and one's last is to come to terms with every...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG With most people unbelief in one thing is founded upon blind belief in another.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinions at all.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Don't judge a man by his opinions, but what his opinions have made of him.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG What a blessing it would be if we could open and shut our ears as easily as we open and shut our eye...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG There are people who think that everything one does with a serious face is sensible.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The worst thing you can possibly do is worrying and thinking about what you could have done.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The proof that man is the noblest of all creatures is that no other creature has ever denied it.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Perhaps in time the so-called Dark Ages will be thought of as including our own.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG One of the greatest creations of the human mind is the art of reviewing books without having read th...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG He who is in love with himself has at least this advantage - he won't encounter many rivals.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG First there is a time when we believe everything, then for a little while we believe with discrimina...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Everyone is a genius at least once a year; a real genius has his original ideas closer together.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG A book is a mirror; if an ass peers into it, you can not expect an apostle to peer out.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG When a book and a head collide and there is a hollow sound, is it always from the book?
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG What a blessing it would be if we could open and shut our ears as easily as we open and shut our mou...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG An hour-glass is a reminder not only of time's quick flight, but also of the dust to which we must a...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Some men come by the name of genius in the same way as an insect comes by the name of centipede - no...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The man was such an intellectual he was of almost no use.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nothing is more conductive to peace of mind than not having any opinions at all.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG God created man in His own image, says the Bible; philosophers reverse the process: they create God ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The sure conviction that we could if we wanted to is the reason so many good minds are idle.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The thoughts written on the walls of madhouses by their inmates might be worth publicizing.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG I cannot stop thinking that I died before I was born and that at my death I will return to the same ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG A book is a mirror: If an ass peers into it, you can't expect an apostle to look out
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered a...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG What most clearly characterizes true freedom and its true employment is its misemployment.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG It is we who are the measure of what is strange and miraculous: if we sought a universal measure the...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The noble simplicity in the works of nature only too often originates in the noble shortsightedness ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Many a man who is willing to be shot for his belief in a miracle would have doubted, had he been pre...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG You can make a good living from soothsaying, but not from truthsaying
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG As nations improve, so do their gods
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Most men of education are more superstitious than they admit - nay, than they think
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Those who never have time do least
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG A clever child brought up with a foolish one can itself become foolish. Man is so perfectible and co...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG It often takes more courage to change one's opinion than to stick to it.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Man loves company even if only that of a small burning candle
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG A good metaphor is something even the police should keep an eye on.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Jedermann sollte wenigstens soviel Philosophie und schöne Wissenschaften studieren, als nötig ist,...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The most dangerous of all falsehoods is a slightly distorted truth
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Man loves company even if it is only that of a small burning candle
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG To read means to borrow; to create out of one's readings is paying off one's debts
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The most dangerous untruths are truths moderately distorted.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG If moderation is a fault then indifference is a crime
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG To do just the opposite is also a form of imitation
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Erudition can produce foliage without bearing fruit.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is that they must change if...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG After all, is our idea of God anything more than personified incomprehensibility?
{Said i...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Aujourd'hui, on cherche partout à répandre le savoir; qui sait si, dans quelques siècles, il n'y ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The drive to propagate our race has also propagated a lot of other things
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG One's first step in wisdom is to question everything - and one's last is to come to terms with every...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG We say that someone occupies an official position, whereas it is the official position that occupies...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG It not seldom happens that in the purposeless rovings and wanderings of the imagination we hunt down...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The most dangerous of all falsehoods is a slightly distorted truth.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG The highest level than can be reached by a mediocre but experienced mind is a talent for uncovering ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG In the weak, lack of strength to defend oneself passes over into complaining. This can be observed i...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG There are people who possess not so much genius as a certain talent for perceiving the desires of th...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG For the loss of those we have loved there is no alleviation but time and carefully and rationally ch...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG He who is enamoured of himself will at least have the advantage of being inconvenienced by few rival...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Sometimes we know a person better than we can say, or at least than we do say.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG En la naturaleza no hay palabras, solamente iniciales. Al releer las nuevas "palabras", descubrimos ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nothing is more inimical to the progress of science than the belief that we know what we do not yet ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG It requires no especially great talent to write in such a way that another will be very hard put to ...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG We say that someone occupies an official position, whereas it is the official position that occupies...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG It makes a great difference by what path we come to a knowledge of certain things. If we begin in ou...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nothing makes one old so quickly as the ever-present thought that one is growing older
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Every condition of the soul has its own sign and expression...So you will see how hard it is to seem...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Just as there are polysyllabic words that say very little, so there are also monosyllabic words of i...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG In his Comedy, Dante Alighieri names Virgil, with many tokens of respect, as his teacher, and...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG To make clever people believe we are what we are not is in most instances harder than really to beco...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG You can make a good living from soothsaying but not from truthsaying
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG You believe I run after the strange because I do not know the beautiful; no, it is because you do no...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG If countries were named after the words you first hear when you go there, England would have to be c...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG I forget most of what I read, just as I do most of what I have eaten, but I know that both contribut...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Whenever he composes a critical review, I have been told, he gets an enormous erection.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG There are very many people who read simply to prevent themselves from thinking.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG No es que los oráculos hayan dejado de hablar, sino que los hombres han dejado de escucharlos.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG When a book and a head collide and a hollow sound is heard, must it always have come from the book?
