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Quotes by German Authors
"Who says I am not under the special protection of God?"
"Man's ultimate concern must be expressed symbolically, because symbolic language alone is able to express the ultimate."
"It is easy to understand that in the dreary middle ages the Aristotelian logic would be very acceptable to the controversial spirit of the schoolmen, which, in the absence of all real knowledge, spent its energy upon mere formulas and words, and that it would be eagerly adopted even in its mutilated Arabian form, and presently established as the centre of all knowledge."
"In action a great heart is the chief qualification. In work, a great head."
"The situation in Iraq is dangerous but the regional situation is also very complicated and precarious."
"All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again."
"Well-meaning, helpful, good-natured attitudes of mind have not come to be honored on account of their usefulness, but because they are states of richer souls that are capable of bestowing and have their value in the feeling of the plenitude of life."
"Who has not sat before his own heart's curtain? It lifts: and the scenery is falling apart."
"There are also two kinds of truths: truth of reasoning and truths of fact. Truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible; those of fact are contingent and their opposite is possible."
"Common to all these types is the anthropomorphic character of their conception of God. In general, only individuals of exceptional endowments, and exceptionally high-minded communities, rise to any considerable extent above this level. But there is a third stage of religious experience which belongs to all of them, even though it is rarely found in a pure form: I shall call it cosmic religious feeling. It is very difficult to elucidate this feeling to anyone who is entirely without it, especially as there is no anthropomorphic conception of God corresponding to it."
"In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality."
"But thus do I counsel you, my friends: distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful!"
"Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone."
"I received your letter of June 10th. I have never talked to a Jesuit priest in my life and I am astonished by the audacity to tell such lies about me. From the viewpoint of a Jesuit priest I am, of course, and have always been an atheist."
"We experience ourselves our thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest. A kind of optical delusion of consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us."
"Quentin Tarantino asked me to work with him but there is no way I am going to do that while Matthew Vaughn is working in film."
"If only these treasures were not so fragile as they are precious and beautiful."
"Goodness means the highest degree of popularity."
"What sort of philosophy one chooses depends on what sort of person one is."
"It's pleasant and bothersome and embarrassing all at once. Especially when you haven't done much and are a celebrity."
"The SS, as such, behaved no more criminally than any other social groups would behave when taking part in political events."
"Soldiers and peasants lived together on friendly terms; they knew each other and their everyday routines, and trusted each other; they shook their heads together over the war."
"Ethics is nothing else than reverence for life."
"One experiments and has to choose always the best results."
"Film is a very, very powerful medium. It can either confirm the idea that things are wonderful the way they are, or it can reinforce the conception that things can be changed."
"For, to be a stranger is naturally a very positive relation; it is a specific form of interaction."
"As I sit down and start to work, I often panic. I stare at the empty piece of music paper. How can I say that my piece will be ready for performance next January when I do not have a recipe for making it happen?"
"I was out of my bed in one second, trembling with excitement, and I dashed to the door and into the adjoining room, where I could watch the streets below from the windows."
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