“The world is a bell that is cracked: it clatters, but does not ring out clearly.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Maxims and Reflections (1833), Maxim 193 (translation by Elisabeth Stopp)

About Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

1749 – 1832

German poet and polymath, author of "Faust".

“Youth is intoxication without wine.”

“When we lack ourselves, we lack everything.”

“But what is your duty? What the day demands.”

“He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.”

“He who knows others is wise; he who knows himself is enlightened.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“The man who asks a question is a fool for a minute, the man who does not ask is a fool for life.”

“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”