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG What I do not like about our definitions of genius is that there is in them nothing of the day of ju...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG To make a vow is a greater sin than to break one.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Some people read because they are too lazy to think.
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Man…who lives in three places – in the past, in the present, and in the future – can be unhapp...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG Când ai de facut o lucrare, nu te gândi mereu la întregimea ei; executa fragmentul pe care-l ai �...
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG We say that someone occupies an official position, whereas it is the official position that occupies...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There are very many people who read simply to prevent themselves from thinking.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Do we write books so that they shall merely be read? Don't we also write them for employment in the ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A vacuum of ideas affects people differently than a vacuum of air, otherwise readers of books would ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG People who never have any time on their hands are those who do the least.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Theologians always try to turn the Bible into a book without common sense.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG As I take up my pen I feel myself so full, so equal to my subject, and see my book so clearly before...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Nowadays three witty turns of phrase and a lie make a writer.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The sure conviction that we could if we wanted to is the reason so many good minds are idle.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Man is a masterpiece of creation if for no other reason than that, all the weight of evidence for de...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG What most clearly characterizes true freedom and its true employment is its misemployment.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfe...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A man is never more serious than when he praise himself.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG So-called professional mathematicians have, in their reliance on the relative incapacity of the rest...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG As the few adepts in such things well know, universal morality is to be found in little everyday pen...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered a...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG To err is human also in so far as animals seldom or never err, or at least only the cleverest of the...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I have remarked very clearly that I am often of one opinion when I am lying down and of another when...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Man is a gregarious animal and much more so in his mind than in his body. A golden rule; judge men n...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG We accumulate our opinions at an age when our understanding is at its weakest.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG We cannot remember too often that when we observe nature, and especially the ordering of nature, it ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG We often have need of a profound philosophy to restore to our feelings their original state of innoc...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If this is philosophy it is at any rate a philosophy that is not in its right mind.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Once we know our weaknesses they cease to do us any harm.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG In each of us there is a little of all of us.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I am convinced we do not only love ourselves in others but hate ourselves in others too.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The fly that does not want to be swatted is safest if it sits on the fly-swat.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG We are obliged to regard many of our original minds as crazy at least until we have become as clever...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG I believe that man is in the last resort so free a being that his right to be what he believes himse...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG To grow wiser means to learn to know better and better the faults to which this instrument with whic...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There are people who believe everything is sane and sensible that is done with a solemn face.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If you are going to build something in the air it is always better to build castles than houses of c...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Many things about our bodies would not seem to us so filthy and obscene if we did not have the idea ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The proof that man is the noblest of all creatures is that no other creature has ever denied it.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Erudition can produce foliage without bearing fruit.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Nothing can contribute more to peace of soul than the lack of any opinion whatever.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If moderation is a fault, then indifference is a crime.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is in the gift for employing all the vicissitudes of life to one's own advantage and to that of o...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Rational free spirits are the light brigade who go on ahead and reconnoiter the ground which the hea...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG First there is a time when we believe everything, then for a little while we believe with discrimina...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG With most people disbelief in a thing is founded on a blind belief in some other thing.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG With the majority of people unbelief in one thing is founded on the blind belief in another.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Delight at having understood a very abstract and obscure system leads most people to believe in the ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Some theories are good for nothing except to be argued about.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A good metaphor is something even the police should keep an eye on.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG With a pen in my hand I have successfully stormed bulwarks from which others armed with sword and ex...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If another Messiah was born he could hardly do so much good as the printing-press.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A book is a mirror; if an ass peers into it, you can not expect an apostle to peer out.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG To be content with life -- or to live merrily, rather --all that is required is that we bestow on al...