Idea for a General History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose (1784), Proposition 6.
...aus so krummem Holze, als woraus der Mensch gemacht ist, kann nichts ganz Gerades gezimmert werden.
Original text (German)
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Notes from Wikiquote
Never a straight thing was made from the crooked timber of man. | Out of wood so crooked and perverse as that which man is made of, nothing absolutely straight can ever be wrought. | From such crooked wood as man is made of, nothing perfectly straight can be built. | Nothing straight can be constructed from such warped wood as that which man is made of.
Variants
s: Out of timber so crooked as that from which man is made nothing entirely straight can be built.