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A teacher who can arouse a feeling for one single good action, for one single good poem, accomplishes more than he who fills our memory with rows on rows of natural objects, classified with name and form.

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Elective Affinities (1809)

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More quotes by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A mathematician is only perfect insofar as he is a perfect man, sensitive to the beauty of truth.

Maxims and Reflections (1833)

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.

Elective Affinities (1809)

I had rather be Mercury, the smallest among seven [planets], revolving round the sun, than the first among five [moons] revolving round Saturn.

Of freedom and of life he only is deserving
Who every day must conquer them anew.

Faust, Part 2 (1832)

Properly speaking, such work is never finished; one must declare it so when, according to time and circumstances, one has done one's best.

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.