G. C. Lichtenberg Quotes
Most popular G. C. Lichtenberg Quotes
Health is infectious.
Reading means borrowing.
The most dangerous untruths are truths moderately distorted.
To me the most entertaining surface on earth is the human face.
Man loves company—even if it is only that of a small burning candle.
Doubt must be no more than vigilance, otherwise it can become dangerous.
A man reveals his character by nothing so clearly as the joke he resents.
Nothing is more conducive to peace of mind than not having any opinion at all.
I forget the greater part of what I read, but all the same it nourishes my mind.
In the world we live in, one fool makes many fools, but one sage only a few sages.
A book is a mirror: if an ape peers into it, you can't expect an apostle to look out.
Never undertake anything for which you wouldn't have the courage to ask the blessings of heaven.
Everyone is a genius at least once a year; a real genius has his original ideas closer together.
What a blessing it would be if we could open and shut our ears as easily as we open and shut our eyes!
I am always grieved when a man of real talent dies, for the world needs such men more than heaven does.
Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer together.
People often become scholars for the same reason they become soldiers: simply because they are unfit for any other station.
Perseverance can lend the appearance of dignity and grandeur to many actions, just as silence in company affords wisdom and apparent intelligence to a stupid person.
He was then in his fifty-fourth year, when even in the case of poets, reason and passion begin to discuss a peace treaty and usually conclude it not very long afterwards.
To receive applause for works which do not demand all our powers hinders our advance towards a perfecting of our spirit. It usually means that thereafter we stand still.
I made the journey to knowledge like dogs who go for walks with their masters, a hundred times forward and backward over the same territory; and when I arrived I was tired.
Just as we outgrow a pair of trousers, we outgrow acquaintances, libraries, principles, etc., at times before they're worn out and at times—and this is the worst of all—before we have new ones.
There were honest people long before there were Christians and there are, God be praised, still honest people where there are no Christians. It could therefore easily be possible that people are Christians because true Christianity corresponds to what they would have been even if Christianity did not exist.
If nature be regarded as the teacher and we poor human beings as her pupils, the human race presents a very curious picture. We all sit together at a lecture and possess the necessary principles for understanding it, yet we always pay more attention to the chatter of our fellow students than to the lecturer's discourse.
I am always grieved when a man of real talent dies. The world needs such men more than Heaven does.
