Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the greatest demand a certain insensitivity which under other circumstances we would call stupidity.


Georg C. Lichtenberg

  Email Quote to Friends   Link to Quote   Create Short URL  Publish Text About This Quote   Share on Facebook, Twitter, and more
  See Recommended Quotes For You

Related

Just as the performance of the vilest and most wicked deeds requires spirit and talent, so even the ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
I like to open for a band as it brings on sort of a challenge and it makes things more interesting. ...
KELLY JONES
Absoballylutely top hole, wot. A and B the C of D I'd say. . . Above and Beyond the Call of Duty.
BRIAN JACQUES
Eros (or call it lust if you will), is like a beautiful, magnificent Afghan Hound! A pure white Afgh...
C. JOYBELL C.
Just as the results of inebriety are most painful to the habitually sober, and just as the greatest ...
STANLEY BALDWIN
We have tears in our eyes
As we wave our goodbyes,
We so loved being with you, we three. ROALD DAHL
Well… er -”
“Expecting a rescue is beyond hope under the circumstances!” Sam Barthoff, ...
CHRISTINA ENGELA
His face spreads into a warm smile. “As a matter of fact, no, I have never slept under the stars �...
J.A. REDMERSKI
What is the Other?" they ask.
The Other is the one who taught me whatI should be like, but not ...
PAULO COELHO
Having mercy is an act of love and a gift of the Holy Spirit.
JAIME CONTRERAS
Under certain circumstances, urgent circumstances, desperate circumstances, profanity provides a rel...
MARK TWAIN
There is no worse discriminator than envy. No worse traitor than envy. Even those who are seemingly ...
C. JOYBELL C.
The heart is deceitful and wicked in everyone; the Holy Spirit changes even the most wretched sinner...
NORM TOMLINSON
Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.
HERMANN WEYL
Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.
MARK TWAIN
We all find joy and radiance and a reason to move on even in the most dire of circumstances. Even in...
ISHMAEL BEAH
Somebody once asked,how can I Love another? The reply he got was,do you love yourself? He replied ye...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN)
And Goodness knows
The Wicked's lives are lonely
Goodness knows
The Wicked die alo...
STEPHEN SCHWARTZ
Are people born wicked, or is wickedness trust upon them?
STEPHEN SCHWARTZ
I know you don't want to hear this but someone has to say it! You are out of control! I mean they're...
GREGORY MAGUIRE
Some things I cannot change, but 'til I try I'll never know.
STEPHEN SCHWARTZ
GLINDA: Well,I'm a public figure now! People expect me to--

ELPHABA: Lie?