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There were honest people long before there were Christians and there are, God be praised, still hone...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A person reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Affectation is a very good word when someone does not wish to confess to what he would none the less...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Ideas too are a life and a world.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Cautiousness in judgment is nowadays to be recommended to each and every one: if we gained only one ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If we make a couple of discoveries here and there we need not believe things will go on like this fo...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The American who first discovered Columbus made a bad discovery.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If all mankind were suddenly to practice honesty, many thousands of people would be sure to starve.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG What is the good of drawing conclusions from experience? I don't deny we sometimes draw the right co...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Of all the inventions of man I doubt whether any was more easily accomplished than that of a Heaven.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There are people who possess not so much genius as a certain talent for perceiving the desires of th...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If all else fails, the character of a man can be recognized by nothing so surely as by a jest which ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG That man is the noblest creature may also be inferred from the fact that no other creature has yet c...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG What is called an acute knowledge of human nature is mostly nothing but the observer's own weaknesse...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is hardly to be believed how spiritual reflections when mixed with a little physics can hold peop...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG He who is in love with himself has at least this advantage -- he won't encounter many rivals.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Even truth needs to be clad in new garments if it is to appeal to a new age.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG What I do not like about our definitions of genius is that there is in them nothing of the day of ju...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Everyone is a genius at least once a year; a real genius has his original ideas closer together.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A clever child brought up with a foolish one can itself become foolish. Man is so perfectible and co...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If there were only turnips and potatoes in the world, someone would complain that plants grow the wr...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Food probably has a very great influence on the condition of men. Wine exercises a more visible infl...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The journalists have constructed for themselves a little wooden chapel, which they also call the Tem...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG One cannot demand of a scholar that he show himself a scholar everywhere in society, but the whole t...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG People often become scholars for the same reason they become soldiers: simply because they are unfit...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There is no more important rule of conduct in the world than this: attach yourself as much as you ca...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The most perfect ape cannot draw an ape; only man can do that; but, likewise, only man regards the a...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Here take back the stuff that I am, nature, knead it back into the dough of being, make of me a bush...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The most dangerous untruths are truths slightly distorted.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The most successful tempters and thus the most dangerous are the deluded deluders.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Once the good man was dead, one wore his hat and another his sword as he had worn them, a third had ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is almost everywhere the case that soon after it is begotten the greater part of human wisdom is ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG To do the opposite of something is also a form of imitation, namely an imitation of its opposite.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG A handful of soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Be wary of passing the judgment: obscure. To find something obscure poses no difficulty: elephants a...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Man is always partial and is quite right to be. Even impartiality is partial.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If people should ever start to do only what is necessary millions would die of hunger.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is a question whether, when we break a murderer on the wheel, we do not fall into the error a chi...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG He who says he hates every kind of flattery, and says it in earnest, certainly does not yet know eve...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Before we blame we should first see whether we cannot excuse.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The pleasures of the imagination are as it were only drawings and models which are played with by po...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG We can see nothing whatever of the soul unless it is visible in the expression of the countenance; o...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is no great art to say something briefly when, like Tacitus, one has something to say; when one h...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Astronomy is perhaps the science whose discoveries owe least to chance, in which human understanding...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG Actual aristocracy cannot be abolished by any law: all the law can do is decree how it is to be impa...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG If an angel were ever to tell us anything of his philosophy I believe many propositions would sound ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The most heated defenders of a science, who cannot endure the slightest sneer at it, are commonly th...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG There is no greater impediment to progress in the sciences than the desire to see it take place too ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG It is said that truth comes from the mouths of fools and children: I wish every good mind which feel...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG The greatest events occur without intention playing any part in them; chance makes good mistakes and...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG He was always smoothing and polishing himself, and in the end he became blunt before he was sharp.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG