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And less is often more, as Lessing's Prince teaches us.

— Christoph Martin Wieland

Und minder ist oft mehr, wie Lessings Prinz uns lehrt.

Original text (German)

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Source and credibility

Wikiquote does not flag this quote as disputed or misattributed.

Source: "Neujahrswunsch", in Der Teutsche Merkur (January 1774) p. 4; translation from The Quote…Unquote Newsletter (October 1997) p. 3.
Source quality: Precise citation Points to a specific work with a page, chapter, date or similar locator, so you can look it up.

More by Christoph Martin Wieland

Saddle the Hippogriffs, ye Muses nine,
And straight we'll ride to the land of old Romance.

Thou mockest? Tremble! the avenger's lightning bolts do not forever dormant lie.

Man blindly works the will of fate.

The compulsion of fate is bitter.

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Notes from Wikiquote

The phrase "Less is more" was later used by Robert Browning, and by Mies van der Rohe.

More quotes by Christoph Martin Wieland

To do nothing by halves is the way of noble spirits.

What is the world to him now? a vast and vacant space, for fortune's wheel to roll about at will.

An illusion which makes me happy is worth a verity which drags me to the ground.

I have often thought that however learned you may talk about it, one knows nothing but what he learns from his own experience.

Too oft is transient pleasure the source of long woes.

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Attribution

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