GLIN...
STEPHEN SCHWARTZ
it was more like two scared kids huddling in the dark when they knew the monster under the bed wasn'...
LAURELL K. HAMILTON
Measures of policy are necessarily controlled by circumstances; and, consequently, what may be wise ...
JOHN C. CALHOUN
In my mind I compared Elen and Vintel. Next to Elen, Vintel appeared to be no more than a simplemind...
CATHERINE M. WILSON
All Hell is smaller than one pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this w...
C.S. LEWIS
Almost all people have this potential for evil, which would be unleashed only under certain dangerou...
IRIS CHANG
Nuclear, ecological, chemical, economic — our arsenal of Death by Stupidity is impressive for a sp...
JEANETTE WINTERSON
Empathy is the new measurement of everything. It doesn't matter what religion you have, what God you...
C. JOYBELL C.
A man cannot be accurately judged by the things he say, until we are certain about the circumstances...
ORLANDO ANTONIO WALTERS
And men said that the blood of the stars flowed in her veins
C.S. LEWIS
Even of if a certain backlash is unavoidable, we must make the most of the momentous chance with whi...
MOSHE SHARETT
When I'm creating a character, I don't see it so much as playing someone else as just playin...
OSCAR ISAAC
The critical method which denies literary modernity would appear -- and even, in certain respects, w...
PAUL DE MAN
It was because they were two parts of a whole. He did not belong to her. And she did not belong to h...
RENEE AHDIEH
Cease with the displays of false modesty. The entire palace knows about it."
A feeling of warmt...
RENEE AHDIEH
Do you know why I adore roses?" Shahrzad untied the knot of his tikka sash with deliberate slowness....
RENEE AHDIEH
Where were you?" Shahrzad tried to control the tremor in her voice.
"Not where I should have b...
RENEE AHDIEH
As always. As ever. As a rose to the sun.
RENEE AHDIEH
We call on Iran's spirit of responsibility to re-establish cooperation and confidence, without which...
DENIS SIMONNEAU
And of the Witch? In the life of a Witch, there is no "after", in the "ever after" of a Witch there ...
GREGORY MAGUIRE
Forever is a long long time and time has a way of changing things
WALT DISNEY COMPANY
When we put LIVE backwards it spells EVIL, interesting how one word can have two totally opposing me...
GARY F EVANS...
I love you." she whispered into the rough wool of his sweater.
L.J. SMITH
And the Lord spake, saying, "First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin. Then shalt thou count to three,...
MONTY PYTHON
I make mistakes. That's what I do. I
speak without thinking, I act without
knowing. I d...
CANDACE BUSHNELL
The warm sound of her laughter stole through Khalid's skin, heating the coldest reaches of his soul.
RENEE AHDIEH
Self-importance is our greatest enemy. Think about it - what weakens us is feeling offended by the d...
CARLOS CASTANEDA
The best love in the world, is the love of a man. The love of a man who came from your womb, the lov...
C. JOYBELL C.
I'm always highly irritated by people who imply that writing fiction is an escape from reality. It i...
FLANNERY O'CONNOR
Hard to restrain, unstable is this mind; it flits wherever it lists. Good it is to control the mind....
GAUTAMA BUDDHA
You must save what you can of your life; you musn't lose it all simply because you've lost a part.
HENRY JAMES
The days of pioneering, of lassies in sunbonnets, and bears killed with axes in piney clearings, are...
SINCLAIR LEWIS
We pay a price for everything we get or take in this world; and although ambitions are well worth ha...
L.M. MONTGOMERY
In a world in which the common rule which binds and regulates what the general masses feel is underm...
ERNEST AGYEMANG YEBOAH
You can only shove shit under your bed for so long before it starts moving around and wanting to get...
LILI ST. CROW
Gravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love as Einstein stated which is very t...
GARY F EVANS...
Man's sensitivity to the little things and insensitivity to the greatest are the signs of a strange ...
BLAISE PASCAL
Everyone gets dumped and everyone gets hurt and there's karma to love in regards to what you'...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
My dad's quite a conservative person, and he brought me up to be very questioning of the commerc...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I don't think she's a lesbian. I think she just ran out of men. [Charlotte]
SEX AND THE CITY
When you are with the wrong person, who doesn't really love you, all you want is to be adored. I...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I really like the look of the 1950s, lots of suburban Americana influences. I'm 5'4', so...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I am very curvy, so the vintage stores suit me better than most designers. I just can't seem to ...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I have quite a lot of plastic sunglasses. It's just a nice accessory, it adds a final thing, and...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I lived in Greece for about four years of my life, and living there had a huge impact on my life gro...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I love natural beauty, and I think it's your best look, but I think makeup as an artist is so tr...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I think celebrity culture and sexuality in pop music is really important, but I want there to be an ...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I'm not really part of that 'L.A. thing' or that celebrity culture. I'm more like so...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
This obsession with celebrity culture is really unhealthy. I don't want to live my life like tha...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Even when I see a beautiful woman, I think, 'Aw, her life must be amazing.' Everyone does it...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Blonde symbolises sexuality and power - it holds very different connotations. The archetypal star ha...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Love is really my nemesis. I never really allowed myself to indulge in such basic things because I w...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Britney Spears is a big influence. Huge. I think people thought I was joking about that for a long t...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Puberty is a phase... fifteen years of rejection is a lifestyle. [Stanford]
SEX AND THE CITY
I criticized the whole American songwriting industry and the pop side of it and I was bitter about i...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I often take things I find in vintage crawls and hand them to a very good seamstress, who then repli...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I've read every Madonna biography. I've also looked up every pop star to see how they first ...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
Oh my God, she's fashion road-kill!
SEX AND THE CITY
I love you, but I love myself more.
SEX AND THE CITY
Maybe mistakes are what make our fate... without them what would shape our lives? Maybe if we had ne...
SEX AND THE CITY
Desperate Housewives.
SEX AND THE CITY
Sean (while ice-skating with Carrie): I'm guessing it's easier to balance when you're not smoking.Ca...
SEX AND THE CITY
I want you to look at me, connect with me. This is lovemaking, it's not a porno flick. [Maria]
SEX AND THE CITY
I once was broken up with by a guy's doorman. 'I'm sorry Ms. Hobbes, Jonathan won't be coming down. ...
SEX AND THE CITY
I feel like everyone has the right to privacy, even if you're the most famous person in the worl...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
When you are in the studio, you don't have anybody to feed off of; meanwhile, when you are playi...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I am absolutely not a roll-on-stage kind of girl! I would be totally freaked out if I didn't war...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
It's a slippery slope, Carrie. Without boundaries you never know what might happen. [Miranda]
SEX AND THE CITY
the sort of person who'd back Proposition 14.
SEX AND THE CITY
A stud is born! [Stanford]
SEX AND THE CITY
Maybe we should get married.[Charlotte] Alrighty.[Trey]
SEX AND THE CITY
My Zen teacher also said: the only way to true happiness is to live in the moment and not worry abou...
SEX AND THE CITY
Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story.
SEX AND THE CITY
No lady likes to dance or dine, accompanied by a porcupine. Burma Shave.
SEX AND THE CITY
I don't think I'm an instantaneous act the whole world will love in one second - but that...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
What's the big mystery? It's my vagina, not the sphinx! [Miranda]
SEX AND THE CITY
My style icons are Leigh Lezark, Gwen Stefani and Shirley Manson.
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I do have a memo all the time because I need to be guided by something in my life. I'm not relig...
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS
I'm masquerading as an innocent pop star.
MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS

More Georg C. Lichtenberg

Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer t...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Man loves company - even if it is only that of a small burning candle.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
It is a question whether, when we break a murderer on the wheel, we do not fall into the error a chi...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
If people should ever start to do only what is necessary millions would die of hunger.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
If moderation is a fault, then indifference is a crime.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
He who is enamored of himself will at least have the advantage of being inconvenienced by few rival...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Once we know our weaknesses they cease to do us any harm.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Just as we outgrow a pair of trousers, we outgrow acquaintances, libraries, principles, etc., at tim...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Sickness is mankind's greatest defect.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
If you are going to build something in the air it is always better to build castles than houses of c...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Even truth needs to be clad in new garments if it is to appeal to a new age.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
To err is human also in so far as animals seldom or never err, or at least only the cleverest of the...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
A book is a mirror: if an ape looks into it an apostle is hardly likely to look out.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Actual aristocracy cannot be abolished by any law: all the law can do is decree how it is to be impa...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Every man has his moral backside which he refrains from showing unless he has to and keeps covered a...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
The Greeks possessed a knowledge of human nature we seem hardly able to attain to without passing th...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Men still have to be governed by deception.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Perhaps in time the so-called Dark Ages will be thought of as including our own.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
The most dangerous untruths are truths slightly distorted.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Here take back the stuff that I am, nature, knead it back into the dough of being, make of me a bush...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
With most people disbelief in a thing is founded on a blind belief in some other thing.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Man is a masterpiece of creation if for no other reason than that, all the weight of evidence for de...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
He who says he hates every kind of flattery, and says it in earnest, certainly does not yet know eve...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
The most successful tempters and thus the most dangerous are the deluded deluders.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Be wary of passing the judgment: obscure. To find something obscure poses no difficult, elephants an...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Many things about our bodies would not seem to us so filthy and obscene if we did not have the idea ...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
One might call habit a moral friction: something that prevents the mind from gliding over things but...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Erudition can produce foliage without bearing fruit.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
There is no greater impediment to progress in the sciences than the desire to see it take place too ...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
It is almost everywhere the case that soon after it is begotten the greater part of human wisdom is ...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
If all else fails, the character of a man can be recognized by nothing so surely as by a jest which ...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Much can be inferred about a man from his mistress: in her one beholds his weaknesses and his dreams...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfe...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
The most perfect ape cannot draw an ape; only man can do that; but, likewise, only man regards the a...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Prejudices are so to speak the mechanical instincts of men: through their prejudices they do without...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
There exists a species of transcendental ventriloquism by means of which men can be made to believe ...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Doubt must be no more than vigilance, otherwise it can become dangerous.
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
With a pen in my hand I have successfully stormed bulwarks from which others armed with sword and ex...
GEORG C. LICHTENBERG
Nothing makes one old so quickly as the ever-present thought that one is growing older.
GEORG C. 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
Man loves company, even if it is only that of a smoldering candle.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
Reason now gazes above the realm of the dark but warm feelings as the Alpine peaks do above the clou...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
The noble simplicity in the works of nature only too often originates in the noble shortsightedness ...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
A schoolteacher or professor cannot educate individuals, he educates only species.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
Most subjects at universities are taught for no other purpose than that they may be re-taught when t...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
The great rule: If the little bit you have is nothing special in itself, at least find a way of sayi...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
Good taste is either that which agrees with my taste or that which subjects itself to the rule of re...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
The human tendency to regard little things as important has produced very many great things.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
He who is enamored of himself will at least have the advantage of being inconvenienced by few rivals...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
One is rarely an impulsive innovator after the age of sixty, but one can still be a very fine orderl...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
He was then in his fifty-fourth year, when even in the case of poets reason and passion begin to dis...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
We have no words for speaking of wisdom to the stupid. He who understands the wise is wise already.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
He swallowed a lot of wisdom, but all of it seems to have gone down the wrong way.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
Virtue by premeditation isn't worth much.
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
Man can acquire accomplishments or he can become an animal, whichever he wants. God makes the animal...
G. C. (GEORG CHRISTOPH) LICHTENBERG
The worst thing you can possibly do is worrying and thinking about what you could have done.
G. C. (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
I cannot say whether things will get better if we change; what I can say is they must change if they...
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